George1 sat across the table from me in a Chicago restaurant. Nine years ago he had been an elder at his conservative evangelical church when he’d walked away from his wife, Teresa. He told me, “I’m good at starting to love, but really bad at the follow-through.” I thought Teresa would agree. I said, “So you have a love-hate relationship with love. You want intimacy, but you become overwhelmed with the work of love.” George nodded.
I had contacted George on a whim. I’d known him and his wife at the time of their separation and divorce, and I’d been praying for Teresa. I was doing one of our A Praying Life seminars in Chicago and the thought had occurred to me, “Contact George.” He’d texted Teresa out of the blue a couple of times during the year, hinting that he was sick of his life. I wondered if there might be an opening. Two weeks before, unknown to me, Teresa had begun to pray that God would bring godly men into George’s life. When I contacted him, he agreed to meet.
I asked George why he’d left Teresa. He said, “I was overwhelmed by the black hole of her needs. I couldn’t take her demanding spirit and constant criticism.” I knew Teresa would not disagree—God had done a work in her since the divorce. I thought there was no point in beating around the bush: “George, at the heart of love is incarnation that leads to death. Death is at the center of love. It happened to Jesus. It happened to us.”
I took a drink of water and continued. “I discovered this twenty years ago when I immersed myself in the Gospels, the story of Jesus’s life. This understanding of love transformed how I related to people.”
I knew George was puzzled by what I was saying, but I wanted to give him a map for the future. I wanted him to know that there was at least one person in the world who thought it was possible to endure in love. I wanted to give him hope.
I was praying my way through the meeting, unsure of what to say. Sure enough, George asked me, “What does Teresa think of me?” I had nothing to lose, so I said, “George, you lack three things: purity, integrity, and endurance.” He didn’t disagree. He told me that the night before, he’d slept with a woman he barely knew. Though saddened, I was heartened by his honesty. It was a step in the direction of integrity.
Beginning a Journey of Love
George had inhaled the spirit of the age. He’d been chasing his feelings and desires instead of doing the good work of love. His last long-term relationship had broken up, and he’d been devastated. He was alone now, and he hated it.
I wanted George to understand what love looked like, so I said, “Before sleeping with that woman last night, you went on a path with her. The two of you went through a kind of dance. You were both kidding yourselves, but it was still a mini-journey. All of us are on journeys, regardless of whether the journey is characterized by self or love. The Hebrews thought of a life of love not as just a state, but as a path of righteousness, a direction.”2
George leaned toward me as I talked. I sensed that it was providing a new frame for him to think about his
