Unquenchable Love – Stronger than Death

A SONNET TO LOVE, IT’S ALL WE CAN DO. But how on earth can it come close? Let’s look at the power of love:

“... love is as strong as death,

its jealousy unyielding as the grave.

It burns like blazing fire,

like a mighty flame.

“Many waters cannot quench love;

rivers cannot wash it away.”

~Song of Songs 8:6b-7a (NIV).

Love is beyond life itself. Five minutes of its power says more for life than all the accessorising under the sun. This is where the sum of all its parts pales into insignificance regarding the sole value of love.

There is no hyperbole in this description of love. We know the pungent tug of betrayal—and who hasn’t been betrayed in love? Oh, how crushed we are, unrequited in state. Left “owned” and emotionally marooned. And yet, there still is the issue of the jealous lover; “jealousy arouses a husband’s fury... a man who commits adultery... destroys himself.” The offended husband “will show no mercy.” (Proverbs 6:30-35)

The strength of love, like almost no other, has sparked many a crime. Criminals not, people are “found” suddenly in prison, because of their ‘crime of passion,’ a lover who strayed, a family member betrayed, and so on. And for their unrestrained anger they live with an element of society that is far gone psychologically and morally. That’s a tragedy!

The good news from all this, however, is the “holding” power of love. Love commits us. And it’s this commitment which sees us stay just a little longer, beyond the storms that come.

And such too is God’s love...

Because God’s love is better than life (Psalm 63:3) we see the Divine love as the powerful and anointed food of life. His love is also a jealous love as we see when he fights for our souls; the backslider always must contend with the disciplining love of God in their venturing far from him. This is seen most powerfully in retrospect.

And yet this love of God’s is never far from any of us. His depth of passion and concern is stronger than we could even know. He never lets go.

Jesus is our passionate lover. Such is his love he’ll never forsake us, not the last living one. With a sharp divergence of passion, his love—displayed on the cross—is the symbol of eternity and a caption of eternal love, redeeming us from disconnection from God himself.

His love is an unquenchable, inexhaustible love.

© 2010 S. J. Wickham.