{"id":18694,"date":"2020-03-27T09:32:09","date_gmt":"2020-03-27T13:32:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=18694"},"modified":"2020-03-27T09:32:09","modified_gmt":"2020-03-27T13:32:09","slug":"love-is-stronger-than-death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=18694","title":{"rendered":"Love is Stronger Than Death"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>The Path of Descent<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Love is Stronger\nthan Death<\/strong><br>\nFriday, March 27, 2020<\/p>\n\n\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/OgqYYk-0wDs\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n\n\n<p>The Path of Descent is very real and usually\nvery painful, but something else is equally true. Love is both who we are and\nwho we are still becoming, like a sunflower seed that becomes its own\nsunflower. It seems to be a fully cooperative effort according to St. Paul\n(Romans 8:28), and according to my limited experience too. God never coerces us\ntoward life or love by any threats whatsoever. Yes, God seduces us, but\ncoercion? Never (see&nbsp;Jeremiah 20:7; Matthew 11:28\u201330). Whoever this God\nis, he or she is utterly free. Love cannot happen any other way. Love\nflourishes inside freedom and then increases that freedom even\nmore.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We are all allowed to ride life and love\u2019s wonderful\nmystery for a few years\u2014until life and love reveal themselves as the same\nthing, which is the final and full message of the risen Christ\u2014life morphing\ninto a love that is beyond space and time. God literally \u201cbreathes\u201d shalom and\nforgiveness into the universal air (John 20:22\u201323). We get to add our own\nfinishing touches of love, our own life breath to the Great Breath, and then we\nreturn the completed package to its maker in a brand-new but also same\nform.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I believe the meaning of the Resurrection of Jesus is\nsummed up in the climactic line from the Song of Songs, \u201clove is stronger than\ndeath\u201d (8:6). If the blank white banner that the Risen Christ usually holds in\nChristian art should say anything, it should say: \u201cLove will win!\u201d Love is all\nthat remains. Love and life are finally the same thing, and we know that for\nourselves once we have walked through death.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Love has you.\nLove&nbsp;is&nbsp;you. Love alone, and your deep need for love, recognizes love\neverywhere else. Remember that you already are what you are seeking. Any fear\n\u201cthat your lack of fidelity could cancel God\u2019s fidelity, is absurd\u201d (Romans\n3:3), says Paul. Love has finally overcome fear, and your house is being\nrebuilt on a new and solid foundation. This foundation was always there, but it\ntakes us a long time to find it. \u201cIt is love alone that lasts\u201d (1 Corinthians\n13:13). All you have loved in your life and been loved by are eternal and\ntrue.&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Path of Descent Love is Stronger than Death Friday, March 27, 2020 The Path of Descent is very real and usually very painful, but something else is equally true. Love is both who we are and who we are still becoming, like a sunflower seed that becomes its own sunflower. It seems to be [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18694"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18694"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18694\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18695,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18694\/revisions\/18695"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18694"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18694"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18694"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}