Choosing to Love

This year I've chosen to write a blog post for each of my siblings. While I still have one more sibling to go I'm taking a break to write about another person who's not quite a sibling but is family. Due to the sensitive nature of this post I'm not going to say his name. Those who know him will recognize the story but I hope the rest of you will be able to draw something from it.

I'm going to call this person M, that's not even his initial but it's the one I'm using. M has had an interesting life. As kids we were close. We're not that far apart in age and we usually got along. As M got a little older he got into some bad stuff. Drinking, drugs, etc. It's been hard on our whole family and those who love him. There's no way to sugar coat that.

When I think about the people that have broken my heart the most over the years M is at the top of that list. At different times, myself and others in our family have thought "Okay, this is it, this will be when he turns his life around. This is what it's going to take." And sometimes he has, at least for a while, and then something happens and it feels like we're right back to where we started. Talk about heartbreaking.

Throughout all these years of ups and downs with M there have been countless sleepless nights and heart wrenching sobs. Sometimes I've tried to encourage others in his life and sometimes others have tried to encourage me. We've cried together and prayed together and spent years hoping together that M would be able to turn things around.

Sometimes he stops talking to the people who love him and then it's really scary because you don't always know what's happening. Other times you see glimpses of the real M underneath all the bad decisions and you find hope, then something happens and it feels like it's dashed again.

I'm not going to explain all of M's problems or the circumstances that have led him to this place. I'm not going to try to justify his actions or share my hopes of him coming back to the Lord someday. That's not the point of today's post. The point is that through it all myself and others have had to learn one of, what I believe to be, life's hardest lessons. Choosing to love.

See M isn't perfect, he's hurt lots of people through his choices. Like I said earlier, he's broken my heart too many times to count because of things he's said and choices he's made. Drugs and alcohol don't just destroy the life of the one using them, they can destroy the lives of those who love that person. Obviously my life hasn't been destroyed by M's choices but my heart has been broken. So what do you do when a person you love constantly makes bad decisions?

In this case, when it doesn't put anyone in danger, I choose to love him anyways and still be a part of his life. I've lowered my expectations so I'm not constantly disappointed when he makes poor choices but I don't stop loving him. Sometimes it's difficult because he's not acting very lovable but I choose to love him anyways. Love is more then an emotion, it's a choice and an action and a commandment.

Jesus commanded us to love our neighbors and although M and I don't live near each other anymore I'm still supposed to love him, even when he makes it hard. I do hope and pray that someday he comes back to the Lord and is finally able to deal with his problems and move on with his life but I have no guarantee of that ever happening. And although that breaks my heart I will choose to love him anyways and ask God to give me strength to continue praying for him no matter what.