Without hope or agenda

In the immortal words of the guy from Love Actually,

But for now, let me say - Without hope or agenda - Just because it’s Christmas - And at Christmas you tell the truth - To me, you are perfect - And my wasted heart will love you - Until you look like this.

This past weekend, I got a chance to see everyone’s favorite British romantic comedy, Love Actually, again. I actually started watching the movie when all the individual stories started climaxing–basically, all the moments that make you wish your life was a British, romantic comedy: the little drummer boy’s mad dash through the airport, the Portuguese proposal, the Presidential kiss, etc.–all in about 30 minutes.

One climax, the ’signs’ scene, stuck out in particular. For those of you who haven’t seen the movie, Mark (the guy in the picture), realizes that he is in love with his best friend’s newly-wed wife, Keira Knightley (who wouldn’t be?). When she finds out, he has no choice but to reconcile the matter in the best way possible: with posterboards, a sharpie, and a knock on the door. While the situation Mark’s in isn’t at all the picture of our relationship with God, I still love his attitude here. The only thing he can do is accept his love for her and do so “without hope or agenda.” When he finishes his poster slideshow, Mark doesn’t expect anything in return. I mean, he did get a kiss, but it would have been totally fine with him if he continued walking down the road alone without anyone running after him. What could he do but confess his love?  He embraced the mindset of loving without expecting or even hoping for anything in return.

Leave it to a movie that features a porn star couple (well, they’re just stand-ins for sex scenes) to teach me a little something about love. Actually, I think seeing Love Actually was all part of God’s mission this past week to teach me about being a servant. This year, God’s been opening doors for me to serve, but I didn’t truly understand how to be a servant. The former is just the action, the latter is the motive. This past Sunday, one of the sermon’s bullet points was, “Watch out: you must remember that you are a servant.” In my notes, I have written down for that section: “We do not deserve anything. Why do you serve and get bitter? You ultimately want to get served yourself. The older son, the pharisee was like this, but the younger son realized that even being a servant is a privilege (The Prodigal Father, Luke 15 11:32).” After that sermon, I thought to myself, “Dang, I just got served! Sucker.” (HA)

One example that comes to mind that illustrates this point is my work on the flyer for Revival. As I said in the previous post, the first flyer I made wasn’t accepted. If I wasn’t so stubborn and decided to work on another flyer, none of my designs would have been used–someone else would have done it. I admit, I was a little bitter that my first try that I worked pretty hard on wasn’t accepted, and I probably still would be if the second one wasn’t made. But I have to ask myself: why do I serve and get bitter? Isn’t it enough to just serve? I don’t even deserve this opportunity to begin with; so, even if my servanthood doesn’t impact the world, who cares? I’m serving God–that should be where my joy comes from.

So, this is my prayer: Lord, help me be like Mark. Scratch that. Help me be more like Christ. When He sacrificed His life for me, the flesh torn from his back was nothing compared to the emotional torture he experienced. The entire world was against Him; yet, He still willingly suffered so greatly for us. While we were still sinners, while his closest friends on Earth turned their backs and said they never knew Him, Christ did what He did. His sacrifice boils down to this: without hope or agenda, except to serve God the Father, Christ served. You know what? The Gospel is love, actually.