With the recent Royal Wedding for Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, the world’s attention focused on the coming together of two people in love that crossed cultures as it did continents. Highlighting this love in a most poignant manner was Bishop Michael Curry’s sermon, whose message and delivery provided quite the contrast to the more traditional and solemn address more typical of previous royal weddings. The theme was about how “love is the way.” It was powerful and emotive in its expression and appeared to jolt many of the wedding attendees, including those in the royal family out of a certain level of comfort, as this sermon was a far departure from any other royal wedding sermon in history.
The message was moving because Bishop Curry honed in on the very essence and power of love. He quoted from the late Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., proclaiming that “we must discover the power of love, the redemptive power of love. And when we discover that, we will be able to make of this old world a new world. Love is the only way.”
It’s this redemptive quality of love that is so incredibly powerful because it means that no matter the actions that you may have committed or omitted, or any negative life experiences that you may have gone through, love can overcome all. This amazing quality of love caused me to reflect back on when I was in hospice with ovarian cancer and told that I had just four weeks left to live. Despite the trauma of hearing this prognosis and experiencing the rapid physical deterioration of my body, it was none other than through my personal experience of God’s unconditional love that I found not only strength to handle my condition, but ultimately, to heal and recover from near death. Moving from the macrocosm of the world to the microcosm reflected within my body, on every level, I underwent a transformation—physical, mental, and spiritual– emerging from the “old” me to the “new” me.
The “old” me was someone who never would voice her opinion because she felt inadequate and unworthy of speaking. Others were always smarter, wiser, and more capable. She was someone who could not make decisions because she did not trust in her own ability to select the best options. She was shy, could not look people directly in the eyes, and was not comfortable in her own skin.
It took going through a life crisis for this woman to go through a metamorphosis that allowed her to emerge from the cocoon that had essentially imprisoned her to become a “new” being. Through this experience, I have discovered and learned more to trust that small, still inner voice within me. Sometimes, building up this trust may prove challenging because the messages expressed from this voice often do not fall within the lines of that which is expected nor within conventional norms.
This transformation affected not only my mind, emotions, and spirit, but also my physical being. More than ten years prior my cancer diagnosis, I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome, where I had painful lesions throughout my body and unmanageable fatigue, where it took great effort to even walk. These painful lesions were physically palpable as knots that felt like bruises to me. I could press almost anywhere on my arms, legs, back, and hip, and feel pain.
After developing ovarian cancer and ending up in hospice, there came a point where I had lost so much muscle mass that I was literally skin on bones and had lost twenty-four pounds. Looking in the mirror, the reflection that stared back at me was a clear outline of a collection of bones draped with skin. At this point, I was told that once I lost muscle mass, it would not come back.
However, to my amazement, after months of physical and occupational rehabilitation, not only did my muscles grow back, but they appeared to be new and improved in that I no longer had the widespread painful lesions and knots. Observing this firsthand within my body was nothing short of the miraculous. It showed me that the potential for new growth and change is unlimited. As told from one of the tales of Aladdin in the Book of One Thousand and One Nights, it is actually possible to receive a new lamp for old.
In Ephesians 4:22-25, where the apostle Paul writes a letter to the church of Ephesus, which is located today in modern Turkey, we are reminded “to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another.” Here, we see instruction to put away the old self so that the new self may emerge.
Growing up, many of us have learned habitual ways of thinking and behavior from our family, schools, church, and societal systems. While there may be many positive aspects of what we were taught, like being thoughtful and kind towards others, or having a spirit of excellence in all that we do, there are often other, less positive habits that we pick up that affect our perspective, not only outwardly towards others, but inwardly on ourselves, which can have untold consequences on our lives. For me, it was my own self-worth and value, which was a struggle because there were beliefs that I held that simply weren’t true. Anything that we do out of a false belief system will yield fruit that is based upon that false concept. In essence, it is necessary to put away the falsehoods in our belief systems, so that we can think, speak, and act in truth and love towards those around us.
It seems ironic that it took the experience of being brought literally to the brink of death that finally opened the doors of my soul to learn the most important life lessons. However, this transformation and healing would not have happened without the power of love. No amount of rationalization or intellectualization can help you at the level of the soul or spirit. To read more about the scientific basis for the healing power of love, take a look at my article and video, What’s Love Got to Do With It? The Power of Love in Healing.
Being able to receive unconditional love is that healing “balm in Gilead” that Bishop Curry so eloquently spoke about in his sermon. His message pointed to Jesus, who is the embodiment of God’s love towards humankind. Embracing and receiving this love is the force that facilitates true healing to occur throughout your being—mind, body, and spirit.
In a way that is a mystery in itself, seeing the hand of God directly orchestrating the events of your life and experiencing His incredible love can greatly overshadow any human suffering. I can still remember the days when it would literally take me well over an hour to move to a sitting position in the hospital bed stemming from the tremendous pain I would experience in between the ribs in my back due to having both my lungs collapsed and filled with fluid. The searing sharp pain made it such that I did not even want to breathe because each breath felt like a knife being driven into my back. It was during this time that I would pray and meditate on God’s unconditional love, often to the point of being moved to tears. Being in this state allowed me to continue to have hope and faith in the midst of some of my most trying moments.
Bishop Curry continued his sermon, saying, “There’s power in love. Do not underestimate it. Don’t even over-sentimentalize it.” This is such a concise encapsulation that can shape our perspective on the mysteries of love. It is the most powerful force that we have in this world, so it is not to be underestimated nor over-sensationalized as is common through trite love stories and what’s projected on some of the Hollywood large screen movies. No, there is a strength and quiet sense of calm that can be experienced in the midst of life’s storms by opening up yourself to this incredible way of love.
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