Henry Nowen writes in his book “The Return of The Prodigal Son” about the concept of first love and second love. Both are loves that every human being has the need for.
Second love is the need we all have for human love, affection, connection. It includes the entire range of human relating from camaraderie to friendship to family love to romantic love to all levels of human intimacy.
First love is the love that can only come from God. People have referred to it is the “God shaped hole”. It is the need for intimacy and friendship with God.
Both the need for first love and the need for second love are good things that God has created in all of us.
The problem is when we seek from a second love that which can only come from first love.
Last week I sat in a room with three pastors and four soon-to-be priests. We talked about the struggles in our lives right now. We talked about difficulties with motivation, stress, anxiety, direction and other things. We talked about how it can be that we could be struggling so much with these things.
As we talked it through, it came down to this: when I am seeking anything other than God’s love as first love and first fulfillment in my life, I simply do not do well.
It is not that I do not have many things to seek and desire and enjoy and love and look forward to, etc. It is just that when I get into trouble is when I forget that those things are only good and life-giving for me when I remember that they are second loves and they will only be fulfilling when I am fully experiencing connection with first love…well…first.
Like Walking Trees 