Love is an investment.
No better show demonstrates this than Shark Tank.
Premiering in August of 2009 as an American franchise of the Japanese original, Money Tigers–the show consists of “a panel of potential investors who listen to entrepreneurs pitch ideas for a business or product they wish to develop.” The show is both thrilling and threatening; it is an opportunity for the contestant to go from pulling oneself up from the bootstraps, to donning full on red bottoms. Before a final decision is made, the investors or “sharks” take turns finding faults and weeding out weaknesses in the business model. Some rejections are delivered sweetly–offering advice and suggestions for improvement. Others are served bitter and brutal, the entrepreneur leaving empty-handed, without a handshake. Just appearing on the show at the very least offers exposure and increases sales.
It is worth the risk.
Love is an investment.
No better experience demonstrates this than dating.
Women have been doing this dance literally and figuratively since the book of Judges (21:23). Without a doubt, today some women are perfectly ok with, and in fact quite comfortable and proud to be single. Others are working on self improvement while praying to be found. As a gender we have been groomed to please for profit (i.e. attention) from as far back as Herod’s birthday party. It is both exciting and in the words of Sex in the City’s Charlotte York, “exhausting.” Dating, like Shark Tank, consists of being vulnerable. We shine the light on our strengths and try not to share too many weaknesses. While getting to know each other every text, phone call and well, “date” is an elevator pitch to hopefully secure the next outing. One’s intentions and maturity dictate how rejection is given and received. There’s nothing worse than being ghosted, but we all are to a certain extent. Some are Casper the Friendly Ghost, kindly declining any further dates. Others are Phantom of the Opera-ish, the dating experience permanently scarring and haunting one’s ability to love. If we’re lucky, we’ll experience the Demi Moore/Patrick Swayze kind of Ghost love…one that transcends this lifetime. If we’re willing, the opportunity to love makes us wiser and better.
It is worth the risk.
Love is an investment.
Greater love has no man than this…
Finances or fiances, money or marriage, loot or love– we spend our lives attempting to acquire one or the other, but all are temporary.
The quest fills our days with highs and lows, joy and pain. But there is a panel–The Father, Son and Holy Spirit that has an eternal interest in us. We don’t have to prove our worth. We don’t have to do a song or dance. All we have to do is believe.
Easter, the day on which we celebrate God’s priceless, matchless gift has passed. But He makes the decision to invest, to give His love to us each and every day. God doesn’t hold our faults against us, but instead presents us as blameless and guiltless (Colossians 1:22). God never rejects us. Ever. He’s never on His cell phone; He is present. He’s never too busy; He is available. He will never ghost, or leave us. He knew that we would fall “and for that reason He was out”–He died and gave His life that we might live.
We were worth the risk.
“Praise be to God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For He chose us in Him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in His sight. In love He predestined us for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ, in accordance with His pleasure and will.”
Ephesians 1:3-5
