To love another in spite of his weaknesses and errors and imperfections is not perfect love. No,to love is to find him lovable in spite of and together with his weakness and errors and imperfections. Let us understand each other.

Suppose there were two artists, and the one said, “I have traveled much and seen much in the world, but I have sought in vain to find someone worth painting. I have found no face with such perfection of beauty that I could make up my mind to paint it. In every face I have seen one or another little flaw. Therefore I seek in vain. “Would this indicate that this artist was a great artist? In contrast, the second one said, “Well, I do not pretend to be a very good artist, if one at all; neither have I traveled very much. But remaining in the little circle closest to me, I have not found a face so insignificant or so full of faults that I still could not discern in it a more beautiful side and discover something glorious. Therefore I am happy in the art I practice, though I make no claim to being an artist.” Would this not indicate that precisely this one was the artist, one who by bringing a certain something with him found then and there what the much-traveled artist did not find anywhere in the world, perhaps because he did not bring a certain something with him! Was not the second of the two the real artist?It is a sad upside-downness, altogether too common, to talk on and on about how the object of love should be before it can be loved. The task is not to find the lovable object, but to find the object before you lovable – whether given or chosen – and to be able to continue finding this one lovable, no mater how that person changes. To love is to love the person one sees. As the apostle John reminds us: “He who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.” (1 John 4:20)

Consider how Christ looked on Peter, once he had denied Jesus. Was it a repelling look, a look of rejection? No. It was a look such as a mother gives her child when the child is in danger due to its own indiscretion. Since she cannot approach and snatch the child from danger, she catches him of guard with a reproachful but saving look. Was Peter in danger, then? Alas, we do not understand how serious it is for one to betray his friend. But in the passion of anger or hurt the injured friend cannot see that it is the denier who is in danger. Yet the Savior saw clearly that it was Peter who was in danger, not him, and that it was Peter who needed saving. The Savior of the world did not make the mistake of regarding his cause as lost because Peter did not hurry to help him. Rather, he saw Peter as lost if he did not hurry to save him.

Christ’s love for Peter was so boundless that in loving Peter he accomplished loving the person one sees. He did not say, “Peter you must first change and become another man before I can love you again.” No, he said just the opposite: “Peter, you are Peter, and I love you; love, if anything, will help you to become a different person.” Christ did not break of his friendship with Peter, and then renew it again when Peter had become a different man. No, he preserved the friendship and in this way helped Peter to become another man. Do you think that Peter would have ever been won again without such faithful love?

We foolish people often think that when a person has changed for the worse we are exempted from loving him. What a confusion in language: to be exempt from loving. As if it were a mater of compulsion, a burden one wished to cast away! If this is how you see the person, then you really do not see him; you merely see unworthiness, imperfection, and admit thereby that when you loved him you did not really see him but saw only his excellence and perfections. True love is a mater of loving the very person you see. The emphasis is not on loving the perfections, but on loving the person you see, no mater what perfections or imperfections that person might possess.

He who loves the perfections he sees in a person does not see the person, and thus does not truly love, for such a person ceases to love as soon as the perfections cease. But even when the most distressing changes occur, the person does not thereby cease to be. Love does not vault into heaven, for it comes from heaven and with heaven. It steps down and thereby accomplishes loving the same person throughout all his changes, good or bad, because it sees the same person in all his changes. Human love is always flying after the beloved’s perfections. Christian love, however, loves despite imperfections and weaknesses. In every change love remains with him, loving the person it sees.

Alas, we talk about finding the perfect person in order to love him. Christianity teaches us that the perfect person is the one who limitlessly loves the person he sees. We humans always look upward for the perfect object, but in Christ love looks down to earth and loves the person it sees. If then, you wish to become perfect in love, strive to love the person you see, just as you see him, with all his imperfections and weaknesses. Love him as you see him when he is utterly changed, when he no longer loves you, when he perhaps turns indifferently away or turns to love someone else. Love him as you see him when he betrays and denies you. Love the person you see and see the person you love.

- Søren Kierkegaard – Works of Love

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