I’m not sure where the term first settled into my consciousness as something wrong, but perhaps it was early on in my ministry when I’d meet with young couples preparing to marry. Rather than use more or less traditional “’till death do us part” language to express their level of commitment, they’d a little too frequently ask for euphemisms such as “for as long as love lasts” or, and this is what I’m thinking about, a promise to give the marriage “one hundred, ten percent.”
I suspect both terms speak to a problem in our time and place.
As love as long lasts is itself a term that needs, desperately, to be unpacked. Otherwise it is just a string of words conveying no particular message beyond some vague sentimentality…
Likewise, and I hear this one in so many contexts, I’ll give it one hundred and ten percent, or one hundred and twenty or two hundred…
Now, obviously, the intended meaning is I’ll give it all I’ve got and a little more.
But, the fact that it moves from a complete number, one hundred percent, to a fantasy number, speaks to a deep problem I perceive among us, within us…
Like a box and its lid, the commitments we need in life are the complete fit.
Somethings don’t require our all. Many things…
But, some things do. Just a few, but they’re so important.
Life in many ways is a vow.
It is a vow of presence.
It is a vow to not turn away.
In our life commitments, such as marriage, but I suggest in a few more places, as well: the call is complete.
One life time.
One hundred percent.
Anything else is a betrayal of the necessary intention.
Anything else is turning away.
So, a small call to eschew the over the top euphemism for complete commitment.
I hope we will try as hard as possible, if it really is so important, to make it one hundred percent…
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