God's love...a choppy version.
God's love is infinite. He sent His son for me, to die in my place. So that I could have eternal life. This is unquestionable, yet unfathomable.
I can't fully wrap my head around God's love for me. It is probably the hardest part about faith. I can understand the logistics of Noah's arc, and I know about Moses' law. I get that Paul was imprisoned for his faith, and that John the baptist ate locusts and honey. I get the facts. But there are so many times that I get stumped when I try to consider God's love for me.
Paul writes that He knew me before I was born. He died for me. The fact that the same Person who made the Milky Way and the depths of the ocean, and the sky, and the Plumeria plant, loves me. I can't wrap my head around it. I know how not worthy I am. I feel like such a disaster. I know that I don't do enough for God's kingdom. I know that I am such a sinner. But He doesn't care. He chases me. He loves me.
Last weekend, I painted a hallway upstairs. When I finish projects in my house, I always end up staring at them for a long time. Like I am so proud of myself. I love my new blue hallway. It adds such zest to the upstairs. As I was cleaning my paintbrushes, I thought of the verse in Genesis that says "and He saw that it was good." God said that about everything that he made. The Lord ministered to me as I put away my paint, and painter's tape. He reminded me that although my work was almost nothing in comparison, that He embedded that desire to create within me. I am my maker's daughter. I felt such a connection with the Lord as He reminded me that my desire to make a comfortable home for my family is the design that he granted me when He made man in His image. I thought of how proud God is when our breath is taken away by a sunset, or how alive we can feel when we are confronted by the majesty of the mountains. He made it for us, and agrees that, yes, it is good. "Lindsay," he calls me by my name sometimes, "take the feeling you have for your wall, and your house, and your children. Multiply it infinitely. This is how I feel when I think of you. Lindsay, I love you."
Oh.
How does one respond to the love that God has for them? I guess you blog about it. Ha!
God loves me. When I am overwhelmed, and under pressure, and stressed, and being hurt by those close to me, God loves me. When I overreact, and make stupid mistakes, and say hurtful things to others, God loves me. When I am dealing with the consequence of my sin, or regretting choices, or spatting regretful words to my husband, God loves me. When I know this, life gets easier.
God's love takes such pressure off of me, and it urges me to make righteous decisions, and beckons me to repent. I want to be blameless. Not because I am supposed to, or because I am religious. I want to be blameless because experiencing God's love can happen better when I am. And my sin looks ridiculously lame when I match it up against the perfect love of my Father. I become less overwhelmed with life, and more overwhelmed with His love.
I suppose I can't do a good job explaining the love of God, because I don't quite understand it. But when he ministers to me through His word, or through life experiences, or after I paint the hallway, I want others to know. Because He loves all of His children. A lot. There is nothing we can do to take it away, but I believe that we can do a whole lot better job in experiencing it.
1 John 3:1 See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him.
I can't fully wrap my head around God's love for me. It is probably the hardest part about faith. I can understand the logistics of Noah's arc, and I know about Moses' law. I get that Paul was imprisoned for his faith, and that John the baptist ate locusts and honey. I get the facts. But there are so many times that I get stumped when I try to consider God's love for me.
Paul writes that He knew me before I was born. He died for me. The fact that the same Person who made the Milky Way and the depths of the ocean, and the sky, and the Plumeria plant, loves me. I can't wrap my head around it. I know how not worthy I am. I feel like such a disaster. I know that I don't do enough for God's kingdom. I know that I am such a sinner. But He doesn't care. He chases me. He loves me.
Last weekend, I painted a hallway upstairs. When I finish projects in my house, I always end up staring at them for a long time. Like I am so proud of myself. I love my new blue hallway. It adds such zest to the upstairs. As I was cleaning my paintbrushes, I thought of the verse in Genesis that says "and He saw that it was good." God said that about everything that he made. The Lord ministered to me as I put away my paint, and painter's tape. He reminded me that although my work was almost nothing in comparison, that He embedded that desire to create within me. I am my maker's daughter. I felt such a connection with the Lord as He reminded me that my desire to make a comfortable home for my family is the design that he granted me when He made man in His image. I thought of how proud God is when our breath is taken away by a sunset, or how alive we can feel when we are confronted by the majesty of the mountains. He made it for us, and agrees that, yes, it is good. "Lindsay," he calls me by my name sometimes, "take the feeling you have for your wall, and your house, and your children. Multiply it infinitely. This is how I feel when I think of you. Lindsay, I love you."
Oh.
How does one respond to the love that God has for them? I guess you blog about it. Ha!
God loves me. When I am overwhelmed, and under pressure, and stressed, and being hurt by those close to me, God loves me. When I overreact, and make stupid mistakes, and say hurtful things to others, God loves me. When I am dealing with the consequence of my sin, or regretting choices, or spatting regretful words to my husband, God loves me. When I know this, life gets easier.
God's love takes such pressure off of me, and it urges me to make righteous decisions, and beckons me to repent. I want to be blameless. Not because I am supposed to, or because I am religious. I want to be blameless because experiencing God's love can happen better when I am. And my sin looks ridiculously lame when I match it up against the perfect love of my Father. I become less overwhelmed with life, and more overwhelmed with His love.
I suppose I can't do a good job explaining the love of God, because I don't quite understand it. But when he ministers to me through His word, or through life experiences, or after I paint the hallway, I want others to know. Because He loves all of His children. A lot. There is nothing we can do to take it away, but I believe that we can do a whole lot better job in experiencing it.
1 John 3:1 See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him.
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