God Loves You Most

“God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”   Romans 5:8

My thoughts:

“Who do you love?  Yeah, who do you love?”  Famous singer, Bo Diddly, in the 1950’s coined these lyrics, and they have been sung by millions upon millions since.  When it all comes down to it, we don’t really even know what love is.  For there is only one true, pure love and that is agape love, from the Father.

You kiss your spouse goodnight and whisper “I love you”.  When you leave your date at her doorstep and turn to walk back to your car, she tells you “I love you”  When your child is struggling to get it right, and everything looks negative, you calmly take their hands in yours and tell them “I love you”  When your best friend is going through a hard time and your there to provide support and a shoulder, it’s so easy to say those three little words, “I love you”  When you show up at the hospital and the family is crowded around the parent in their bed, you lean in close and hear those words for the very last time, “I love you.”

The words fall from our lips with ease and trigger emotion in our soul that is often followed by tears, joy or comfort.  When we say the words though, how often are they said as a cliché, or out of habit vs the authentic, deep, heart tugging love that we ought to have for one another?  You see, I think the words have lost their meaning, especially since we have removed the importance and sanctity from the words.  Love is now one emotion that is shared between anyone at any given time without the sincerity or heart felt truth behind it.  Most of you are aware that there are multiple Greek words for love: Eros ~ love of the physical nature; Phileo ~ love your friends; Storge ~ familia love as in parent to child; and Agape ~ love that is beyond understanding as in the Love from God.  Paul warns in 2 Timothy 3:1, that one mark of the “terrible times in the last days” is that people will lack natural love for their own families.  Have we come upon those days?

The love of the Father though is unlike any of these, and so incomprehensible in human terms, because we cannot love in the same manner.  His love exceeds anything we can imagine or conjur up in our mind when we try.  You see, His love transcends all other things, any emotion, any physical boundary, any action, any thought, and any sin.  He cannot stop loving you in the most extreme sense of the word.

Several years back I coined a phrase in our home and with my friends – “I Love you more”  It wasn’t intended to be a statement of superiority over their love for me; but rather a statement that they could be confident that regardless of what happened between us, my love was stronger.  It was a statement that I love you more than this temporary setback or strife that may have come between us.  Even then though, this commitment of loving them pales by comparison to the love the God promises us. 

Our only action to receive this love from the Father is to be conceived.  There is no amount of good works that you can achieve in this life that will make Him love you more.  For if this were true, than His grace becomes a farce.  For through His grace, He loved us when we didn’t deserve it and still does to this very day.  You are unlovable but yet He loves you more and always will.

Be Blessed,

Rich

 

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Finding Me - Day 1

September 8, 2014

If they knew the real me, they would see the ugliness that resides within.  They would hear the words, witness the temper and suffer the selfishness that has been built up over years of feeling sorry for myself.  Some look upon my story and turn away believing that I have been blessed and they would be right in their assessment.  But the blessings go much deeper than any other could ever realize or visualize.  For you see, the life that others witness is nothing but a front for the fear, helplessness and worry that rests just beneath the surface.  In this life I have discovered how to hide behind this image of strength and confidence so that the world will not see the weakness within.

Within the last few months I have taken a sabbatical from writing, to seek the truth of what is underneath the exterior persona and attempt to find the root of who I really am.  Many of you may not want to follow along my journey and I understand that.  We are all pressed for time and it only makes sense that you have many other things vying for your attention and precious moments throughout each day.  If this is you, simply shoot me a message and I’ll take you off the distribution list, no questions asked.  Those of you who want to follow along, I ask for your prayers and patience as the Lord walks me through this valley.  If you want to forward this to others, please feel free.  Perhaps they are going through similar self evaluations.

Day 1: Unconditional Love
"But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." – Romans 5:8

God knows exactly who I am.  Unlike you and your opinion of me based on who you see on the outside God has known me from the moment I was conceived in my mother’s womb.  He knows of my strengths, my weakness’ and my failures, and despite all of this He has still granted me the opportunity of eternal life with Him one day.  Nothing can ever compare to His act of sacrifice offered to save my soul from eternal Hell.  I start my journey by realizing that my God loves me, even when others don’t.

Prayer:
Father,
Thank You for loving me, even when I don’t.  Thank You for the grace and mercy You have provided through the sacrifice of Your son, Jesus Christ.  Help me, Lord, to put away the past, the unrighteousness and focus on the path You have laid out for me.  Holy Spirit, speak through me, guide my footsteps to fall upon the path of righteousness and let my words edify Your glory.  I humbly lay myself before You and seek Your truth.   – Amen

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14 Days of God's Love - Day 12 - He did it!

“But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”  – Romans 5:8

"I didn’t do it", he says as I walk down the hallway to the bedroom.  A loud thud had startled us as we sat in the kitchen.  Of course being concerned for his safety, we called out to him to see what had happened.  Looking into the door of his bedroom, the bookshelf had tipped over scattering toys and books everywhere.  He was the only one in the room and all indications pointed to his guilt in the situation.  When we asked him what happened he explained quickly, “I didn’t do it.  I was just standing here and it fell.”  Obviously, he was trying to cover up his guilt, but it went even farther.  My son, at age 4, began to blame it on his imaginary friend Luke. 

With the straightest face in the world, he looked up at us, his eyes twinkling with imagination and crafted an unbelievable story about his friend who was invisible, and maybe he was climbing up the shelf and knocked it over.  Well, I did what any father would do.  I told him that Luke could not play at our house anymore if he was going to do dangerous things like that.  He would have to stay outside, because we don’t want things in the house getting broken when Luke climbs on them.  My son’s response was one of responsibility, “Okay, Dad, I’ll tell him for you.”  Luke hasn’t visited us in quite awhile, but I’m pretty sure he taught our son how to climb shelves, because that hasn’t stopped.

Making mistakes is natural.  It happens every day to every one of us.  As hard as we try to do the right things, we are going to mess it up from time to time.  Life is filled with temptations and it takes a strong will to resist giving in to them.  In our weakness we are prone to succumb to our human desires and emotions, resulting in separation from God’s perfect will in our life.  The scripture captures God and heaven as a place of perfection (Matthew 5:48) to which no unrighteous, sinful man is capable of entering.  We are all born into sin though, which originates from Adam and Eve.  Because of our inherent sinful nature, we are all prone to living in a state of sin in our life.  This causes a huge chasm between the perfection required by God the Father and His children (us).  Jesus Christ was not born of man, but of the Holy Spirit, thereby separating Him from mankind’s original sin.  Through His perfect life He taught us who God is and what God expects from us.  He was sent from God the Father with the sole purpose of ushering us into God’s plan of salvation. The fact that God has provided a way for us to overcome our sin and join Him in eternity demonstrates His huge love and desire for us. 

Just as any father watches over the safety of his children and throughout life teaches them to follow rules, be truthful and love others; God in heaven is teaching us the same.  There are many excuses and others we can blame for the sin in our life, but we must realize God sees and knows all things.  He knows we are sinful, yet still loves us.  He knows we cannot overcome our propensity to sin, but gave us a path to heaven anyway.  We don’t deserve to enter His perfect kingdom, but He wants us regardless.  This is the grace of our Lord.

 Prayer:
Loving Father,
You have provided for our every need.  You have forgiven our sins and provided a way for us to cross the chasm of unrighteousness and join You in eternity.  We lay our sins at the foot of the cross and look to You saving grace.  Build in us the strength to overcome our sinful nature and give back to You the love You deserve.  In Your name we pray – Amen

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