Tuesday, August 5, 2008

God's Love

I love this verse in Ephesians 1:4 (The Message)

"Long before he laid down earth's foundations, he had us in mind, had settled on us as the focus of his love, to be made whole and holy by his love. Long, long ago he decided to adopt us into his family through Jesus Christ. (What pleasure he took in planning this!) He wanted us to enter into the celebration of his lavish gift-giving by the hand of his beloved Son. "

What an awesome verse. Before time ever began ,before the foundations of the earth, God was already thinking of you. He had decided to make you the focus of His love. Of all the things He could have loved, HE CHOSE YOU! Even though He knew you. He knew your faults, flaws and failures. He knew you hurts, habits and hangups. But He still chose to love you just like you are. Warts and all!

He even loved you so much that He wanted to adopt you into His family. He wanted to share with you everything that He has.

He loved you so much that He chose to use His love to make you whole and holy in His sight. To cover the failures, and faults with His love.

He loved you enough that He wanted to lavish gifts and blessings on you through His son.

Yesterday we talked about loving God. How could we not love Him when He has loved us this much? Our love is just a response to His great love.

1 John 4:19 says "We love Him because He first loved us." Let's not forget how much God loved us as we strive to love Him more.

3 comments:

Pump Dude said...

Amen, brother! It's sometimes difficult for us to see past our own shortcomings, let alone think that God could still accept us and show us unconditional love.
This reminded me of Paul's letter to Timothy (1 Timothy 1:12-17) where he was expressing God's abundant grace and mercy, even after he had persecuted Christians.
It's impossible to enjoy the fullness of His love without first letting go (and repenting) of whatever our faults, failures or flaws might be (good alliteration throughout the blog, Padre). If we can remember that he tosses our sins into the Sea of Forgetfullness, it helps to free that portion of our heart so we can devote it to Him!

Adam said...

I struggle with this alot. How could God still love me after all my shortcomings and failures. I desperately want more, I want what God has in store for my life, but I many times can't past the thought that perhaps I've failed too much or that God can't love someone like me. My wife asked me the other day, "Is there anything that your kids could do that would make you stop loving them?" My answer was of course, "no." She then said God loves you more than that. I hate it when she's right :)

Rhettro said...

Your not alone Adam. Dude, I don't think it matters how spiritually mature I become, I don't know if I will ever completely understand Gods unfailing love. I read that Mother Teresa, towards the end of her life, felt distant from God. She wrote in her journals that she hadn't heard or felt Gods presence for years. At first this statement made me wonder, Why? She was Mother Teresa! I feel distant from God sometimes, but it is always because I am pulling away from him. But the more I thought about it the more it inspired me. She didn't feel Gods presence, but that didn't mean He wasn't there, and she knew that. Just because God is speaking to me, just because I don't get goosebumps during Sunday morning Worship, doesn't mean that God isn't there and that He isn't getting goosebumps. I think that sometimes he just steps back and wants to see how we react. Hang in there Bro! You are not alone.