For the past week this has been the theme of my life. Over and over again the verse has come to mind, and I've been reminded that nothing can change the fact that God loves me. Nothing.
Every year on Halloween, I take my kids out of school and we celebrate fall together. We usually go out for lunch, spend some time at the pumpkin patch, and finally we come home to work on a special craft. The kids enjoy giving out their craft to all the "treat-or-treaters" that come visit our home.
This year we made a bat. It was very difficult to come up with a clever phrase like all the years past. My mind was a complete blank. I prayed about it, and when I woke the next morning, this verse was running through my mind. "Nothing can separate us from the love that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
I constantly have to remind myself that I am not trying to earn God's love. He gives it freely. There is nothing I can do to deserve it.
A few months back I heard someone use this phrase, "We feel bad when we let God down, but when have we ever really held Him up?" Shouldn't that take the pressure off?
God doesn't need our help. God is God. He allows us to help Him, just like a small child might help out with the chores around the home. Sometimes it doesn't even improve when our hand has touched it. But it does help our heart and mind.
It's almost a selfish thing. I want God to use me. I want the benefit of having God work through me. He doesn't need me. But often He allows me to be used for my sake. In that same way, no matter how often I'm used, nothing I do makes God love me more.
He unconditionally, wholeheartedly, sincerely, unreservedly, passionately, powerfully, zealously, selflessly loves me. He literally goes bats over me! He has a crazy, unexplainable love for me, and it has nothing to do with what I've done, or not done. It's because God is who He says He is.
"My beloved friends, let us continue to love each other since love comes from God. Everyone who loves is born of God and experiences a relationship with God. The person who refuses to love doesn't know the first thing about God, because God is love—so you can't know him if you don't love. This is how God showed his love for us: God sent his only Son into the world so we might live through him. This is the kind of love we are talking about—not that we once upon a time loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to clear away our sins and the damage they've done to our relationship with God." 1 John 4:7-10
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