I woke up this morning and my heart was all over the place... a little fearful about stuff at work.... and my list can go on. So, I opened my journal and started to write and the Lord reminded me of all he has been talking to me about lately.... and showed me that my fears are all about circumstances. I'm unsettled about the things I see around me... the circumstances in the world.... and He showed me that I'm trying to hold on to the things that are 'seen' and I just need to let go and focus on what He has been telling me lately.... and that is that HE is our Father and HE LOVES US.
I'm one of those people who no matter how many times I heard it, I just couldn't grasp the depths of God's love for me. Not that I'm blind to it, its just something I've had to grow into.... and, I, along with Paul, have prayed "that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power...to grasp how wide and long and wide and deep is the love of Christ and to know the love that surpasses knowledge-- that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God." (Eph 3:17-19.)
That verse is so rich, isn't it? Well, a dear friend sent me a devotion the other day and said I came to mind as she was reading it. As soon as I saw it, I realized this was the 2nd time I had seen this, and it was a piece of a message that God had been sharing with me, which started with these two verses:
"He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive Him. But to all who received him, to those who believe in His Name, He gave the right to become Children of God." (John 1:11-12)
"The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt--a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, 'Know the Lord', for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more." (Jeremiah 31:31-34 -NRSV)
We are His Children! Children of His Covenant. A covenant made by God Almighty... who changes not. Ponder that! I have been grasping afresh the awesome privilege we have to belong to God… as HIS child…. the steadfastness of know him as father... the privilege of approaching Him without having to go through a high priest or someone else....
Now, my friend has 5 children, and she always says a mother is as happy as her most unhappy child. In other words, she always carries the burdens of her children in her heart. And it struck me, how much more God cares about our burdens and sadness. (Even though we who are 'evil (we) know how to give good gifts to (our) children, how much more (does) our Heavenly Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him. Matt. 7:11) And, if our PERFECT Father is a better gift giver than an imperfect parent, isn't he also a better PROTECTOR, PROVIDER and CARETAKER? Of Course he is. I can trust Him.
The devotion that my friend passed along to me had a reference to a video I saw at a women's retreat a few weeks earlier, where Speaker and author Louie Giglio spoke about a molecule in the human body called Laminin. Laminin is actually a protein adhesion molecule, meaning it is responsible for holding you together right now. A scientist told Louie that it’s the 'rebar, the glue, which is literally holding all of your skin on, holding the linings of your organs on, and basically keeping you from being a pile of bones and flesh on the ground." Please watch this video with this verse in mind, and allow the LORD to strengthen you today.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_e4zgJXPpI4
Isa. 49:15-16 says, "Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you! See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands; your walls are ever before me."
Oh, Lord, help us to grasp it in the depths of our souls…. that we belong to you… that our names are written on the palms of your hands, that you hold our lives together… all the days ordained for us was written in your book before one of them came to be (Psa 139) We can TRUST YOU. Rest in You. Help us to REFLECT you through the depths of our soul, because we truly understand our identity in YOU as YOUR Children. Thank you Jesus, our LORD, for the blood you shed for us on the cross. Thank you for YOUR love, LORD. And Thank you that you hem us in, behind and before (Psalm 139). AMEN.
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