Why is it so hard? I think we throw those words around to much. I love Jesus, you love Jesus, we all love Jesus. But do I? Do you? I think i’ve posted on this at various times over the past year, but i can’t seem to get away from it. As I’ve been reading through the Bible over the past couple weeks I’ve been struck again by his great love for us. One of his names is Jealous. Over and over he tells Israel to set themselves apart and wholeheartedly follow him. I’ve also been reading some in Revelation. It’s all about the same thing. Jesus is a jealous bridegroom and he is returning to utterly destroy all that does not love him. It sounds pretty harsh for a God who is LOVE…but it does not contradict his love. He is perfectly just.
I was listening to a message recently that was talking about 4 dimensions of love.
- the revelation of God’s love for us
- our love for God
- our love for ourselves (with God’s love)
- our love for others
If we don’t first have the revelation of God’s love for us then we won’t truly reciprocate that love back to Him. And if neither of those happen we can’t really love ourselves as God loves us. And if we’re off on the first 3, how do we expect to love others? It’s so easy for me to get caught up in thinking about what God’s assignment is for me, whether it’s a missionary, or a businessman, or something else. And it’s all with the best intentions. While that is important, it’s not why he created me. He didn’t create me to get saved and then do good things for him. He created me to be a lover of Himself. “Now this is eternal life, that they would know you the one true God and Jesus Christ whom you sent.” (Jn 17.3) This is why he created me. This is the purpose of my life. I can serve Him the rest of my life, but as Matthew says, if i don’t know Him then none of the rest matters.
So i feel that this where I’m at. I feel like I can almost say what David said in Psalm 27, that his one desire was to dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of his life and gaze upon his beauty. How my heart longs to do that. Now I’m trying to discover what that actually looks like on a day to day basis. I have no option but to press into that reality. My eternity depends on it.
2 Comments
September 23rd, 2008 at 8:56 am
Hey Adam!!! Thanks for keeping up with my random life-blog. . . and thanks for faithfully posting your own. The message of God’s jealous love resonates within me: I hear Him saying strongly to run after Him with “my whole heart” and to leave all else behind; it’s always encouraging to hear that from another too.
Can’t wait to see you guys in a short amount of time, I’ve been missing you! Call me when you’re settled back in town in November!!!
love to Jess and baby leu.
September 24th, 2008 at 6:43 pm
Good words, my friend.
Probably if I tried to sum up all of the crazy things I’ve been learning for the last year-and-a-half, it would probably be: Love Jesus more.
And I have found that as I focus on that, on learning to know Him, learning to love Him, learning to listen to Him, just basically focusing entirely on Him… well, everything else is falling into place. Isn’t that a beautiful thing? Truly, the entire Law can be summarized in loving God and allowing that love to overflow into others.
Keep walking strong. I can’t wait to catch up with you two when you get home.
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