It’s True, God Loves You!

We all long to know
we are worthy of belonging.
To have connection.
To be accepted for who we are.
To be loved.

When my boys were in high school,
one played guitar on the worship team.
The other took up acting.

Every time one of them was on a platform,
you can bet I was front and center.
I had my eyes locked on him until
he did something clever or
performed some especially challenging feat,
at which point,
I would turn to the person on my left,
elbow them to get their attention,
point at the stage and exclaim,
“See that one in the blue shirt?
That one’s mine.
Isn’t he wonderful?”
Then, I’d turn to the person behind me
and say,
“Did you see that?
Did you notice how brilliant that boy is?
He’s mine.
He belongs to me.”

Girlfriend,
it didn’t matter what they were doing.
On the stage or loafing on the sofa,
showing off or crashing the car,
my eyes are always on my boys,
loving them.

They weren’t perfect.
They aren’t perfect.
Sometimes, they weren’t even very good.

Their performance never affected
the way I love my children.

I love them because they belong to me.
They are part of me.

From the time they were born,
I told them over and over,
“Mama loves you to the moon and back.
There is nothing you could do
to make me stop loving you.“

 When they were little, they’d ask,
“Mama, what if I was very naughty,
would you still love me?”

“Oh, yes,” I’d reply.
“You could never make me stop loving you
by being naughty.”

As they got older, they’d ask me,
“Mom, what if I committed a heinous crime,
would you still love me?”

“Yup,” I’d say.
“Nothing you can do or say would make me
love you any less.”

The truth is, loving my children isn’t all that hard.
Through the terrible twos and threes,
into the tween and teen years,
and now as adults,
loving the humans I had a part of creating
is intuitive.

I may not love everything they do or say.
I may not agree with the choices they make.
I hurt when I see the pain they bring on themselves,
but nothing changes the love I have for them.

Do you know that is how God loves you?

God loves you when you are good
and when you are naughty.
He loves you when you are brilliant
and when you are foolish.
He will try to hem you in,
guide you to better choices
and outcomes,
but through it all,
God loves you.

Even more than a mother can love her child,
is God’s love for you.

Yes, you.

Stand on that for a minute.

God loves you.
You don’t have to solicit it.
You don’t have to behave for it.
You don’t have to wait for it.

You have it.

God loves you
endlessly.
Unconditionally,
As is.
Right now and forever.

I don’t know where you are in your journey of faith.
I don’t know if you’ve been in church since the crib
or if you’re new to Jesus
or even if you’re still trying to figure this God thing out.

God promises that He will always love you. 

He tells you He loves you
over and over in the Bible.

“The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying:
‘I have loved you with an everlasting love;
I have drawn you with unfailing kindness.’”
Jeremiah 31:3 (NIV)

“As the Father has loved Me [Jesus],
so have I loved you.” 
John 15:9 (NIV)

He doesn’t just tell you,
He demonstrates His love.

God proved his love to you through Jesus’ death and resurrection.

Christ died so you might know the love of God personally.
A love you don’t have to earn, but merely receive.

For God so loved the world,
that He gave His only begotten Son.
John 3:16 (NIV)

But God demonstrates his own love for us in this:
While we were still sinners,
Christ died for us.
Romans 5:8 (NIV)

Friend,
you are loved
by God
to the moon and back,
to infinity and beyond,
now and forevermore.
You were loved before time and
will be loved through eternity.

That’s a promise you can stand on.