God’s love is constant.
I think we struggle with that statement in our daily lives. While no doubt we are able to say it as a matter of fact, we often do not feel that it is true, or we feel that His love comes in degree – He obviously must love me more or less at times and more or less than other people. The truth is of course that God’s love for you is a perfect love and that perfect love is constant – whether I feel it or not.
My feeling and experiencing the love of God is really the issue; and in these few paragraphs we can only address one aspect of our experience of God’s love. Here’s a critical point: We have considerable impact on how we experience the love of God. When we live in sin, rebel, or simply walk in our own strength we will fail to enjoy the love of God (at least the way we want to). This means we will fail to experience His peace and joy as well. And as difficult as today may and as miserable as life can be, one truth remains – His love is constant. He is still just as committed to you, but He has designed life in such a manner that for the believer to “do it his own way” will naturally result in the experience of Holy discipline.
Let’s illustrate. The sun is a wonderful experience when you are on the beach, but it is a kicker in the desert! Nothing has changed about the sun, only the way it is felt. So one place brings about refreshing while the other drains. Obedience is the only path to the beach and the joy of the sun.
This is your relationship to God’s love. He never changes, but His love will bring about polar extremes in relation to your obedience or lack of it. So today if you wake up in the desert you must ask yourself, “What did I come out here to get? And is it worth it?”
Hey, I looked outside for you already and it looks like a great day to head for the beach.
For the mountains may be removed and the hills may shake, But my lovingkindness will not be removed from you…. Isaiah 54:10
The LORD’S lovingkindnesses indeed never cease, For His compassions never fail. They are new every morning, great is your faithfulness. Lamentations 3:22
Oh no, You never let go
Throught the calm and through the storm
Oh no, You never let go
In every high and every low
Oh no, you never let go
Lord, You never let go of me!
Psalm 91
He who dwells in the shelter of the most high will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress my God in whom I trust.
I have been here all day and it goes on. We love him, he loves us better that is why he is my refuge and my fortress My God whom I trust. Even when I don’t understand what he is doing I know he loves me and I know he is there.
But, all desert experiences of God’s are not the result of sin and disobedience, take Job for instance. God was constant in His love for Job, but Job certainly had a hard time understanding that it was because of God’s love, he was in the heat.
Oooh – I really like the sun analogy. Very true. When we are feeling “overheated” we should evaluate the reason why. A good habit to be in is to spend some secluded moments asking the Lord to reveal sin in our lives and recent or past disobedience. I think we can so easily attribute difficulty to the Lord bringing a trial for spiritual growth’s sake. Sometimes it’s because we’re just plain out going in the wrong direction and He is enforcing discipline. When that is the case, we can find relief much sooner when we take inventory and – like Jonah – get back to our Nineveh, the challenge we were called to from the beginning.
All sunshine makes a dessert.Korean proverb.Rain can be highly underrated,without it nothing grows
Can I quote Oswald Chambers again?
“The love of God…we have lost it today; we have turned our back on the ocean & are looking out over barren, colorless hills for the ocean’s fullness. We need converting again…turning round, & there basks the ocean, whose waves sparkle & ripple on fathomless deeps & fullnesses.”
The analogy of the sun reminds me of hearing, there is no shadow of turning with God. The sun is always present. It has no shadow and even in the darkness the moon reflects the suns light. What light are we reflecting? It also reminds me of the verse that sais, if we walk in the light as He is in the light we are developing a relationship in right standing with God, that will spread out to the people we come in contact with. Marsha’s paraphrase! I do like the idea that disobedience allows you to feel the heat, and obedience allows you to be refreshed.