RECKLESS LOVE
This song wrecks me every time.
“The overwhelming, never-ending, reckless love of God. It chases me down, fights til I’m found, leaves the 99...I couldn’t earn it. I don’t deserve. Still You give yourself away.”
“When I was your foe, still your love fought for me. You have been so so good to me”
“There’s no shadow you won’t light up, mountain you won’t climb up coming after me. There’s no wall you won’t kick down, lie you won’t tear down coming after me.” (“Reckless Love” by Cory Asbury)
CARPATHIAN MOUNTAINS, UKRAINE
Worship is easy for me. Feeling God’s presence wash over me in a place, bringing me to tears. His glory. His bigness and majesty. Counselor, guide. His infinite wisdom. His plan, His purpose...ok these are difficult. All are heavy concepts and attributes of God, but none do I struggle with the most as God’s love. His big, deep, unfailing, never-ending, overwhelming, reckless love.
A friend recently asked the question, “what is evidence of God’s love for you in your life?”
I couldn’t quite give him a straight answer. This has always been a difficult concept to wrap my head and heart around: God's deep love. More specifically His love for me. I’ve had moments when my eyes were opened to past events when God was loving, protecting, and guiding me. So it’s also not that I don’t necessarily feel loved, which I do...I think. But in the present, tangible now, it’s tough.
It seems so abstract to me. I don’t know why. I’m a feeler; I feel oh so deeply. I feel Holy Spirit and am moved by His leading. I can sometimes hear and/or see God speaking to me. I feel His presence and majesty often. I feel His power. But His love…
I know they all go together. They are all a part of the same whole, the same attributes of God. I know He loves me, “the Bible tells me so.” Why is it so hard for me to grasp, to know it within the depths of my soul? Man, I really don’t know.
That fierce love wasn’t something that was necessarily modeled for me and shown to me in my life. I haven’t really experienced love like this, human-wise. Don’t get me wrong, I know my family loves me wholly and truly. I know my dad would bust some heads, or at least try to, of anyone who would dare hurt me. But, honestly, I’m not sure that in my formative years I truly felt that kind of love. Not really.
Influential men have disappointed me throughout my life in the department of consistent love and the expression of it. I haven’t always been protected or fought for. I haven’t felt romantic love or been fiercely pursued. I know you can’t really compare God’s love to human love. I know God’s love is bigger, better, and deeper than any of these disappointments. HE pursues me. HE shows me His love for me. HE protects me. HE fights for me. Everyone’s love here on this earth is finite and fallible. God’s love is infinite and pure, without fault. How do I separate these two when the first is all I know. But, I suppose, that’s not true is it?
God continues to show me how much He loves, whether I’m looking or not. If He didn’t love me He wouldn’t bother with any of it. He wouldn’t have chosen me to go, to do, to be. He wouldn’t have protected me and saved me from utter destruction. He wouldn’t have continued to bless me with people, who are expressions of His love. He wouldn’t bother with giving me gifts and an overwhelming joy to show people His glory. He wouldn’t put this desire in me to fully understand His love. Right?
I wrote on my bathroom mirror, “You are deeply love by God.” I need that written reminder in a place I look daily. I need a little extra counsel some days. I feel it, though. I do. In worship, in my niece and nephew, in my friends, in my successes, in my failures. I may not understand it fully, or be able to debate all the theology about it, but I do feel God’s big, deep, overwhelming, never-ending, reckless love.