Proof of life, proof of happiness.
Confirmation of silence. Silence, interpreted as fearful rejection… Or rejection, rejecting in fear.
Response: Perfect love. With a sigh of frustration, remembrance of times gone by, and things that might have been.
In rejection, remember your perfect acceptance. Remember the everlasting love of God.
And as we talked about, what was revealed last Sunday: When even remembrance fails, the Holy Spirit has always been present.
Ministering to our hearts. Ministering to our entire beings, all this time we thought we were alone in our struggles.
Continuing to convict the world of its story: Of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment.
Sin: The tragedy of our past.
Righteousness: Our peace in the present.
Judgment: The glory of the future.
So while we’re coping and recovering from all that might have been, and all the regrets of what should have been done according to our own limited minds,
may we always remember, and may we always focus on the great and glorious grace of God, alive in us through Christ Jesus.
And even when that fails, we will not stop in praising God…
For His Spirit convicts us, and He Himself is always thinking about us.
In our struggle to forget, His Spirit convicts us.
In our struggle to remember, He remembers us.
In our struggle to focus, He is focused on us.
Response: Perfect love.
Praise God, from whom all blessings flow,
Praise Him, all creatures here below,
Praise Him above, Ye heavenly host,
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
Perfect love, that causes me to sing out in worship, when I have no idea what else to do.
Perfect love, which causes the Word to be revealed, in God’s perfect time.
For at one time, Jehoshaphat came as he was before the house of the Lord, at wits’ end:
O our God, will you not execute judgment on them? For we are powerless against this great horde that is coming against us. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you.”2 Chronicles 20:12
As he cried, so we can cry – We can come, and we can run to our Father, as we are, whether we are driven by life giving experiences and/or deadly trials, and/or gently led by the Holy Spirit within us; Oh, we can run to our Father, with all our pretentions, our machinations, our intentions, however corrupt or pure they may be…
Oh, praise the Lord! For through Christ, who is our High Priest, we can ‘with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need’ (Hebrews 4:16)!
And even when we do not see results, even when we do not experience immediate peace or relief from our plights… We still praise the Lord, because we know, that just as His ways are beyond and are not our ways, so we can trust that His responses are beyond any responses we expect. He responds, according to His infinite power, eternal wisdom… and according to His everlasting love.
So that when we pray, we are thankful right away, going as far as to proclaim, just as David proclaimed so long ago:
I sought the LORD, and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears.Psalms 34:4
Yes, we can be as raw as Jehoshaphat was, and we can be as confident or as at peace, as David was. All because of this perfect love that casts out our anxieties, replacing them with the Truth that God has responded, is responding, and will respond – a Truth we can claim, a Truth guaranteed by Jesus Christ.
So in these moments where the uncertainty turns for the worst, and when we do see proof of life (proof of interaction without acknowledgement and/or reciprocation), and proof of happiness (not according to our own terms and our own imagination), yes, the syntax(?) continues to be Response: Perfect Love…
But I suppose in all that I’m putting in here, it’s all more of taking it in that dealing it out. Or, taking it all in, before expressing it.
Taking in the Truth of God’s absolute love for us, which is for us no matter how confused we are.
Taking in the Truth of God’s amazing faithfulness to respond when our faith in ourselves and all we insist for ourselves is fading, instead of recklessly spewing out what comes by impulse.
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases.
His mercies never come to an end.
They are new every morning, new every morning.
Great is Your faithfulness, O Lord.
Great is Your faithfulness.
In the days leading to Valentines’ Day I really, genuinely didn’t fret. I don’t want to say I didn’t care, but I just want to say that I wasn’t anxious, nor was I fearful of how this day would go. And to be honest, it’s still going pretty nicely.
I just want to give thanks to the Lord, because it’s His faithfulness that stands, before, during, and after this day, much like any other day that’s bound to cause anxiety for a lot of other people (e.g. Christmas, New Years, etc.).
I also give thanks to the Lord, because I know that even if I have no grasp or control over what’s going on in certain aspects of my life… Or even if I’m still to figure out what control I have… Well, in all of it, I claim the promises of His word.
I am thankful, because I can cast all of these anxieties, these old pains, these thoughts of fear and uncertainty, all to the Creator of the Universe, whom I call my Father… I can cast it all to Him, knowing that He is always thinking of me.
Thank You, Father.
If you’ve made it this far, I have no idea why you would, but God bless you. Nothing more to see here, I guess.
God bless us all.
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