Learning Father Gods Love is a Life Long Process of Moving Deeper into Rest
Matthew 23:37 – Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing.
Three Core Truths
- Father Gods love continually draws us. (He doesn’t close His heart.)
- Father Gods love is a nurturing place.
- Man often resists Father Gods love.
1 – Father Gods Love Continually Draws us
This verse in Matthew 23 shows us that Father Gods love is reaching out to His people, even when they’ve been at their worst.
“God does not begin to save us because we repent. We repent because He’s begun His saving work in us.” – Timothy Keller
Religion is seeking for God to respond to us. True Christianity is where we are responding to God.
2 – Father Gods Love is a Nurturing Place
Again Matthew 23 speaks of being under protective wings as does Psalm 91:
Psalm 91:4-7 – He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler. Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day; Nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday. A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee.
This place the psalmist mentions is the place where your heart is safe and nurtured and blossoms forth into fruitfulness.
3 – Man Often Resists Father Gods Love
Unresolved shame issues always involve black-and-white thinking such as: “I have overcome, or I haven’t.” “I’m acceptable, or I’m not.” This type of thinking does not allow for any sort of learning process to occur.
Learning to live loved is a lifetime process, not a one-time event. Most Christians would say they believe God loves them. But the working out of that in actual experience is something that goes ever deeper throughout our lives.
We have a lifetime of conditioning that says we have to earn love.
- This comes from religious doctrine.
- This comes from our parents.
- This comes from our flesh.
If you can see that you are in process and and feel that it’s okay to be in process, you are on the path of growth. No one is immediately healed of performance issues. We all grow ever deeper into a life of rest in Father’s love.
What can we do to help this process?
Allow God to expose wrong thinking from any doctrine that may be partially true but not the whole truth. James is clear that our works do matter, yet Ephesians is clear that everything is based on a free gift that can never be earned. Remember, this is a process that we work out throughout our lives.
Also we can allow God to heal wounds in our life that would lead to orphan thinking. You are a precious child of God. You are loved, regardless of your failings and mistakes. You are not alone, powerless, unprotected, or abandoned. Again, this is our lifelong journey.
As events in life arise that test us (and they will!), just think – we have the opportunity to go deeper in His love!
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