"Because he holds fast to me in love, I will deliver him. I will protect him because he knows my name. When he calls I will answer him. I will be with him in trouble. I will rescue him and honor him. With long life I will satisfy him and show him my salvation." (Verses 14-16)
I read these verses this morning with a mother's heart. Having held each of my three children in my arms at their births, smoothing my hand over their velvety heads, smelling their scent while I nursed them, I have a sense of the love God has for His children. I held onto my kids' fingers when they took their first steps, left them with trepidation at their first day of school, glowed as they graduated from high school and then college and still burst with joy each time I look into their amazing faces. I love my kids! So much! I would risk anything to help them when they need me. And what makes it even better is their rich love for me! It fills me. Blesses me. In ways I can't even express. When they call me Mom, I melt.
Could this be my Father's heart for me? Having birthed me before the foundations of the world. Having understood me and my way as I grew in my mother's womb. He knows my name. He's held my hand as I learn to walk. My Father loves me and has from the beginning. What blesses Him is that I love Him back. That I steadfastly cling to Him when life doesn't make sense and when it does. My Father protects me because I know His name. The word for know is yada. It is to know God relationally and experientially. So much more than to simply know God's name as in "Yeah, I know about God." It's that I know the character of the Most High God. I'm acquainted with his ways. They are associated inextricably with the name. We are intimate. He, my loving Father; me, His precious daughter. His promise is to protect me because of our relationship. How could my Father miss it, then, when I call to Him for help? My God is with me when things get rough. Maybe I don't get out of the trouble in the way I want, but however He pulls me through, around, over or up to Him, I am promised rescue and kabad. Glory. The weightiness that comes with honor. I am assured by my Father in these verses that all that happens in my life will ultimately be for glory. His and mine. Because of our love relationship, my Father never takes His eyes off me. Knows what my cry sounds like out of all the other whimperings in the universe. Never alone, never destitute. Even in the worst of circumstances, my God is feeling what I'm feeling, hurting when I do, laughing when the river overflows, and taking me down the road to Him.
Whether God allows us to live into our hundreds or takes us home to Him before that, we are assured of the most amazing promise of all. Home. The daunting premonition of death loses its sting because for our Father, our homegoing is what He's waiting for. To actually hold us in His arms and be with us forever. Our vaporous lives are lived for an eternal weight of glory, changed into the likeness of Jesus because of His blood, which bought our adoption into the family of God. I want to press in today, close to my Father's heart. To love Him reciprocally, selflessly and fearlessly. To make Him smile. To give His heart the same warm joy in my love that I have in His. So when my Father looks at my life, His eyes dance and His feet tap. I don't always get it right, for sure. But this I do, I love my Father!
For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. 2 Corinthians 4
I read these verses this morning with a mother's heart. Having held each of my three children in my arms at their births, smoothing my hand over their velvety heads, smelling their scent while I nursed them, I have a sense of the love God has for His children. I held onto my kids' fingers when they took their first steps, left them with trepidation at their first day of school, glowed as they graduated from high school and then college and still burst with joy each time I look into their amazing faces. I love my kids! So much! I would risk anything to help them when they need me. And what makes it even better is their rich love for me! It fills me. Blesses me. In ways I can't even express. When they call me Mom, I melt.
Could this be my Father's heart for me? Having birthed me before the foundations of the world. Having understood me and my way as I grew in my mother's womb. He knows my name. He's held my hand as I learn to walk. My Father loves me and has from the beginning. What blesses Him is that I love Him back. That I steadfastly cling to Him when life doesn't make sense and when it does. My Father protects me because I know His name. The word for know is yada. It is to know God relationally and experientially. So much more than to simply know God's name as in "Yeah, I know about God." It's that I know the character of the Most High God. I'm acquainted with his ways. They are associated inextricably with the name. We are intimate. He, my loving Father; me, His precious daughter. His promise is to protect me because of our relationship. How could my Father miss it, then, when I call to Him for help? My God is with me when things get rough. Maybe I don't get out of the trouble in the way I want, but however He pulls me through, around, over or up to Him, I am promised rescue and kabad. Glory. The weightiness that comes with honor. I am assured by my Father in these verses that all that happens in my life will ultimately be for glory. His and mine. Because of our love relationship, my Father never takes His eyes off me. Knows what my cry sounds like out of all the other whimperings in the universe. Never alone, never destitute. Even in the worst of circumstances, my God is feeling what I'm feeling, hurting when I do, laughing when the river overflows, and taking me down the road to Him.
Whether God allows us to live into our hundreds or takes us home to Him before that, we are assured of the most amazing promise of all. Home. The daunting premonition of death loses its sting because for our Father, our homegoing is what He's waiting for. To actually hold us in His arms and be with us forever. Our vaporous lives are lived for an eternal weight of glory, changed into the likeness of Jesus because of His blood, which bought our adoption into the family of God. I want to press in today, close to my Father's heart. To love Him reciprocally, selflessly and fearlessly. To make Him smile. To give His heart the same warm joy in my love that I have in His. So when my Father looks at my life, His eyes dance and His feet tap. I don't always get it right, for sure. But this I do, I love my Father!
For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. 2 Corinthians 4
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