It’s funny how often we forget our allow ourselves to be hornswaggled regarding the unending love of God. We push, we fall, we make human mistakes and get caught up, as anyone would, in this mess of life and think that God must have rejected us sometime during the night. Amidst the chaos and din, He must have gotten tired and left.
But never, ever, in the history of the world and even before it, has God ever up and left. He has never once decided He’s had enough. In fact, just the opposite is true.
God is insanely, madly in love with us. Sometimes I think we forget this. I think we get afraid that if we focus too much on God’s love, we’ll miss something or do something wrong or get stuck in shallow spirituality. And perhaps it’s possible to do so.
But we have to remind ourselves and remind the enemy (yes, I mean the devil. yes, the devil is real,) that God delights Himself in resuscitating, rescuing, and restoring His people. He may not coddle us or pander to us, but He is always faithful and kind and compassionate.
Don’t believe me? Try this on for size:
3 The LORD appeared to us in the past, [a] saying:
“I have loved you with an everlasting love;
I have drawn you with loving-kindness.
4 I will build you up again
and you will be rebuilt, O Virgin Israel.
Again you will take up your tambourines
and go out to dance with the joyful.
That’s Jeremiah 31:3 – 4. I could talk for hours just about that passage, but let’s keep this sophisticated here.
Loved with an everlasting love; drawn with loving-kindness. Rebuilt, O Virgin Israel.
I love this verse because it’s God telling us with such fatherly care that everything really is going to be okay. Sure, it’s hard. Times are tough. Life kicks you around. But He’s the God of dancing-again. And I love the fact that God chooses to refer to His people as “O Virgin Israel.”
We know that throughout history, the people of God had certain habits that were lest than faithful.
Folks was skanky. In a spiritual sense. Israel was sleeping around with whatever false god shook its little booty at the time, getting into all sorts of trouble and really falling off of all kinds of wagons.
But here, the God of the universe refers to His people as, “O Virgin Israel.”
As in, O pure, unspoiled, sanctified, precious, clean, beautiful and sacred treasure Israel.
Meaning that in our absolute dirtiest, nastiest, fallenest, fail-iest, most skanky, most distant-from-God-liest, God still looks on us as His pure, special, sanctified, set apart, holy people.
Life’s really not fair, and I mean that in the best way possible.
bright and beautiful 