Day 10: For Outrageous Love
“The Christian does not think God will love us because we are good, but that God will make us good because He loves us.”
Would you mind reading that incredible C.S. Lewis quote one more time? I’ll totally wait.
Thank you. Let that one seep into your bones. And whether or not you identify with being a “Christian” - I am more thinking about who God is from that quote.
I think we can all agree that we are quite flawed. Beautiful, but broken. Spirited, but sinful. We don’t always work right.
And God is not shocked that we don’t work well. That we are sometimes jealous and hurtful and rude and deceitful and drunk and too much of something and not enough of something else. That we are imbalanced and we yell and we are messy.
Yep.
He doesn’t love us because we are good.
He just loves us. Period. Which is pretty outrageous. Not one string attached.
He made you and He loves you and He knows our mess and aren’t we grateful? I am thankful that the King is not in a state of shock but in a state of grace. And He's not shocked because He knows the full story. He made the beginning and He knows the ending. Of your story and mine.
And knowing YOUR full story, He came.
He came small and helpless. He came in a smelly barn, humble, gentle. With-Us. For Us. He came to be with us because He made us and He loves us and He is for us.
I can get grateful about that. Grateful that His arms are big and wide and ready for us. That we can come to Him and tell Him anything and everything and say we want Him and He will say Me too.
God, thank you that your love is unbelievable. Thank you that you see us and love us. That you see our past and love us. That you see us now and love us. That you see what we can become, and love us. Thank you that your love is not conditional. Thank you that your love says you are FOR us. That your love hinges on nothing else but You. Thank you for Your outrageous love.
God, I come to you in my brokenness and my mess. I need You. I come thankful for You and thankful for all You give. Amen.
“But you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and ABOUNDING in steadfast love and faithfulness.”
“For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
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“For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the Lord set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, BUT IT IS BECAUSE THE LORD LOVES YOU and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. ”