He Makes You Whole

Do you know how much Jesus loves you?

We’ve been told that He loved us so much He died on a cross for us. But that is so huge, so unfathomable, we don't really grasp the love in it.

I want to tell you how much He loves you.

He watched you as you slept last night. He sang songs over you as He absorbed the wonder of you. He was with you as you crawled out of bed. He ached for you as you showered and imagined those conversations you really want to have with your mother-in-law.

He was with you as you ate breakfast. When you yelled at your kids for the third time this morning his hand gently rubbed your back.

On the way to work when your eyes strayed to the guy in the car next to yours, He whispered how much He loves you and how desperate He is to heal you.

When you poured yourself a drink, the secret one that you slip into your coffee or cola, He called you his daughter and spoke words of love to your heart. He aches to free you, to make you whole.

His love is the desperation of a father who sees His child entangled and snared by the lies and pain of a life disconnected from Him. This love drove him to rescue you.

I want you to imagine a child, dirty and abused. Hair snarled and tangled with dirt and lice. Clothes filthy and torn. That is a picture of you before the cross came into your life. Before the ultimate price was paid for you.

Now I want you to picture a child of royalty. Oh, how she glistens. Her eyes sparkle, her clothing is the finest imaginable. She is fresh, rested, peaceful and fully clean. That is a picture of who you are now. You may not see it, but your Father does.

Every curse, every sin, every stain was paid for and washed clean at the cross of Jesus. Every pain you’ve felt, every humiliation, every horrible word you’ve hurled at someone you loved or hated. Every terrible act you’ve committed: the lies, the cheating, the unfaithfulness, the murder you’ve committed in your heart. Every awful thing you’ve said, done or thought—each one has been dealt with. Jesus took it all onto himself. He did this for you.

Every awful thing you do tomorrow, next day or next year or when you’re eighty. It’s all been dealt with.

The anger of God toward your sin went on Jesus. Every bit of God’s anger was extinguished in the person of Jesus. There is no anger left. No disappointment over your choices. Just a longing to free you from the unhealth in your life. The places he doesn’t inhabit. The places that aren’t working any more.

He wants to fill you from the inside, so full of His love that you start seeing and believing the reality of who you are: a child of royalty.

You are a prince or princess in His household. In the Kingdom of God. You fulfill a place in His heart that no other person ever can. He longs for you. There is so much He longs to tell you of His love and His plans for your life. Plans that will excite and delight you.

The Bible is not a list of do’s and don’ts. It is a love letter He wrote to you. In it He tells you that He is love (I John 4:8) and He tells you all about his character (1 Cor. 13). How kind and patient He is. And He has the best sense of humor and longs to laugh with you.

He will never turn you away or turn away from you.
Come to Him all you who are weary and lost and without hope. He longs to give you rest. To show you a new way that is full of life, rest and peace.

Lovely Not Ugly

I've been reading an amazing book, Finding Peace for Your Heart by Stormie O'Martian. Stormie points out how critical it is to our emotional health to confess and repent of sin.

Because I know that when we receive salvation all our sins (past, present and future) have been forgiven, I don't spend a lot of time on the confessing part. I toss up my share of, "Sorry, Lord, there I go agains," but don't really focus on the confessing of it. Sometimes I even skate around my sinfulness because of the shame I feel for my behavior.

Then Stormie shared (and I agree) that though we are forgiven and our citizenship in heaven is certain and secure, unconfessed sin becomes a weight we drag around.

A little further along, she said that when we are victimized by others, our response to it can be sinful and needs to be confessed. I was still nodding until my gaze skidded to a stop on the sin of criticism.

I felt my defensive heels dig in. But Lord, I'm not trying to be critical, it's just when they . . . and I saw myself trying to justify why I had a right to criticize and judge.

Oh, yes, my rights. I wear them like armor. You see, on some level (yeah, that would be the fleshly one) I believe I have a right to be critical if I have been wronged by them (all those thems out there that spoke rudely to me, that cut me off in traffic, even the short ones who talked back to me after I told them to put their breakfast bowls in the dishwasher instead of the sink).

Stormie made it abundantly clear—quoting Bible verses no less—that I have no rights when it comes to this.

So I reluctantly started confessing and repenting. She hammered that one home too. No point in confessing (apologizing) if we have no intention of repenting (turning away from the sin and behavior).

So after pondering all this, I wandered to the kitchen to make myself a cup of late night cocoa (I was craving and it was the only chocolate in the house). I told the Lord that I realize I often avoid him because I don't want him to see the criticalness and judgment I have in me.

He pretty much said that was silly since he already knew it was there. So feeling like a kid digging her toes in the dirt, I asked, "So what do you think of me when I'm like that?"

I truly felt like he said, "I think you're lovely."

I blurted out. "But I'm so ugly in my sin." And I heard. "Don't call ugly what I call lovely."

He reminded me that all my sin has been paid for and his anger satisfied when Jesus took it upon himself, so what is left, is my loveliness.

Isn't that amazing? And it is for each one of us.