Forgetting God’s Love. Ignoring God’s Love. Believing that God only sometimes loves us because we only sometimes love ourselves. Sometimes we will believe because of all that is happening around us, an overwhelming negativity has too much influence and directional control over our existence, and God does not, is not immediately stepping in or we believe we are being unreasonably punished by an inconsiderate, uncaring, totally lacking in empathy God, our anger arises! Our hearts are hurting more than we can know, we want God now, we love God still, but His unknowability, His invisibility, assures us our relationship is done.

I pray to God, my Father, I guess it is alright if you do not love me right now. I suppose you have your reasons and I believe your reasons to be 100% righteous and purposeful and true. I guess I will just have to figure out for myself, how I can get back into Your Book of Life again. but please know, “I Love You, Yet!”

Psalm 13Authorized (King James) Version

Psalm 13

To the chief Musician, A Psalm of David.

¹ How long wilt thou forget me, O Lord? for ever?
how long wilt thou hide thy face from me?
² How long shall I take counsel in my soul,
having sorrow in my heart daily?
how long shall mine enemy be exalted over me?
³ Consider and hear me, O Lord my God:
lighten mine eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death;
⁴ lest mine enemy say, I have prevailed against him;
and those that trouble me rejoice when I am moved.
⁵ But I have trusted in thy mercy;
my heart shall rejoice in thy salvation.
⁶ I will sing unto the Lord,
because he hath dealt bountifully with me.

The Word of God for the Children of God. Gloria! In Excelsis Deo! Alleluia! Amen.

Yesterday, we had considered the wisdom of God from 1 John 4:7-21 (NASB)

God Is Love

⁷ 7 Beloved let’s love one another; for love is from God, and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 By this the love of God was revealed [a]in us, that God has sent His only Son into the world so that we may live through Him. 10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the [b] propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God remains in us, and His love is perfected in us. 13 By this we know that we remain in Him and He in us, because He has given to us of His Spirit. 14 We have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.

¹⁵ Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God remains in him, and he in God. ¹⁶ We have come to know and have believed the love which God has ^[c]for us. God is love, and the one who remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him. ¹⁷ By this, love is perfected with us, so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment; because as He is, we also are in this world. ¹⁸ There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear, because fear ^[d]involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love. ¹⁹ We love, because He first loved us. ²⁰ If someone says, “I love God,” and yet he hates his brother or sister, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother and sister whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. ²¹ And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God must also love his brother and sister.

But that conversation lacks thoroughness without our also considering just the opposite. Because there are those among us who for their given circumstances spend a great deal of their time, energies and lifetimes believing the opposite is true. They possess an image of their God which is quite diametrically opposed to what the Apostle John wrote in our devotional text for today. They have their reasons which have been born of a crucible of time amidst life experiences that leave more room for doubt than room for acceptance. We 100% acknowledge this view of God, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, is real to them and unto God.

Therefore, for the sake of God’s grace, in prayer for their souls, in our efforts at understanding their views, I give unto you these essential Questions to Ponder

1. Do you see man as a “tyrant”? Do you see God as a tyrant? If so, why?

2. Do you feel you cannot come or go to Him for everything? If so, why?

3. Are you fearing Him to the point of not talking to them, Him? If so, why?

4. Are you mad at God and or mankind for your life or current situation? If so, name and claim the situation.

5. Are you unhappy with how He created you? Are you unhappy that God created you (Psalm 138:13-18)? If so what is it you believe you don’t like about yourself?

6. Do you see God as your Earthly father or as your Heavenly Father? If so, how?

7. Who do you believe to be in more control of your life right now? Yourself, Mankind or God? Why do you believe this to be true? How might it be false?

We are in this mess called Pandemic where it seems everything under the sun is being controlled by someone other than ourselves – air travel. mask mandates, social gatherings, being in and among crowds in a shopping mall or in markets. New Year’s Eve is but a few days away and we are human, and we love to PARTY! Do we trust the person sitting next to us or near to us in our favorite restaurant?

Regulation after regulation is coming from well-meaning people to protect life. Perhaps it is the sum total of everything about your and my life which are right now converging into this moment, into this season. Perhaps we are simply tired of it all, quite overwhelmed, spiritually exhausted. Perhaps these feelings which have been represses, suppressed by our belief in Father, Son and Holy Spirit are being rigorously and vigorously challenged as the Patriarch Job found himself. Maybe the Lord of all Creation, this sovereign God who is all about “first love.” is inserting Himself once again directly into the affairs and works of mankind?

His Question becomes even for faithful in Jesus Christ – Okay, where are You? “I see you are getting distracted again like my faithful, faith-filled servant Job was by all of the blessings I gave to him over his many years of devotion. Job needed a “reality check” and I saw zero reason why I should not learn for myself where my servant Job’s life was zeroed in on – his abundance or MY abundance alone.” “I had to have an answer directly and decisively from the soul of Job himself!”

So, as many or as few as may find themselves righteously questioning the very presence and sovereignty of God, the value of His scriptures, His promises from His scriptures, the genuine trueness of His “FIRST LOVE,” ask of yourselves the questions which would otherwise go unasked if pandemic were non-existent. It is a good time and a proper season to question exactly where God is, His Son is, where His Holy Spirit is. Take the other side of the belief question for a while.

From the position of those who question God’s FIRST love, dare to ask yourself this day; What about God’s FIRST LOVE is losing its luster for me, for my family and for my friends and for my neighbors and my community and my church? I am asking you to prayerfully take the time to reconsider “church” in your soul. How is it we can reach unbelievers to be 2022 Acts 2, Acts 3 and Acts 4 church? How is it we can overcome our own doubts to reach into our neighbor’s doubts?

God the Father and God the Son and God the Holy Spirit really want to know if we ourselves truly know what the plan is for the continuance of God’s kingdom. To reach the unreachable. To teach the unteachable, Preach to the unreceptive. The year of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ 2022 is a critically pivotal season. What confidence do we have to put on full display, to witness, our Testimony? What about a prospect of developing a “pandemic free” intimate relationship?

What if we 100% really, genuinely allowed God to get that close to us and His Children again? What if we genuinely gave God, Jesus, Holy Spirit permission, unconditionally reveal, unconditionally unleash His FIRST LOVE to us again?

How would our pandemic conditioned responses, respond to such a revelation?

HMM …

I SHALL NOW LEAVE YOU IN GOD’S MOST CAPABLE HANDS TO PONDER THIS!

In the name of God, the Father and God the Son and God the Holy Spirit,

Let us now pray the prayer Jesus taught His disciples to pray,

Our Father, which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy Name. Thy Kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, As it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, As we forgive them that trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, But deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, The power, and the glory, For ever and ever. Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia! Amen.

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