ADVENT (Week 4) -- Fullness of LOVE in Jesus: "the Smile that Destroyed My Religion"
/When I think of God’s Love in Jesus, I no longer think,”Yeh, He loves me, but then sometimes He loves me not.” Do you feel this way?
For this very short 4th week of Advent, I feel compelled to share the most critical turning point in my spiritual life, and this turning point is all about the “fullness of the love of God” for me truly and totally.
Here’s another except from Glory in Disguise, from the final section “Glory in Our Story.”
See what great love the Father has lavished on us,
that we should be called children of God!
And that is what we are.
1 John 3:1 NLT
Much of my life I lived under the "frown of God," or so I thought. I wasn't a bad kid; in fact, I was quite religious and moral. But I wasn't perfect for sure. For one thing, I wasn’t a very loving or kind big sister. I was self-centered and heartless. And I knew God required perfection, so I was always working my way down a spiritual "to do list" of some kind.
My heart was tender toward God, but my concept of Him was off. I thought He was waiting for my perfect performance. Even though I had come to understand and embrace the unconditional grace of God for salvation, I continued to make lists of my own to make me "spiritual.” I wanted to be more pleasing to God so that He would love me more, use me more, and not frown so much. I had a prayer list for each day, week, and month; fasting days; a scripture memorization schedule; Bible study plan, etc. etc.
I was sincere. But I was always wondering if I "qualified" to get God's help to be and do what He wanted. I was a Christian, and I wasn't working for my salvation. I knew that I was secure because of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Rather, this was my askew, "messed up" way of living. This was the "Christian life," I thought.
Then after years of this sin-focused, legalistic, unproductive way of living; after years of struggle with a mixture of grace and "Christian law:” after failing health because of strange sensitivities and years of being thought of as a hypochondriac; I finally gave up. I assumed God was judging me, but I basically said to the Lord, "I can't do this anymore."
That's when I heard the Voice and saw the Smile that destroyed my religion. My Father through His indwelling Spirit, said to my heart:
“I love you even if you never do another thing right.”
When I chose to believe and embrace this message as God's truth for my life, everything changed. In an instant my soul was set free by the unconditional love of God -- His "Never Stopping, Never Giving Up, Unbreaking, Always and Forever Love."
I felt like I was born again, again. I began seeing God’s love and grace all over the scriptures. I hadn't really “seen” His love there before. His love remained hidden, because I was focused on the "doing" passages and not the "done" passages -- not on the truth verses, like these:
See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. 1 John 3:1-2 NLT
The Father Himself loves you. John 16:27 NASB
I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:38–39 NASB
And so besides seeing Love all over the pages of God's Word, I began to see His Smile – it was there all the time. Now I live under that Smile. I live in Grace, no longer law or a mix of law and grace...just grace.
What about you, my friend? Are you living under what you think is God's frown or even His fickleness (“He loves me/He loves me not”). Those are lies from the pit. Embrace God and His unconditional love: His "Never Stopping, Never Giving Up, Unbreaking, Always and Forever Love."
Live under His Smile and in pure grace because that is your reality, O child of God. Then He can transform you by His indwelling Holy Spirit of Life.
God’s Smile
To see a loved one’s smiling face
Is like receiving a Valentine trimmed with lace
Or visiting a friendly, homey place,
Or getting a lovely warm embrace.
Can you imagine God’s smiling face?
Looking at you He sees not a trace
Of your failures, short comings or disgrace
Because He sees you through His love and Grace.
Penny Mandeville
Prayer
O my Father God, thank You for speaking Your smiling words that set my soul free from my faulty religion – my checklists, my trying to earn what I already have. I now know that your unconditional, tender love for me, your beloved daughter, is fixed. Nothing has been the same since. I see Your smile always and never your frown. Your love is no longer hidden from my sight. And it’s all Your Son’s doing. So for me it’s done. Amen.
Reflections
1. Do you see God smiling at you or frowning or changing back and forth? If His expression is frowning or changing, what do you think is causing that?
2. Are you on the verge of giving up? Take the risk and fling it all on Him. Then embrace the Truth and hear the Voice and see the Smile that will set you free.
3. As you meditate on the above Scriptures, ask the Holy Spirit to make His unconditional love and grace real to you in the depths of your soul. Amen.
A perfect gift for a friend or family member who enjoys meditative daily reading. Each meditation begins with a Scripture, a real life story and encouragement with application, followed by a poem and prayer and interactive journaling suggestions.
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