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Is Love Worth the Pain it Brings?

The faithful love of the LORD never ends! His mercies never cease. Great is his faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each morning. Lamentations 3:22-23

Love.

It moves us. Compels us.

Sometimes it breaks us.

Recently my heart broke under its weight as we said goodbye to our beloved Annie, our Australian Shepherd puppy-person that melted our hearts from the first day we met her.

Some of you may not understand such a strong attachment to a four-legged creature. But perhaps you’ve never opened your heart to receive the love of one.

You see, our Annie never held her love back like people do. She gave it. Freely.

She always greeted us with enthusiastic kisses—whether we’d been gone for 15 minutes or 15 days—and she loved snuggles more than anyone I know. Her tender heart often reflected our moods. She would share joys and bear burdens, lovingly coming near to lay with me and comfort me when she sensed my heart hurting.

Annie knew how to make a girl feel special. She followed me wherever I went in the house—even if only to run back upstairs to grab something I forgot. But Annie was unconcerned over the reason for going. She simply went. Because nothing gave her greater joy than to be in the presence of the one who loved and took care of her.

Oh, that we would love our God without restraint like Annie loved me!

Over these last ten years, she taught me so much about unconditional love. But recently, as cancer revealed itself in our family again—this time in our furry, precious loved one—a fresh awareness of the cross washed over me. While laying with Annie to comfort her when disease had rapidly taken her strength and she could no longer get up to follow me, an overwhelming desire to release her suffering gripped my heart.

And I realized. That’s precisely how God feels about our suffering. He aches. And He wants to remove everything that hinders our capacity to enjoy one another completely.

God wants to remove everything that hinders our capacity to enjoy one another completely. Click To Tweet

But being God, He’s able to do something about it. And He did. He sent His Son to bear our suffering, so that He could redeem it. And suffering itself became the catalyst for our redemption.

Christ’s love flowed red at Calvary, beloved.

Now the only thing that can keep us from the power of His love is our refusal to receive it. A guarded heart that won’t open to love will never experience its resurrection power.

And so the enemy of our souls keeps us fearing love.

In this fallen world we live in, we’re going to hurt, dear one. Man’s choice to separate from God brought pain—pain the enemy of our souls has convinced us we can escape if we avoid loving freely.

But you and I were created to love. Made in the image of the God of love, we can never experience the joy of abundant life without loving. Love brings life to dead places. It exhilarates. It heals. And yes, sometimes it hurts.

But the beauty of pure love reveals itself in its faithfulness. In love’s embrace, even the hurt will become joy again as love heals.

You and I don’t want to run from love, beloved. We want to run toward it. We want to dive headlong straight into the arms of its Source. So we can become it. And give it. Freely. Because only as we give it can we receive what it gives. Jesus said so in Luke 6:38,

“Give, and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use it will be measured back to you.”

But loving takes faith, dear one. We’ve got to trust to love. We must love without fear.

God is love. Love is eternal. Love never fails. Nothing entrusted to love is ever lost, and nothing birthed out of love well ever die. But there are some places that love does not grow; love cannot flourish in the company of its rival, fear. Fear has an end—actually, fear is a dead end. Fear is an ungodly spirit that leads to torment. Fear advises from its seat in the shadow of doubt, while love draws its wisdom from the light of faith. If you heed the counsel of fear for too long, you will fail.

(Lisa Bevere, THE ONE THING I WOULD CHANGE IN MY MARRIAGE, Messenger International, http://messengerinternational.org/blog/lisa-devotional/one-thing-change-marriage/)

As I lay holding Annie, my heart in shattered pieces under the heavy weight of loss, I never regretted my decision to love her. My lips offered a sacrifice of praise to my God for the privilege of it. I thanked Him for the cuddles and kisses, the laughter, and the joy. And I know my heart—though broken—will keep beating. My Father’s love will heal and mend it, making it even stronger. Increasing its capacity, and allowing it to give even more.

Beloved, when we love, we bear our Father’s image.

Don’t hold back from love, dear one. Become it. Give it. Feel it.

And live reaping its resurrection power.

A Thirsty Soul, part 2

A Thirsty Soul, part 2

by Juliet Sharrow

Last week I shared how God met me in my deepest pit and intervened when I tried to take my own life. He not only sent someone to break down my door, He showed up Himself to sing His love over me. I am still amazed by the thought.

You might think that at this point I surrendered my life to the Lord. Nope.

Instead I knew I deserved to be punished, not just for trying to take my own life, but for all the bad choices I had made, for all the times I had turned from God and went my own way. I was so ashamed!  Surely God could not, would not want me. Surely He could never forgive me. How could He love me after everything I had done?

And so I ran, right into the arms of an abusive man. This man was not my husband.  I chose to live in sin even though I knew in my heart it was wrong.  When he hit me the first time, I knew I deserved it. I deserved every beating, every broken bone, every humiliation. I had been searching for love for so long, I was willing to accept any love I could get, even love that hurt.

So for almost three years I suffered beatings every day, and I would think, maybe today he’ll kill me.  Every beating, every name calling chipped away at me a little bit more.  Each blow confirmed what I already knew in my heart of hearts: No one could ever really love me.  No one would ever want me; I was too broken and too damaged. Satan worked his magic through the fists and words of an abusive man, but once again God had other plans for me. Even though I had turned from Him yet again, He continued to pursue me.

This time He sent me a precious gift, a life saving gift. He sent me a child.  I was so excited when I found out I was pregnant.  I would love my child in all the ways I had not been loved.  I would somehow make it all right.  I just knew that this child would satisfy my thirsty soul.

Finally, my son was born. In my whole life I had never felt what I felt for this child!  It was a love I could not understand.  I loved him with everything that was in me.  And I thought I had finally satisfied that longing, finally quenched my thirst.

But when I brought my son home from the hospital, I was still waist deep in my pit.  I remained in a very dangerous, very abusive relationship with my son’s father.  I was afraid for my life and for my son’s life, but I was too scared and too weak to do anything about it. And, I was still living in sin with a man who was not my husband.  So I prayed that God would change my abuser so we could be a family.  That’s one prayer I am thankful God answered with a no.  Instead God began to change me.

He began to change the way I saw my abuser. Eventually I got to the point that I loathed the man I once loved, hating every minute I spent with him. I even cringed at the sound of his voice. I no longer saw him through the tainted view of desperate love. Instead I saw the reality of who he was. I believe God was working in me to prepare me to leave.  He had to change my heart and my thinking about this man to give me the strength to go.  He needed to get me to a place that when I came face to face with my Lord there would be no looking back, no going back!

During this time, my love for my son only grew.  I took many beatings to protect him. I cried out to God to save him from my fate. And one day the revelation came: someday, this man would hit my son.  I could not let that happen.  I would do anything for this child, and he deserved a better life than this. I loved him so much I’d die to save him, and that’s when God changed my life forever. He spoke right into my heart, “Don’t you see? That’s how much I love you. I gave up MY son for you!”

I thought of John 3:16,

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

I realized that God so loved Juliet, He was willing to sacrifice His son for me! I could not understand how He could love me after what I had done. I had turned my back on Him so many times, and I chose to run the other way even when He met me as I lay dying.

But the sins of my past didn’t matter. That day God reminded me how much He loved me. He reminded me how He had sung over me as I tried to take my own life, reminded me that He had offered me the gift of grace through my son. And He reminded me that He would always love me, no matter how far away I ran, or how many times I turned my back on Him, or how many bad choices I made. He showed me how He had pursued me and met me time and time again in my moments of greatest need.

No matter what I look like or what I’ve done, He loves me as I am! He loved me first. And this time when my God met me in my circumstance, I turned to Him.  I received what He was offering me, the water of life.  I had no regrets, no thoughts of running, just an overwhelming sense of relief, that all the searching and all the pain was finally over.  And the void I had been trying to fill for so many years was finally filled.

My encounter with God saved my life in more ways than one. I finally found the strength to leave my abuser. And I found the love I had been searching for since the day He knit me together in my mother’s womb in the arms of my heavenly Father.

Our God works in ways beyond our comprehension.  He sees our whole life laid out before Him, and He knows what you and I thirst for. He knows what it will take to get us to turn to Him, and He knows precisely when we finally will.  And so He has written it in the stars, for each and every one of us, a clandestine date when He meets us face to face in the midst of our pit to offer us the water of life.

You can be sure He will go out of His way to be there. The question is, will you receive what He is offering you?  Or will you go away thirsty and continue your futile search to fill the emptiness inside.  Please know today that NOTHING in this world will quench your thirst.  Nothing else will satisfy. Only Christ can give you what you are searching for.  Only He can refresh your weary soul and breathe life back into your hopeless world.

What will you do at your next encounter with the King of Kings?

The Father’s Love

This week’s post comes from Juliet Sharrow, my dear friend and assistant in ministry. Her story reveals God's great power to redeem. I pray that it will bless you and help you to know that you are never alone, no matter how desparately isolated you feel. No matter your circumstance, your Heavenly Father rejoices over you, and He will never abandon you. Be blessed, dear one.

 

Guest Author Juliet Sharrow

I was 21 and my life had spiraled into such a deep pit, I saw no way out. I was in pain, pain that I could not bear. All I wanted was someone to love me for me, to accept me the way I was.

I never felt loved as a child. I was never told I was pretty. No one told me I was good at anything. I felt unloved and ugly, like a failure.  And because of this, I did what failures often do. I made one bad choice after another trying to earn love and acceptance. By the age of 21, I was finished. I decided to kill myself.

I knew in my heart that no one would miss me. I knew that I was doing everyone a favor. I had convinced myself that this was the answer.  This would make the pain go away. I was desperate to make the pain go away!

Have you ever been there, my friend?  Willing to do anything to make the pain go away?  Maybe you didn’t resort to suicide for your way out. Perhaps you turned to alcohol to dull the pain, or drugs to help you forget, or maybe the arms of a man to try to fill the emptiness inside.

I saw death as my only escape, so I made up my mind and took a whole mix of pills.  I went to sleep knowing it would soon be over; I would never be in pain again!

But God had other plans for me. He sent paramedics to break down my door and save me from myself.

As I lay there fading in and out of consciousness, I heard singing!  Just one voice—a man’s voice—so tender and sweet, singing, “I will always love you . . . I will always love you . . . I will always love you . . . yes, I will!”

 Zephaniah 3:17 teaches,

" . . . He will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing."

I should have died that day. The doctors did not understand how I made it. But I did.

You might think at this point I surrendered to God. No, not me!  Instead I knew I deserved to be punished, not just for trying to take my own life, but for all the bad choices I had made, for all the times I had turned from God and went my own way. And so I ran, right into the arms of an abusive man.

When he hit me that first time, I knew I deserved it. I deserved every beating, every broken bone—every humiliation! For almost 3 years I was beaten every day, and I would think, maybe today he'll kill me.

Then God sent me a precious gift, a life saving gift. He sent me a son.  And how I loved that child! I took many beatings to protect him. I cried out to God to save him from my fate. And one day the revelation came. I would do anything for this child, and he deserved a better life than this. I loved him so much I'd die to save him, and that's when God spoke into my heart, "Don't you see? That's how much I love you. I gave up MY son for you!" 

I thought of John 3:16. “For God so loved the world, that He gave his only begotten son…” And I realized God was saying He so loved Juliet that He gave His only son to die for me!  He loved me enough to sacrifice His son for me!

I had never believed that God could love me unconditionally, because I did not understand unconditional love.  I had never known that kind of love.  I never knew my real father, and the man who raised me was strict and unloving, even cruel at times.  He was always condemning, punishing, and berating, never forgiving and loving. So I thought my heavenly father must be the same.

That day God revealed to me how much He loved me, and He showed me He’d always been there. He reminded me how He had sung over me as I tried to take my own life.  He reminded me that He would always love me, no matter how far away I ran, or how many times I turned my back on Him, or how many bad choices I made!  

Having my son showed me what unconditional love was for the first time. And so my love for my son saved my life in more ways than one. I found the strength to leave my abuser. I found new life and love in the arms of my heavenly Father, love no one on earth could give me.   And God showed me there was purpose in all my pain.

Do you know the Father’s love, my friend?  Have you allowed Him to sing over you?