My Devotion
My Heart
God is Love
Teresa Jenkins
We
were by nature objects of wrath. But because of HIS great love for us,
God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in
transgressions (SIN)—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised
us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ
Jesus, in order that in the coming ages He might show the INCOMPARABLE riches
of His grace expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. Ephesians
2:3-7
How
great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called the
children of God! 1John 3:1
This
is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an
atoning sacrifice for our sins. 1John 4:10
Have
you or do you know someone who cannot or will not put their love outside
of themselves they will not risk the possibility of getting hurt? They
have either experienced terrible betrayal, abuse, or maybe their ability to
love has been slowly chipped away over time by belittling treatment, by people
in their lives who devalued them and finally it just became easier to brick up
the door to their wall and stay inside of it.
These
people are sometimes hard to notice because they’ve become very good and
playing the game of life to all who see them they are the model Christian, they
may be married with children, go to work, go to church, teach Bible classes, by
all appearances they are right up there next to the angels, or Mary
Poppins…practically perfect in every way. Look closer, not with a judging
eye, but do you ever notice these people having any true relationships outside
of what it looks like about their marriage, leave that relationship
alone. Do these people let anyone get close enough to see they are human
just like you and me? Friendships are kept at bay but if someone happens
to squeeze through the crack in the door of their wall…Bam they are pushed out
with some trivial reason and the door is slammed in the face and there you are
on the other side of that door shaken to the core questioning who you are in
Christ and that you may have not been a good Christian or maybe that you
weren’t Christian at all. This practically perfect Christian person has
severed your relationship on the pretense that you did something to keep them
from being a good Christian so they cannot be your friend anymore.
It
happens all the time people. Though I’ve only experienced this one time
in my entire life as a Christian, let me tell you it shook me to the core and
it has taken me almost five months to pick up all the broken pieces of my
heart. I still tremble remember the pain of rejection that I received
that was coated in the name of Jesus. I still have thoughts of how to get
this person to be my friend again. It took lots of time and prayer and
seeking God in His word to realize that I may never know the real reason the
person rejected me in such a traumatic way. It wasn’t the rejection but
that they used Jesus as the reason to reject and avoid me.
Jesus,
the one I love, and the one I most want to be pleased with me and this person
said to me that they could not be my friend, because Jesus told them not to be
my friend. This same Jesus who said, we should do all that we can to
bring unity among the believers, to love each other, to help each other live
closer to Him, to encourage one another, to teach, instruct, rebuke, and come
along side each other especially when someone falters, who slips into
sin. We are commanded to love each other beyond judgments. Let me
tell you it rocked my world and I questioned who I am in Christ, I questioned
my worthiness to profess the name of Jesus. I wanted so badly to have the
wall that I used to live behind built back up so I could hide away, but there I
was in that really bad nightmare standing naked in the middle of the crowd with
everyone staring and laughing at me.
And
the thoughts that came flooding back to my mind, that I’m stupid, I’m not a
good child of God, I don’t deserve anything, and I should just shut up sharing
what God “supposedly” does because He loves us. This person rejected me
in Jesus name, so that has to mean I’m some kind of fake nothing just babbling,
that nothing I’ve ever testified about God and His love for me was true and I
should just shut up.
Yes
this one rejection still hurts, but guess what, God’s love has washed my wound
clean He has told me in no uncertain terms, that I am His, that He loves me,
that He still has a place for me in the work for His kingdom. He has
reminded me that when we are about His business we will be judged, we will be
rejected, we will be hurt, but not to lose heart He has overcome it all.
He is keeping the record and what is out of my control is never out of
His. So I cut my losses, love that person from a distance, pray for her
that the love of God will penetrate the wall she has built as a fortress and
flood her heart. Though we may never be friends again, I pray that her
relationships will become real and intimate.
Loving
someone doesn’t mean you have to be all up in who they are, you may never speak
to them ever again, but it’s letting go of the hurt and resentment their
actions caused you and letting them go into God’s love. And the best
part, when we can do that we tear down some of own wall and allow God in more
intimately, which opens the way for other relationships to be formed and
nurture the other ones in your life more intimately. We cannot change
what others do or say about us, but we can change who we are individually.
I
learned a very valuable lesson in my heartbreaking experience, that no one or
thing should ever become so important to me that God is ever moved out of first
place, in my heart, in my mind, in my work, in my life. I miss my friend,
but I have a Friend who sticks closer to me than a brother and when I mess up,
He brings it to my attention, not to punish, belittle, or condemn me, but so
that I will confess my sin to Him because He is faithful and just to forgive my
sin and draw me closer to Him and because He loves me.
God
is love and we can love because He first loved us. How great is His love
that He lavishes upon us.
In
HIS Time
Teresa
