 
Come to Me

The unexpected invitation at the heart of the universe

Anton Georges

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © Anton Georges 2013

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 0-9751511-0-X

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by the International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.

Scripture marked NRSV is taken from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible. Copyright © 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. All rights reserved.

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Come to Me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light. Jesus of Nazareth (Matthew 11:28-30)

This book is for weary people: weary of religion and weary of life. For scared people: scared of God and scared of the future. For lonely people: lonely in a crowded world because God seems absent. For burdened people: those who are bowed down low with guilt and shame. For confused people: for those for whom the message of Jesus has seemed to be a collection of dashed hopes and empty promises, for people aching inside. This book is for my brothers and sisters in Christ who are all these things, yet still long for God.

Contents

Forward

Acknowledgements

How to use this book

Truth

Our desire for God

Who do you really think God is?

Jesus

Come to Me

What does God think of me?

Children of God

Jesus' Bride

Forgiven forever

Pictures of grace

Feasting on God

Come with Me

What do we do now?

Come with Me

Walking with Jesus

Not earning, but loving

The wisdom of God's works

Knowing God

Trusting God

Experiencing God's faithfulness

Loving others

The supremacy of love

Our purpose

Leaning and longing

Forward

As I read this book by Anton Georges in Kazakhstan it touched my heart deeply. This book brings us into the Forgiveness and Grace Jesus purchased for us on the cross. As Anton uses his own life to show us how we can have a closer relationship with Jesus as friend, His bride and to have the love relationship with our Heavenly Father that He desires.

At the time I read this book I had it printed in Russian for our leaders and suggested it be used as a devotional, answering the questions throughout the book.

I guarantee you will find this book so helpful to come into a deeper relationship with Jesus. I just read it again and was blessed! So enjoy Come To Me.

Blessing and in His Love,

Paula Shields

Author of Healing of the Soul

Acknowledgements

When God told me to write this book, He told me it would be birthed in pain. At the time I had no idea what He meant. God was true to His word, though the pain was not my own.

I want to thank those of you, especially my wife, who showed me what it means to seek God in the mess of life. Thanks for your questions and your hope. Thanks for teaching me so much about God.

Thanks to those people along the way who believed in this project and, I guess, in me and gave. Thanks in particular again to my wife for her companionship, encouragement and editing acrobatics and to my brother, who loves the Truth.

Finally thanks to God. I don't really know what to say, God. You know me, you formed me and you have borne this book and made something for Yourself. Thank you for your gentleness and determination. Your patience and trust amaze me.

How to use this book

This book can be read individually or as a group. One of the things that I have tried to emphasise throughout the text is questions. When Jesus taught He asked a lot of questions. As people trying to figure out how to live with God on planet earth we also have a lot of questions. Questions are important. Without questions the answers make no sense.

What I have aimed to do is use the questions that many of us are asking as a catalyst for discussion. I have also added my own questions to get us thinking and applying the material that this book presents. I have placed the questions for reflection through the text at places where they naturally arise.

This structure of questions and discussion means the book proceeds somewhat like a conversation. My hope is that this conversation about life with God will extend beyond the book and into your community of believers. That's why I would encourage you to get together with other people and read the book together. As you read, think, talk and pray, you will probably find you have more questions. That's great. Use them as a catalyst to find the truth.

We are on a journey of discovery - a journey driven by questions and the hope of answers.

My prayer is that God would bless you immensely as you read. God is good and wonderfully kind. He is our King and our Guide. He will lead us into the truth and the freedom we long for.

Truth

If you hold to My teaching, you are really My disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.

John 8:31b-32

Chapter 1

Our desire for God

Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost. Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labour on what does not satisfy? Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and your soul will delight in the richest of fare. Isaiah 55:1-2

Hunger

My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? Psalm 42:2

Inside each of us is a desire to know and be with God.

Maybe you would not express it that way. Maybe you would talk about a deep ache inside, about a weariness that you can never seem to shake, and your desire to really rest, to find peace. Maybe you would talk about a loneliness that never leaves regardless of how crowded the market, how full the apartment - and the longing for deep, real companionship. Perhaps you would talk about fear - feeling afraid of God and fearful about the future - and the yearning to feel peaceful and secure, protected and watched over.

Maybe you would talk about shame – shame about who you are and how you look - and the deep need to be accepted wholly as you are, to be enjoyed and respected. Maybe you would talk about boredom and your desire to be fascinated, to be in awe. Maybe you would talk about your desire to be forgiven or to be healed of wounds that you know no one in all the world can fix. Maybe you would talk about your quiet desperation to find love - to be wholeheartedly, unconditionally cherished by one that you trust completely.

For some of us this pain and these desires are like whispers that we only occasionally hear if we stop and listen. For others they are a wall of a noise – weariness, shame and lovelessness are daily, constant companions.

Whether it is a whisper or a wall of noise - all of us have these desires for peace, for rest, for love. When these desires are unmet, it is inevitably painful. The pain might not be sharp, it might only be a dull ache, but it is present. The temptation to try to numb this pain is great and real.

As Christians, many of us have been taught that we should be content, we shouldn't feel burdened, we should feel loved, we should be full of joy, we should be a new person. So what do we do if we don't feel like that? As Christians, where do our feelings, our pain, our disappointment, and the longings of our hearts fit? It is easy to feel guilty even for admitting we have unmet needs. So what do we do? Should we just try to numb our needs? Should we mute our questions? Does God know about them? Does He care? Does He condemn our need and our brokenness?

God says that He is close to the broken-hearted (Psalm 34:18). God says that the poor in spirit, the meek, those that mourn, those that hunger and thirst for righteousness, are blessed (Matthew 5:3-6). Why? I believe it is because those desires, that great need, that brokenness, which I have sketched, are our desire for God expressed in the language of our hearts. The need comes out of the murk and wreckage of sin, yet the cry, in its brokenness, is ultimately a cry for God.

Reflection: Do you tell God about the deep longings of your heart? Take some time now to tell God about them. You may want to write these down.

Created to be satisfied by God

God created us. He made us in His image (Genesis 1:27). He created our bodies, minds, souls, and our emotions. King David wrote in Psalm 139:1-2, 13: O LORD, you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; You perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; You are familiar with all my ways... For you created my inmost being; You knit me together in my mother's womb.

God made us to live with Him. We see this clearly in the book of Genesis where Adam and Eve are described as being with God in the Garden of Eden doing the work He had given them. Loving relationship with God is our chief purpose as human beings. After Adam and Eve's original sin mankind's relationship with God was broken, yet the need for God remained. The way we were designed remained even if it was distorted by sin. Even though people may not know that their chief purpose is to live with God, deep inside we all long for God. We were created to need God's love, companionship and purpose. God has created us with eternity in our hearts (Ecclesiastes 3:11), with a longing to be eternally with Him. He has designed us in such a way that we will be endlessly dissatisfied until we return home to Him.

The pain, the longings, the needs that many of us face on a day-to-day basis, are a powerful witness to the fact that this is true. All our lives we have been trying to get our needs satisfied through varying means – the love of other people, devotion to family, loyalty to a cause, alcohol, pornography, success, astrology, money, food, philosophy, religions, demonic powers, pleasure and many more. I tried to satisfy my needs, to bury my shame, through a mixture of success, lust and trying to win the love of others. But as I discovered, and as you are probably well aware, none of these pursuits really satisfy our longings. All of them leave us empty because all of them are poor substitutes for the real thing – relationship with the living God.

Reflection: In the past, how have you tried to find love, peace and fulfillment? Has this changed since you became a believer? How?

Our deep desires and the eventual dissatisfaction with other things are actually gifts from God for, if acknowledged, they cause us to hunger and thirst for Him. Jesus declares, "Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh." (Luke 6:21) In God's kingdom, if you know you are hungry, you are blessed. If you know you are poor in spirit, or if you know you are mourning, you are blessed, for you are ready to be satisfied by God. Our brokenness is an amazing confirmation in the midst of the noise of life that we were made for better things - that we were made for God.

The wonderful news is that the God of the universe, the God who made us to be with Him, to need Him, promises that as we seek Him in our pain and desperation we will be filled and satisfied by Him. God has not left us to struggle alone with our pain and need. He has come to us in Jesus and says, "I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me will never go hungry, and he who believes in Me will never be thirsty" (John 6:35). Jesus declares, "Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks the door will be opened." (Matthew 7:7-8)

God's call to us, His people, is to come to Him. He is calling us into deep loving relationship with Himself. He is calling us to Himself so that we would be completely satisfied by Him alone. He is wanting to pour Himself, His presence, into our lives and the depths of our hearts so that we will be filled to overflowing with the abundant life of God. Into our vast chasm of need, into our brokenness, our ache for love, our shame, our loneliness, our longing for peace and healing, God wants to pour Himself. God's eternal purpose for us is that we would be satisfied only in Him, so that we would be able to join with all of God's people singing joyfully to His glory, "All my fountains are in You." (Psalm 87:7)

The problem however is that as Christians we are not taught to see our need and longing as God-given. Nor do we actually believe that God is the Good Giver, the Lover and Satisfier of our souls. Too often we believe that to admit need is to admit that we are not 'good Christians'. Too often we think that our need for love and healing is something that God would condemn if we admitted it to Him. As a consequence, when faced with our need and hunger we feel deep shame. We hide our needs from other believers and, most importantly, we try to hide them from God.

Reflection: Do you try to hide your pain and struggles from other people? Do you try to hide these from God?

We find ourselves stuck. We have longings and needs that can only be satisfied in God, yet we feel unable and unwilling to go to God because we believe He will not give what we long for. The problem is not that God is not giving or not loving. The problem is that we don't really know who God is. To find our home, our rest and the love that we crave in order to be satisfied we need the truth – truth about who God is and how He sees us. The beautiful news is that God wants to help us. He wants to show us who He really is so that we can confidently, without fear or shame, go to Him and find the rest and life we long for.

Chapter 2

Who do you really think God is?

"But what about you?" [Jesus] asked. "Who do you say I am?" Matthew 16:15

Julia moves into a new apartment block. She decides to have a celebration and invite the people in her stairwell. She starts to visit her neighbours inviting them to her party. Finally, she has only one more apartment to visit. She is walking up the stairs to the apartment to knock on the door when she meets someone else in the stairwell. "Don't knock on that door," he tells her, "Don't invite them. That old man is about as nasty as they come." So she decides not to knock on the door and does not invite him to her celebration.

The day of the party comes, guests arrive, they celebrate. After a while one of the guests approaches her and asks, "Where is Nikolai?" "Who is Nikolai?" she asks. "Why he's the most wonderful old man - so kind, so gentle. He always loves to welcome people into our apartment block." She is confused.

Later, in a conversation with another neighbour, she learns that the person she met in the stairwell who told her not to invite the old man to the party was bitter. The old man had refused to give him money for alcohol. The day after the party Julia visits Nikolai. He and his wife welcome her warmly. She gets to know them for herself, and finds new friends.

What Julia first heard about Nikolai determined what she thought about him and how she related to him. It stopped her from getting to know her neighbour for herself. Only after she heard the truth did she have the courage and the desire to get to know Nikolai and his wife personally and to seek their friendship.

Where our beliefs about God come from

When we become Christians, we already have a great number of ideas about God. All our lives, even before we were Christians, we have been building up a picture of who we think God is. Everyone does this it seems – even atheists. Throughout our lives we have been hearing information, witnessing events and, usually without being aware of it, developing an understanding of God.

Unfortunately, not all this information that we have used to determine what we think about God is right or helpful. The ideas that we have about God are the result of a whole variety of influences in our lives. As a consequence, what we place our faith in is often a real mixture of ideas. Some of them are true but a lot of them are wrong. For example, through looking at creation all our lives we know the truth that God is hugely powerful and wonderfully creative. But we may have been taught at school that God doesn't exist or is just a fairytale. I cannot hope to address all of the influences which have shaped our view of God, but I will point out a few that I think are crucial in giving us an understanding of how our picture of God has developed.

Creation: Romans 1:20 says, "For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities – His eternal power and divine nature – have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse." God has dramatically revealed His splendour and majesty through His creation. Anyone who has gazed at a sunset knows this is true. There is a majesty and beauty in God's creation that leaves us without doubt that God is wonderfully powerful and wonderfully good.

Parents and other 'father' figures: God's purpose is that parents and other 'father' figures, such as leaders and people in authority, should reflect His character so children grow up understanding what God is like. For those of us who have grown up being unconditionally loved and cared for by our parents it will be natural for us to understand that God loves and watches over us too. However, for many of us our parents have not reflected God's character. Instead they have been abusive or distant or unloving or unemotional or absent. As children we simply accepted that God was like our parents. The result is that many of us have grown up afraid and angry at what we believe to be a cold, abusive, unloving God.

Other religions or other gods: The character of the god/s of the religions we believed in before we became followers of Jesus is often vastly different from the character of Jesus. It is easy for us to take what we believed about those other gods and transfer it directly onto our understanding of the true God. For example, if we have believed in a distant, unmerciful god, then it will be easy for us to start thinking as Christians that our Father God is also distant and unmerciful. Moreover, sometimes we are like the Israelites in Exodus 32 who created a golden calf to worship instead of the true God. We, like them, want a god who is just the way we want him to be: easy to understand and similar to us. So we form an image of God in our minds that is not consistent with the truth of who God is.

False teaching: The Bible warns about false teachers, who will come and lead our minds astray to believe information about God that is not true (2 Corinthians 11:3-4). For example, in the Bible, Paul writes a letter to the Galatian church to correct false teaching they were receiving. The false teachers were arguing that salvation occurred by obeying the Law, not through faith in Jesus alone. Paul made it very clear that we are only saved through faith in Jesus, not by our own efforts to obey the Law. As believers not all the teaching we receive about God is true. We need to know the truth as God has revealed it in the Bible and stand on that truth, not simply accepting teaching because it comes from someone in authority.

My culture and its values: The culture we live in and the values it holds promote certain ideas about God. For example, a culture with a strong emphasis on the importance of the family reflects God's fathering of His children in a helpful way. Yet many of the dominant values and attitudes of the people and institutions we are surrounded by promote false information about God. Much of our society declares that God does not exist, that He does not care about the world and or about suffering, that God is absent and that He is not powerful enough nor willing to protect His people and provide for them.

My experiences: Experiences are powerful influences on our understanding of God. If you have been healed by God or have witnessed an answered prayer this experience builds your faith and enlarges your understanding of the generosity of God. However, in our lives God does not always act as quickly as we would like and does not always do the things we want Him to. In our confusion and pain we can begin to think that God is not actually who He claims to be.

Satan and demons: Jesus describes Satan, in John 8:44, as the 'father of lies'. Behind all wrong ideas about God stands Satan. Satan understands that what we believe about God is the most important thing about us, so he is doing everything he can to stop us (and the rest of the world) from believing the truth about God. Therefore using as many different means as are made available by people's sin, Satan and his demons are attempting to persuade people to believe his lies about God. He is consistently feeding us lies about who God is.

The Bible and The Holy Spirit: These are the reliable sources of truth about who God is. Most of us have already believed some of the truth of the Bible, or we would not have become Christians. I will discuss these two sources of truth in greater detail later in the book.

Reflection: Where have your ideas about God come from? Which of the influences listed above have affected you most strongly?

When I became a believer I wasn't aware that I already had fixed ideas about God. I also had no idea that these ideas determined how I related to God. I just believed in Jesus and did what I thought Christians were supposed to do. In fact I didn't really think that much about who God was at all. I just collected facts about God and kept on going about being a Christian trying to make sure my behaviour changed so that I lived a more moral life.

Slowly though, I started to become a bit more aware of what was happening. For example, I knew that it was good to ask Jesus to be Lord over my day. So I did that. But when I asked Jesus if He had anything particular that He wanted me to do that day, I couldn't listen. I found myself sticking my fingers in my 'spiritual ears', so to speak. I was terrified of what God was going to say. I knew in my head that God was good and would only want good things for my day but in my heart I just could not believe it. In my heart I thought God was cruel and would actually tell me to do something that would cause me pain. It has taken years for me to start to really believe that God is good, not just to know it as a concept.

What I really believed in my heart, not the facts I knew in my mind, determined how I related to God. This should not come as a surprise. We will always relate to God with our hearts. It's the way He has made us. It's just a question of whether our hearts are open to God or closed. Mine, as you can clearly see from the example, was closed. The degree to which our hearts are closed or open to God is largely dependent on who we really believe God is.

Reflection: How do you picture/imagine God? Take some time to sit alone. Ask the Holy Spirit to help you understand what you really believe in your heart about God.

Do you see God as distant? Do you believe He is unloving? That He does not care for you personally? That He is eager to punish you? That He is only pleased with you when you do 'good' things?

Thankfully, the God of the Bible is very different from many of our ideas about Him. John the apostle describes God this way, "God is light; and in Him there is no darkness" (1 John 1:5). God is entirely good, entirely holy, entirely truthful, entirely faithful and entirely loving. There is no evil, no sin in Him. He is all-powerful, all loving, holy and kind, gracious and just. God is awesome and wonderful. God - God the Father, God the Son, Jesus (John 10:30–33), and God the Holy Spirit (2 Corinthians 3:17) - three persons in One, is love (1 John 4:16). This is our God – the God who reached out to us in love and restored us to His family by sending Jesus to die for us.

Closed hearts to God

When we become Christians we often use our old understanding of God as the basis for how we relate to God. This is understandable. We are trying to relate to God but we know so little about who He truly is. We grab for our old ideas that are familiar. Usually, like me, we are not aware that we are doing this.

As new believers we are told the facts about who God is and what He is like. Often, however, we find these truths very difficult to believe. We have had our old understanding of God for a long time. When you have believed something for quite a while it doesn't change instantly, especially if it is something as huge and important as our understanding of who God is. We are not robots. Our beliefs are not simply instantly re-programmed when we decide to follow Jesus.

The problem is that our old beliefs are often far from the truth. Therefore, as I can testify, they seriously damage the way we relate to God.

Clearly what we actually think about God is incredibly important. Indeed these real personal beliefs about God are, arguably, the most important thing about us. It is this, rather than what we know we should believe, that truly determines how we relate to God. What we actually think and believe about God determines where and with whom we will spend the rest of eternity and it shapes how we live each day on earth.

Consider again Julia's experience of getting to know Nikolai. The wrong ideas Julia had heard and believed caused her to think that Nikolai was different to who he actually was. It was only when Julia actually heard a different opinion about Nikolai and chose to find out for herself who Nikolai really was, that she became friends with him.

The same thing happens in our relationship with God. When we base our idea of God on wrong information, we will hide from God in fear, rather than knock on His door, enter into His presence and enjoy His friendship. Again, this is understandable. The unloving, demanding, distant god that many of us believe God to be is certainly not someone we would want to spend time with. Only when we actually discover the wonderful truth of who God is will we dare to approach God and trust Him to be our friend and the One who satisfies our hearts.

As I tried to relate to God with a distorted picture of who He was, my relationship with Him became one of distance and mistrust. I believed in Jesus, indeed deep in my heart I longed to be with God, but due to the lies I had believed, I didn't trust Him. So I tried to live as I thought He wanted me to, but I kept Him at a good distance to protect myself, fearing His punishment. I was like the people of Isaiah 29:13 - my lips honoured God but my heart was far from Him.

We hide from God by closing our hearts. Although we trust God for our salvation, on a day-to-day basis we can keep our hearts closed to Him. It's like any other relationship. We can choose to trust others and let them see who we really are or we can hide and keep them at a distance. By keeping our hearts closed we think we are protecting ourselves from God. But in reality we are keeping ourselves from being able to experience the wonder of relationship with the God of the universe.

Reflection: How do you think your understanding of God affects the way you relate to Him? Do you find it difficult at times to open your heart to God? What are some of the reasons for this?

The struggle

By trying to keep my heart closed to God I stopped myself from being able to enjoy God. God seemed distant and unconcerned about me.

When we shut our hearts to God our desire to know God and be with Him is not met. As the previous chapter, Our Desire for God clearly displayed, our need for God and His love is huge. Not having that need met by God is devastating. The wonder of the gospel is that through Jesus and His death and resurrection we can enter into loving relationship with God freely. We can be satisfied by God. Jesus boldly declares this truth when He says, "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink." (John 7:37) The Bread of Life, the Living Water that we long for is Jesus.

Yet because of the wrong ideas we have believed we have kept our hearts closed to God and have tried to hide ourselves from Him, so we have not been satisfied. Though the One who alone can satisfy our hearts is with us, in our distrust we have not gone to Him to be filled with His love and His presence. The pain and weariness of unmet desires has grown, not lessened.

As a result of this process, there is growing confusion in our lives and continual aching. Songs at church feel like empty words rather than our heart's praise to God. Prayer feels like talking to a brick wall. We hear a sermon, say a prayer that the pastor tells us to pray, but don't feel like we are forgiven and certainly don't seem to have relationship with God. We are told that God loves us but all we feel when we think of God is His anger and disapproval. We are told that God is always with us, our constant companion, but in our lives God seems distant and unconcerned with us. We are told we are a new creation but we continue to be plagued by feelings of condemnation about what we have done in our past.

Rather than rest, we feel deep weariness - rather than peace, fear and anxiety. Rather than feeling beautiful and enjoyed, we feel deep shame. Rather than feeling close companionship with God, we feel abandoned. Rather than feeling loved, we feel tolerated. We feel betrayed and yet our longings, our desire for God, remains. So our pain increases as does our confusion and disappointment at this thing called Christianity.

The desire for God in our hearts struggles in the painful heat of the drought of lies, longing for water. Often though, in that place of struggle, the last thing we think will relieve our thirst is truth about God. Instead we think that God has failed us, that he loves some of His children but not us. But God is true. Jesus said, "... whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life."(John 4:14)

God understands and wants to help

When we start to understand where these wrong beliefs have come from and the affect that they are having on our relationship with God it can be a little overwhelming. Maybe you have only recently become a Christian and are at the very beginning of your spiritual walk. Or maybe you have been a Christian for years and are only just starting to face up to your disappointment and questions about God's heart towards you. When we consider who we really think God is, compared to what we know is the truth, we can begin to feel as though there is no hope, that we are bound up in too many wrong ideas and lies to ever walk with God freely.

At this point we need to remember the truth that we are journeying with God. God has placed a deep desire to know Him in our hearts. And His purpose is to satisfy that desire with Himself as we grow in loving relationship with Him. As believers, He has placed His precious Holy Spirit in each of us (Ephesians 1:13-14). God gave us the Holy Spirit to help us on our journey and importantly to remind us of the truth that we are God's (see John 14 & 16; 2 Corinthians 1:22). We are not alone.

God knows that we struggle with wrong ideas about Him and that they cause us to hide from Him. He knows and He does not condemn us (Romans 8:1). If you need further Biblical proof, consider how Jesus relates to His disciples. They doubted, they rebuked, they even abandoned Jesus when they were persecuted, yet Jesus lovingly forgave them and helped them to keep walking with Him. Rather than condemn us, God wants to help.

The first opinion about Nikolai that Julia heard was wrong. At the time she didn't know any better so she accepted it and avoided him. Later though, Julia heard a different opinion about Nikolai. Initially she was confused but decided to take a risk and find out for herself who Nikolai really was. So she knocked on his door. He welcomed her in and she discovered the truth about Nikolai and found a wonderful friend.

We need to get to know God. We are longing, aching for His presence and His love but we're too scared to knock on His door. We need someone to tell us who He really is. Someone who knows Him. Someone we can trust. Someone who will open the door and introduce us to God. That Someone is Jesus.

Chapter 3

Jesus

No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made Him known. John 1:18

Jesus brings the truth about God. Jesus says, "Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father" (John 14:9). When we get to know who Jesus is, we get to know who God the Father is. Jesus tells us and shows us who God is. He dispels our fears and doubts and brings the truth.

All through His time on earth Jesus repeatedly said, "I tell you the truth". I love that Jesus only speaks the truth. Trying to relate to someone who often lies is burdensome. You spend your time constantly uneasy, trying to work out whether what the person is saying is true. With Jesus we never have to worry about that – He always tells us the truth. This truth is wonderful. God is unimaginably more awesome, more marvellous than what we expected. This is the good news that will give us courage and confidence to freely go to God – to the Satisfier of our souls.

Jesus is the image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15). For people like us, who are trying to work out who God really is, this is wonderful news. Jesus came to earth to make His Father known. His life is recorded in the Gospels. I love reading the Gospels because they answer the deepest of questions in an amazingly humble way. Have you ever wondered what God would do in a certain situation? How would God treat a prostitute? How would God treat a disabled person? Would God care for the poor? Or for children? Would God help me if I didn't understand, if I had doubts, if I was confused? Is God compassionate? Does He heal? Does He forgive?

In the life of Jesus recorded in the Gospels we see the answers to our questions spelled out in black and white. In Jesus we see that God is humble. He is kind, compassionate and gentle. He is patient and loving. He is strong, courageous and persevering. He is not an angry, abusive, distant father. He is not an unforgiving, power-hungry, demanding tyrant. He is just and righteous and is longing to forgive us and accept us. Jesus' life shouts loud and clear across all time and people that God is love.

In Jesus the stunning character of God is revealed. The very thing that we feel so unsure of is clearly displayed. And it is breathtaking to behold.

Seeing clearly

Just before I wrote this chapter my wife cleaned our apartment's windows. The windows had certainly not been cleaned in the last 10 months and had seen a long winter and a dusty summer. Yet to be honest I had grown used to them. So used to them in fact that I felt no real need to clean them. My wife, being a little more conscientious and motivated, and, as it turned out, discerning, decided they were in great need of cleaning.

When I first walked through the living room where she was cleaning the outside of the windowpanes, I wasn't really that impressed. They seemed a little clearer but her cleaning didn't appear to be making a breathtaking difference to our outlook. However twenty minutes or so later when I walked past again on the way to the kitchen I was stunned. She had finished cleaning the pane on the inside as well. My first impression was that the pane had been completely removed, not simply cleaned! The trees outside our window looked a shade of green that I had not imagined they were capable of. The view was sharp and pure, untainted by dust or speck. What I was looking at was as true to life as if I had been standing on the open balcony rather than in our living room looking through a glazed window.

This anecdote, I believe, describes many Christians' experience of growth into a greater revelation of truth. We need to see God more clearly for who He really is. How this happens is a dynamic process. It takes time. It is sometimes hard and difficult to see if progress is being made. Ultimately though, it is incredibly rewarding.

How we engage in this process may vary.

Some of us are like my wife. She reckons the windows are dirty, and that despite the work, the benefits of having clean windows will be worth the effort. That is, she has a desire in her for a true understanding of who God is. She recognises that to find the truth she needs to do something about the problem. So she starts cleaning.

Or our attitude may be the same as mine was about the windows. I thought that the view I had was good enough and I was content to do nothing to change it. In the same way we can choose to be content with the picture of God that we currently hold, or we can choose to seek God and ask for revelation.

As I mentioned in the previous chapter, this can be very difficult for us to do, especially if the disillusionment we have felt about our relationship with God has been intense. But I hope that you will have the courage to want to seek truth. I hope that what you have read thus far will encourage you that there is more to life with God than what you may have experienced. God wants all His children to know Him as He truly is.

Reflection: Are you content with the understanding of God that you currently have?

A life journeying into God

When Jesus was on earth He revealed the truth about God. Jesus is continuing to do this today in our lives by His Spirit and His Word. As He does this He exposes the lies we have believed about God and brings the good news about who God really is. In other words, He is showing us how dirty our windowpanes are and how much better the view can be.

Growing in our knowledge of the truth is a process, because getting to know someone is a process. Growing in our knowledge of the truth is about getting to know God. Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life (John 14: 6). Truth is not an abstract set of ideas. It is the person of Jesus. Our path through life, our vitality, are all found in Jesus.

When I realised that I needed to change my understanding of God, I saw it as a task that had to be completed quickly. I thought I needed to identify all the wrong ideas and replace them with right ideas. This is certainly not what God intends to be the way we get to know Him. It is not just about having the right knowledge. It is first and foremost about relating with God and it does not stop.

What does it mean to get to know someone? It would be very strange and very sad, if I was to say to my wife, "Well I think I know all there is to know about you. I think we'll stop talking and living together now."

The same applies to our life with God. We will never get to the point where we can say, "I know God. Now its time I did something else." We will spend all our lives and all eternity getting to know Him better. He is simply unique. He is holy and fascinating. Our lives are a journey of discovery – living with God, learning more of the wonder of who He is and drinking more of His endlessly satisfying Spirit.

On my journey of getting to know God, His goodness was something I struggled to believe. I was told that God was good and that I needed to believe this fact. I tried to convince myself of this, I even memorised Bible verses, but it did not change what I believed in my heart. Deep down, for a whole variety of reasons, I believed that God was out to punish me.

Now however, I believe that God is good, in fact I delight in His goodness. It is one of those things about God that I know for certain. How did this change happen? From what I understand there is no formula. There is no system of inputs and outputs. There is only Jesus. Truth is a person and that's why we go to Jesus. The rest of this book is devoted to unveiling this truth and some of what I have learnt about getting to know God. As I have discovered, getting to know God is a rich process, an exciting, challenging and wonderful journey.

The importance of humility

Our journey with God is all about humility. The exact opposite of humility is pride. Pride says, "No, I'm right and I'll never admit that I'm wrong or that I need to change, especially if you say I need your help!" Pride is content with a distorted view of God, content to walk apart from God.

If we examine how different people responded to Jesus when He walked the earth we can clearly see this principle at work. The outcasts of society in Jesus' time were tax collectors, prostitutes and others that society labeled as 'sinners'. Today you might see them as prostitutes, alcoholics or beggars. They were despised by the self-righteous, religious elite like the Pharisees as not being 'good enough' for God. Many of these outcasts were not proud. They were broken and humbled. Their lives were a mess and they knew it.

An incredible thing happened when these social outcasts met Jesus. Jesus accepted them. He forgave their sins and asked them to come and follow Him, to be His disciples and His friends. Jesus loved the humble social outcasts and enjoyed spending time with them. Jesus shared the great truths of God and His kingdom with them. By contrast, Jesus delivered harsh rebukes to the religious rulers for their hypocrisy and self-righteousness.

For both the religious leaders and the social outcasts God showed Himself to be very different from what they had expected. Jesus' compassion, His acceptance of the humble, His desire to free and not control, were totally unacceptable to the proud-hearted religious elite. Eventually in their hatred for Jesus they plotted to kill Him.

Yet for the humble-hearted, downtrodden of society the truth of Jesus was the most wonderful news imaginable. God was not as the religious elite had made him appear. In Jesus they saw that God was humble. God was loving and kind. God showed mercy. God was just. God forgave sins. God healed. God cared about them. God listened to them. God taught them of His kingdom and His ways. God laughed with them. God wept with them. God wanted to spend time with them. God enjoyed them. He loved having them around Him. He loved them. So wonderful was this truth, this good news, that a number of them left everything and gave their lives to following Him.

Evidently humility is crucial. Humility enables us to open our hearts and accept Jesus in a way that proud hearts never would. This humility is a wonderful key for our ongoing journey with God.

Come to Me

God is calling us in kindness to Himself. As we understand the wonderful kindness of God towards us in Jesus, I believe we will joyfully begin to throw out the lies about God we have believed and embrace the truth of God (Romans 2:4).

Jesus is calling to us, "Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light." (Matthew 11:28 – 30) We will only ever find the rest and the love that we long for when we go to Jesus. In Him we will find our home. In our search, in our need, He is our confidence, our companion, our path and our hope.

Come to Me

All beautiful you are, my darling; there is no flaw in you. Song of Songs 4:7
Chapter 4

What does God think of me?

What is man that You are mindful of him, the son of man that You care for him? Psalm 8:4

If someone asked you to explain who you are, how would you answer? You would probably mention something about your ethnicity, your family and your work. You might say, "I was born in Omsk, Russia. I am the eldest son of four children. I am a student." You also might add some descriptions about yourself: "I hardworking, I am honest, I am kind". Interestingly, these phrases we use to describe ourselves are often the phrases other people have used to describe us. We simply absorb their words.

Defined by relationships

As people, we tend to define ourselves in terms of our relationships to different things. We may define ourselves in terms of our work, "I am a shepherd", "I am an engineer", "I own this restaurant". But predominantly we define ourselves in terms of our relationships to other people. When talking about ourselves we may say, "I am my parent's first child", "I am his wife", "I am her husband", "I am of this ethnic group" and so on. What these people say about us further defines us. For example "My father always said that I looked beautiful so I believe I am beautiful." Or on the contrary, "My husband always says that I am ugly so I believe I am ugly", "I was told by my family that I will never be good at anything" or "I was always told that I was someone special".

These relationships and statements help us to understand who we are and where we fit in the world. Usually the people who are most influential in our lives are the people whose opinion about us we listen to and hold onto the most.

Reflection: Whose opinion about you do you pay the most attention to? Why do think that is the case?

If we base our understanding of our value and who we are on our relationships with others, our different roles and the statements people make about us, we can run into trouble. Roles, jobs, our skills and people's opinions about us change. For example, when a person loses a job it can be very difficult. This is not simply because their income is no longer secure but also because much of their identity was wrapped up in being employed. Moreover, what people say about who we are is sometimes wrong. For example, if someone important in your life tells you that you are useless, it is clearly a lie. God has created you as unique and of infinite worth to Him. The result of this changing mixture of relationships, roles and opinions is that we are often confused about who we are, what our place is in the world and, in particular, what our value is. We can find ourselves adrift, uncertain about who we are and whether we matter to anyone.

When we come to Jesus though, this confusion, uncertainty and fear can end. There is no one more important in the universe than God and there is no one more important in our lives than God. By going to Him and hearing what He thinks of us and how we fit into His understanding of His world, we can discover our true identity and our true value. Rather than basing our lives on the changing relationships and opinions of people we can find peace on the rock of our relationship with God.

Our search is a search for truth because the truth will set us free. In this chapter we will start our search with this question that is at the core of our beings, "What does God think of me?" We will go to God to get these answers. What we believe the answer to this question is influences our entire lives in an incredibly powerful way. It's a crucial area in which we need the truth. The answers we find will shed light on who we are and, most importantly, on who God really is.

What does God think of me?

You already have an answer to that question. Just as we all believe something about who God is, so we all have a belief about what He thinks of us. We simply make the logical leap from who we think God is to how we think He sees us. For example, if we think that God is distant and vengeful then we will think God doesn't want to be near us and is eager to punish us. These beliefs are often revealed by the way we relate to God.

Reflection: What do you honestly think is God's opinion of you?

As we discussed in the previous chapter, our existing answers to the question of who God is and what He thinks of us may be wrong. And we have decided that we want the right information, the truth, more than the wrong information, lies. So our search for true answers has begun.

Where do we begin our search? Do we try to work out the answer with the information we currently have? Do we ask other people? Do we pray and ask God to tell us what He thinks of us? We agree that the truth sets us free, but how do we find the precious truth about what God thinks of us?

Reflection: Have you searched in the past to understand who you are? Where and how have you searched?

The Bible

God knew that we would, at some time in our lives, ask these questions. So to answer our questions He wrote down clearly what He thinks of us. In the Bible we have an awesome record of what God thinks of those who believe in Jesus. So in our attempt to answer the question of what God thinks of us, I want to start by looking at the Bible.

The Bible is a treasure chest. The Bible is more than a holy book that is full of useful verses which will protect us from evil. It is not simply an instruction book of commands that must be obeyed. It is not a book that should just be memorised or read but not understood. It is actually a collection of a number of books inspired by the Holy Spirit, written by humans, in a variety of literary styles – poetry, narrative, song, letter – which record crucial parts of God's dealings with mankind. The Bible is priceless. It gives us a unique insight into the person of God as He reveals Himself and relates to His creation. In the Bible, God is making Himself known to us.

When we look at photographs or hear our family tell stories about our ancestors we get a picture of who they were, what they did and how they interacted with other people. In the same way, when we read the Bible we learn about what God did in the past and how He interacted with His creation, and also what He will do in the future.

But unlike our ancestors, God is not dead. He is still alive. The Bible then becomes not just a history book but a book that is incredibly relevant to us now. It speaks to us even though it is ancient because the God who inspired it is the same today as He was then. For example, if God hated sin 3000 years ago then we know that He hates sin now because His character does not change. Similarly, if God said that He loves all people 3000 years ago, then because of His unchanging character, we know that He still loves all people today.

The Bible and how to read it is a big topic. I do not have the space to do it justice here but I would encourage you to read other books that talk more fully on the subject. The main point is that if you want truth, the place to start is the Bible.

Pictures of His people

One of the main ways that God conveys what He thinks about His people in the Bible is through the use of different pictures to describe our relationship with Him. From these pictures we can learn a lot about who we are in God's opinion. God describes us in the Bible as His children (1 John 3:1), Jesus' Bride (Revelation 19:7), His servants (Matthew 25:21), His friends (John 15: 15), His sheep (John 10:14-15), His priesthood, His holy nation (1 Peter 2:9), His fellow workers (1 Corinthians 3:9), His disciples (Matthew 28:19), His ambassadors (2 Corinthians 5:20), and His stewards of His creation (Genesis 1:28). These are just a few examples. Clearly our relationship with God is of incredible depth and incredible importance to Him.

In this chapter I want to focus on two of the most important images God uses to describe our relationship with Him. The first is that He is our Father and we are His children. The second is that Jesus is our Bridegroom and we are His Bride. Within these two pictures of our relationship with God are contained the most profound truths about who we are to God and what He thinks of us. A third important image is that God is our Lord and King and we are His servants. I only mention that briefly here. It is a stunning and astounding privilege to be able to serve the Living God and participate with Him in building His eternal Kingdom. I will further develop this idea later in the book. Here we will look at these two crucial truths: that we are the Father's children and Jesus' Bride. To explore these truths we will search the Bible.

The emotions of God

Before diving into these Biblical pictures in depth, I want to mention a very important fact about God which instantly magnifies the wonder of God's declarations about who we are to Him. This truth is simply that God both thinks and feels. God is not unemotional and distant. Rather He feels and experiences emotions at a depth and intensity we cannot begin to fathom.

Reflection: Have you thought that God has emotions? If not, why? If so, what emotions have you thought He felt towards you?

To get a glimpse of this wonderful aspect of our God's nature I want to look briefly at a passage from Zephaniah 3. These words speak prophetically about those who will worship Jesus. That's us! The prophet Zephaniah says:

The Lord, your God, is in your midst, a warrior who gives victory; he will rejoice over you with gladness, he will renew you in his love; he will exult over you with loud singing as on a day of festival. Zephaniah 3:17(NRSV)

It is a remarkable statement. It's as though, for a few moments, Zephaniah is able to understand clearly the heart and activity of the invisible God. He is stunned and proclaims it boldly. Often we can feel stuck on earth, unable to access God and understand who He is or how He feels about things. Suddenly, in this passage, the curtain is pulled back and God reveals Himself and His heart towards us.

What do we find? Well, the first thing I think that really struck Zephaniah is that God is singing. God is not silent; He is not sitting on His big gold throne, distant, aloof, only interested in throwing lightning bolts at people who do not obey Him. God is singing. I cannot imagine how beautiful His voice must be. In the book of Revelation, Jesus' voice is described as being 'like the sound of rushing waters', like a massive waterfall \- a thundering, rich voice. I guess when God sings it sounds like the most amazing choir ever known. It must be incredible to behold. And what is God singing? Not judgement and wrath. He is singing delight, rejoicing and love over His people.

God is not only singing but He is moving as well. Verses 17 and 18 say, "He will exult over you with loud singing as on a day of festival". The Hebrew word translated 'exult', also means to spin around under the influence of any violent emotion (Strong, 1998 Strong's Hebrew and Greek Dictionaries Electronic Edition STEP Files Copyright © 1998, Parsons Technology, Inc). The picture then is this - God is singing and He is so full of joy over us, His people, that He is spinning around. He is not contained and withdrawn. He is releasing all His energy and delight as He rejoices unrestrained over us. What an incredible thing for God to do.

God is also described as rejoicing over us "with gladness". God does not resent us. He is happy. We bring joy and gladness to God. Though we are fallen, sinning people, yet because of Jesus' work on the cross we are made holy and pure before God. We are His children. We have been adopted into God's family. He happily rejoices over His kids.

This sort of information about God may be very difficult for us to believe. Many of us, including myself, have for a long time, had a very limited, almost one-dimensional view of God. God in my mind was powerful, knew everything, and was very big. The only emotion that He possibly had was anger. This fitted in with what I believed about Jesus. Although Jesus was both human and God, I still believed that He felt no emotion. I thought He was like an emotionless robot, cruising through life on earth, immune to any of the difficulties and emotional changes that affect everyone else who lives on the planet.

Yet from this text in Zephaniah, we learn that God is not as we have thought He is. Actually, He is incredibly emotional. Emotions are not bad things that we must block out. Emotions are actually God given, and God has them too. Indeed, God has more emotional capacity than we do and feels things more deeply than us. So when God is described as rejoicing, as singing, as spinning around with delight over us, we know that His delight, His joy is far greater than anything we can imagine.

This knowledge of God's emotions is an essential foundation for building our understanding of what God thinks of us. God has created us with an amazing emotional capacity. We respond to emotions in others and we feel emotions deeply. Not understanding that God has emotions can leave us feeling like God is altogether different from us and that He is someone with whom we cannot relate.

Without an appreciation of His emotional involvement, statements such as "God loves you", can seem flat and lifeless. The knowledge that God is emotional brings such truths to life. God becomes colourful where before I had imagined Him in black and white. The vibrancy, the vigour, the dynamism of a deeply emotional God is awesome! So with this new information our question now becomes, "What does God think and feel about me?" Let's find out.

Chapter 5

Children of God

But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.

The son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.'

But the father said to his servants, 'Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let's have a feast and celebrate. For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.' So they began to celebrate. Luke 15:20 - 24

When was the last time you were told you were a child of God? How did hearing that truth affect you? As a believer, I was often told that I was a child of God but it didn't really seem to affect me much. God still seemed distant. It didn't really make me feel especially loved. Why? Surely it's an amazing thing to be a child of God. Well not if we believe God to be an angry, distant father. Being a child of God is a wonderful truth, but it remains a hollow title until we begin to appreciate what kind of Father our God truly is. When we discover this, our hearts will begin to rejoice at the honour and the wonder that it is to be a child of the unconditionally loving, gentle Father God.

What kind of Father?

In Luke chapter 15 Jesus tells a story about two sons, better known as the parable of the prodigal son. In the story one of the sons leaves his father's property, taking with him his share of the inheritance. He squanders his inheritance, falls into poverty and, in desperation, decides to return to his father. The passage quoted at the beginning of this chapter records the events of his return to his father. It is a passage which wonderfully portrays the heart of our Father God.

Read over the quote above again. Put yourself in the place of the son and imagine what he is feeling. You are well aware that you have squandered your inheritance, which should have lasted you for years. You have been irresponsible and have shamed your father's name. The central question that is running around in your head must be this, "What will your father do?"

The son in the story was clearly expecting the worst. The son says to himself in verse 18 prior to returning, "I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired men." The son is bracing himself for the worst punishment he can think of – being thrown out of the family and being called a hired hand. He expects to get the punishment he deserves. He is plodding along towards home, head-down, fearful and ashamed. He does not expect love or forgiveness - only punishment. He does not expect grace because he does not know his father.

What is the father doing while the son is reluctantly making his way home? Is he plotting how to punish his son? Jesus says, "But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him..." The father was watching the road, expectant, eager for his son's return. The father was longing for his son's return.

As he longingly looked for his son, the father's heart was filled not with anger but "with compassion" (note the rich emotion). The father displayed his compassion in action. He ran to his son. He did not wait for his son to walk the whole way to the house, humiliated. He ran to greet his son. Before the son had a chance to say his prepared speech, the father poured out his affection and embraced his son. He "threw his arms around him and kissed him." His welcome, his embrace, his joy over his son's return was complete and unconditional.

Imagine how it would feel to lose a child and then find them again. The joy would be unparalleled. Jesus says that this is the joy experienced in heaven when one of the precious people God created returns to Him (Luke 15:10). Our heavenly Father created us to be His children. He longs for us to be with Him. Although all of us have rebelled and sinned against God, He has continued to long for His children to receive His love and return to Him. When we return to our Father God, He is ecstatic. Wonderfully, He does not cool off after we have returned and then push us aside. He wants us to forever receive His love and enjoy Him just as He enjoys us.

I love what happens next. In verse 21 the son makes his speech declaring that he understands that he should be expelled from the family. This sounds like the sort of thing a father would want to hear from a son who has done so much wrong. But the father will have none of it. Rather than expel him as the son had expected, the father honours him.

The father does not want the son to think for a second that he does not want him in the family. So as quickly as he can the father showers the very best gifts over his son: the best robe, a ring and sandals, a fattened calf and a party. The son had returned home destitute and hungry, in rags and stinking from feeding pigs. The father lavishes rich clothes, food, honour and dignity upon his precious son. He does not disown and punish him, he embraces and blesses him and in the presence of his household and guests, he is proud to call him "this son of mine".

The grace and blessings that our Father God gives us when we return to Him are amazing. Ephesians 1:3 exclaims, "Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ." The dignity, the honour, the forgiveness and rich revelation of Himself that He gives to us, is breathtaking.

This is just a glimpse of our heavenly Father and His heart for us - His returned children. The wonderful longing and compassion, the action and embrace, the restoration and the honour, the kindness and generosity of the father in this parable, are the character and heart of our Father God. As His returned children, we are recipients of this amazing unconditional love. What a great Dad!

Reflection: Have you thought of God as your Father before? How is God different from your physical father?

As the Father loves Jesus...

I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one: I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. John 17:22-24

It is the night before Jesus' crucifixion. Jesus is pouring out His heart to His Father. Jesus prays for Himself, for His disciples and for all future believers in Him. The excerpt above occurs towards the end of the prayer, when Jesus is praying for everyone that would believe in Him. As He prays, He profoundly reveals our Father's heart for us.

At the end of verse 23, Jesus says to the Father, "[You] have loved them even as you have loved me." What does He mean? Quite simply, that our Father God loves us in the same way that He loves Jesus. Jesus is the Father's beloved Son. Our Father loves Jesus in a way that is beyond anything we can fathom. The love a parent has for a child is but a very dim reflection of the depth, the richness and the purity of the love the Father has for the Son. Jesus, who knows His Father very well, says that this is the way the Father loves us.

That is simply phenomenal. I don't think I have even touched the surface of this truth. I mention it so that we can all be asking God for more understanding of this love that He has for us that goes beyond anything we could hope or dream. I love the way King David grasps for words as he rejoices in this love he has found in God:

How priceless is your unfailing love! Both high and low among men find refuge in the shadow of your wings. They feast on the abundance of your house; you give them drink from your river of delights. For with you is the fountain of life; in your light we see light. Psalm 36:7-9

Reflection: How does this truth that the Father loves you like He loves Jesus make you feel?

When we grasp how unique, how wonderfully loving and gracious our Father's heart is towards us we begin to see many other verses in the Bible about being God's children in a new light. 1 John 3:1 declares, "How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!" That's a fabulous statement, because the Father is so good.

Romans 8:15 states, "For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, 'Abba, Father.'" We do not need to fear our heavenly Father. We are free to return to Him and accept His embrace and call out to Him in our need. He is a compassionate and caring Dad. We can confidently go to Him and find the shelter, comfort and love that we crave.

Our Father loves and cherishes His kids beyond anything we can imagine. He created each of us uniquely and He has a special place for us in His heart and in His family. He is strong and provides for His kids (Matthew 6:32-33). There is no limit to His love and His power. His arms are open, eager for us to turn to Him and receive His embrace. Being a child of God is not a hollow title. When we consider who our Father is we can rejoice at the privilege and the wonder that it is to be a child of God!

Reflection: What does God think and feel about you? Take a moment now to reflect on the passages and thoughts above and write down what you've discovered. Then turn it all into a prayer to God.

God's heart burns for you. He longs for you to return to Him. He forgives you. He welcomes you with open arms. He embraces you. He honours you. You are precious to Him. He loves to lavish gifts upon you. He is proud of you. He enjoys your company. Our Father loves you in the same extravagant way that He loves His Son Jesus.

Chapter 6

Jesus' Bride

As a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will your God rejoice over you. Isaiah 62:5

What is your favourite romantic movie? Titanic? Gone with the Wind? Shrek?! Or your favourite romantic novel? Anna Karenina? Pride and Prejudice? What is it that makes them your favourite? Why do you like them so much?

Recently I was talking with a friend of mine about movies and she told me something that instantly caught my attention. Apparently there is a theory within film and literature studies that says: at the heart of all stories there is just one story. A woman is take captive by a dragon and is rescued by a courageous hero at great cost to the hero. With the rescue over they live happily ever after, extravagantly in love. This very basic plot structure, or part of it, has been employed time and time again as the framework for some of the world's most enthralling narratives.

There is indeed only one story. Our beings and all narratives resonate with its glory. All people at their core long to be cherished and lavishly loved. That one story is our story in Jesus. We were hopelessly ensnared by Satan and sin. Yet Jesus, at the cost of His life, saved us. He rescued us and has made us His Bride, His cherished one. This is the amazing truth of who we are in God.

A bride?!

What does it mean that we - men and women - are Jesus' Bride? It is not always an easy thing to understand (it certainly wasn't at first for me!) and is worth explaining. In its ideal form, marriage is a rich metaphor for the nature and quality of our relationship with Jesus. Jesus uses the image of marriage to describe our relationship with Him because He intended marriage to be a reflection of the way He relates to us.

For example, in the way God intended marriage to be, marriage is a lifelong union based on a covenant agreement. In the 'ideal' marriage the husband never commits adultery and never abandons his wife. In the 'ideal' marriage love is the greatest thing. Love is the reason we have decided to marry and it is the reason we remain married. In the 'ideal' marriage absolute devotion, extravagant passion and sacrificial love for each other are experienced. In the 'ideal' marriage we enjoy each other and are not simply in the marriage contract as a result of family pressure or obligation. In the 'ideal' marriage we grow together in relationship, getting to know each other, doing things together, experiencing life together, in deep friendship and companionship.

This is how Jesus loves us. He is eternally faithful, He sacrificially gave Himself for us. He cares for us. He enjoys our company. As our Bridegroom He thinks we are stunningly beautiful.

Reflection: Do you find this truth that we are Jesus' Bride easy to accept? If not, name some of the difficulties and tell God about them.

As we can see, when Jesus describes us as His Bride He is not describing a contract of obligation and abuse like some earthly marriages may be. When Jesus says we are His Bride, He is describing the quality of relationship He has brought us into. So men if you are reading this and thinking, "This is not for me!" be encouraged. There is nothing un-masculine about the quality of relationship we can have with Jesus. In the same way that being God's children is only good because of the character of the Father, so being the Bride is only good news in light of the character of the Bridegroom. As we will see, our Bridegroom, Jesus, is fantastic.

What kind of Bridegroom?

"In that day," declares the LORD, "you will call me 'my husband'; you will no longer call me 'my master'. I will remove the names of the Baals from her lips; no longer will their names be invoked...

I will betroth you to me forever; I will betroth you in righteousness and justice, in love and compassion. I will betroth you in faithfulness, and you will acknowledge the LORD...

I will plant her for myself in the land; I will show my love to the one I called 'Not my loved one'. I will say to those called 'Not my people' 'You are my people'; and they will say, 'You are my God'." Hosea 2:16-17, 19-20, 23

This passage is from the book of Hosea. It is an Old Testament book recording the prophecies God declared through Hosea. Like other prophecies in the Old Testament this prophecy is fulfilled in us who follow Jesus. Jesus has been around since before the creation of the world. Although this occurred prior to Jesus' time on earth recorded in the gospels, Jesus, by His Spirit, spoke through the prophets long ago. Jesus is speaking through the prophet Hosea about a time in the future when His people will no longer follow other gods but rather will give their hearts to Him. He is speaking prophetically about the relationship we can have with Jesus now. We no longer need to live in fear calling Jesus our master but rather we can call Him our husband. We are Jesus' Bride.

Jesus is speaking to us. He is gazing into our eyes declaring His love. Our Bridegroom is wooing us. Let's listen and be amazed.

"I will betroth you to me forever": Firstly, Jesus declares His eternal commitment to our wary hearts. He has sealed this commitment by shedding His blood for us (Hebrews 9:15). God says elsewhere, "Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you." (Hebrews 13:5) He will never walk out on us. He has promised to love us in steadfast relationship forever.

"I will betroth you in righteousness and justice, in love and compassion.": Amid the flood of unjust divorce, unfaithfulness and broken marriages that covers our world, our Bridegroom Jesus stands declaring the purity of His character and His heart to us.

"...in righteousness and justice": He has shown His justice by taking the just punishment for our sin on Himself, when He died on the cross. We are righteous, restored to relationship with God because our Bridegroom Jesus cleansed us by dying for our sins. He rescued us from the dragon Satan! (Much more on this later)

"...in love and compassion": Jesus chose us to be His Bride in love, not under obligation. Before the creation of the universe Jesus chose us to be His Bride (Ephesians 1:4). He did this out of deep love for us. We are the objects of His desire. Loving us is not a chore or a duty but rather Jesus' joy and delight. He loves us completely selflessly and wholeheartedly and He is full of compassion.

"...in faithfulness": Human beings are often changing - loving someone for a while then stopping and loving someone else. They are unfaithful. Jesus is not. Jesus is completely faithful. He will never leave us, and will always remain true to us. We are His treasured, precious, one and only Bride. He has been faithfully loving us before we knew Him. In His faithful love He rescued us.

Finally Jesus passionately declares, "I will show my love to the one I called 'Not my loved one'. I will say to those called 'Not my people', 'You are my people'; and they will say, 'You are my God.'." Once we were lost and under the curse of sin but now, thanks to Jesus' work on the cross, we are God's people and He is our God. We are Jesus' Bride and He is our Bridegroom. Completely and without reserve we can receive Him as our God.

Reflection: How have you viewed God's relationship with you? Have you seen it as something that is secure and eternal? Who have you thought is more committed to the relationship, God or you?

All beautiful

Jesus unveils His heart for us, His Bride, further in the book of Song of Songs. Wonderfully, He does this by singing. Song of Songs is a love song written by King Solomon. It is also a drama. Its title 'Song of Songs', declares that of all the songs, (Solomon wrote 1005 of them (1 Kings 4:32)), this song is the greatest.

The Song involves a number of characters and tells the story of the romance between King Solomon and a shepherdess he meets. The song follows their relationship from the time they meet through to maturity as a loving couple. It is an incredible song and an incredibly beautiful story. What makes it more amazing is that it is also an allegory describing the Church's romance and journey into deep, mature loving relationship with Jesus.

The two main characters in the song are the Lover, King Solomon and the Beloved, the shepherdess. They are symbolic of Jesus and His Bride, us. The great thing about the Song is that as they interact with each other they sing passionately about what they think and how they feel about each other. So for people like us who are wondering what God thinks and feels about us, it is a goldmine. The Lover sings out:

How beautiful you are, my darling! Oh, how beautiful! Your eyes behind your veil are doves. Your hair is like a flock of goats descending from Mount Gilead. Your teeth are like a flock of sheep just shorn, coming up from the washing. Each has its twin; not one of them is alone. Your lips are like a scarlet ribbon; your mouth is lovely. Your temples behind your veil are like the halves of a pomegranate. Your neck is like the tower of David, built with elegance; on it hang a thousand shields, all of them shields of warriors... All beautiful you are, my darling; there is no flaw in you. Song of Songs 4:1-4,7

Hear again our Bridegroom's fiery love! His words are full of life and adoration: "How beautiful you are, my darling. Oh, how beautiful!" He is clearly overcome with His Bride's beauty. He is doting over her, over us!

I like to imagine Him gazing at His Beloved transfixed, overwhelmed with love for her. He compares her eyes, her neck and her different features with other beautiful things. He is speaking poetically and using similes to try to somehow adequately describe just how lovely she is to Him. The thing that is impressive about this description is that the Bride is completely beautiful to Him. He declares, "All beautiful you are, my darling; there is no flaw in you". What incredible words – "there is no flaw in you". This is exactly how God sees you. You are all beautiful and there is no flaw in you!

Now maybe you are thinking, "This guy is taking this too far. After all it's just a poem and the writer is exaggerating". Not true. These words, sung to the Beloved, are almost exactly the same as those that Paul uses when he is explaining to the church of Ephesus what Christ has done for them through His death and resurrection. Paul says in Ephesians 5:25-27, "Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless [emphasis mine]". "Without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish", can easily be rephrased as 'without any flaws'.

If you asked most Christians how they see themselves as they come to God in prayer, very few people would answer "beautiful". Most of us would probably answer something like "ashamed", "guilty", "not good enough", "scared", or "an annoyance to God". If we used the metaphor of clothing, we would probably say we feel like we are wearing clothing that is dirty and stained from our sin.

However this is not true. When we come to God in prayer we are not ugly, stained, vile creatures. God does not despise us and want to get rid of us from His presence. Rather when God looks at us He is overcome with our beauty. Because we are totally forgiven for our sins by God through Jesus, we stand before God perfect. We do not come to Him beautiful one day and then ugly the next. Jesus has paid for our sins, once for all. We are dazzlingly beautiful before God everyday, forever.

We are so beautiful that He gazes upon us and delights to declare our beauty to us. The Lover, Jesus, says elsewhere in the Song of Songs when singing to His Bride, "You have stolen my heart, my sister, my bride; you have stolen my heart with one glance of your eyes, with one jewel of your necklace." (Song of Songs 4:9). We wonder, "How can Jesus use these words to describe us?" Yet the truth is that we captivate His heart. The God of the universe is enthralled by our beauty.

I can remember a number of times in my life where I have dressed up to go out somewhere or have gotten a new haircut and people have told me my clothes look wrong or my haircut is ugly. I can also remember other times when people have complimented me on how I look and have told me I look great. Being told we are ugly crushes our spirits especially if someone like our dad or husband or wife says it. Being told we are beautiful by someone who is really important to us lifts our spirits amazingly. It's an incredible experience being told we are beautiful by someone who actually means it.

In the same way believing the lie that God, the most important person in our lives, thinks we are ugly crushes us. But actually understanding the truth that God thinks we are stunningly beautiful dynamically lifts our spirits. God made us with a deep desire to feel wanted. He satisfies that desire with His awesome declaration of how beautiful we are to Him. How precious is the truth of the words that Jesus sings to us, "All beautiful you are my darling; there is no flaw in you." It is a powerful truth. As we meditate on our beauty to God we will begin to be transformed in the way we see God and ourselves.

Reflection: When you come to God in prayer, how do you believe He sees you?

As Song of Songs so vividly depicts, Jesus is singing to us a song of love. He is declaring the truth about what He thinks and feels about us. He is singing that we are beautiful. He loves us with all His heart. He is completely infatuated with us.

As people, we love romantic movies like Titanic. It gives us a few hours where we can imagine what it would be like to live our dream – that is to be completely, wholeheartedly loved and in love. Yet these romantic movies, books and songs are only a faint shadow of the true love we have in God. This is what we find in Song of Songs, and this is the truth of God's love. Jesus is wholeheartedly devoted, completely in love with His Bride, which is us. We know this for sure because He made the ultimate sacrifice for the one He loves – He gave His life.

New identity

We established earlier that we are defined by our relationships with others. Their words about us shape our understanding of ourselves and of our value. As followers of Jesus, God now takes centre stage. He is the most important person in our lives. His opinion, what He thinks and feels about us, is the most important, most powerful influence in our lives.

To God we are the Father's kids and Jesus' Bride. He longs for us. He lovingly forgives us and embraces us. He honours us and is proud of us. He sings and declares over us that we are beautiful. He richly enjoys us. We are His delight. He has committed Himself to us forever in holy love. We can confidently say, "I am my Father's precious child", "I am my Beloved's cherished Bride", "God speaks words full of life and love to me!"

Reflection: In light of the last two chapters, how would you answer the question, "Who are you?" Write it down in whatever form you like - prose, poem, song - and then share it with a friend. (Speaking it out will help!)

In looking at these passages in the last two chapters, I am very aware that I am only touching the surface of a vast ocean of truth. The wonder of our relationship with God – of being God's children and Jesus' Bride – is incomprehensible. We could spend all our lives dwelling on these truths and not exhaust their riches. I would encourage you to do just that.

Dedicate yourself to digging deep into the wonder of our Father and our Bridegroom. As we've said, it is the character of the Father and the Bridegroom which makes being His kids and His Bride the awesome privilege that they are. Meditate on these passages that I've discussed and find others like them. Let the words of the Living God overcome the lies that people have spoken to you about your value and who you are. Drink in and chew on these truths. They are the nourishment that our souls have so desperately craved but they are rich food and they require some digestion. Enjoy the banquet. It never finishes and there are always dishes you have yet to savour!

I understand that it may be difficult to immediately believe this new truth. We may not feel beautiful, enjoyed or accepted, and given the way we live, it seems to make a lot more sense that God would think we are ugly and worthy of being rejected. So what is going on? Is God lying? No, He can't lie. But still the question remains, given how we live and who we are, how can God think and feel these wonderful things about us?

Chapter 7

Forgiven forever

But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His wounds we are healed. Isaiah 53:5

It was late. Two young men sat in two separate rooms in different parts of the city. Neither could sleep. Both were agitated, nervous. Both were full of questions. Uncertainty. Expectations. Both watched their clocks. The next morning would be a big day for them both.

The first young man, Evan, was awake lying in his room, trying to work out what his wealthy parents could be getting him for his birthday. His mind ran through all the different possibilities. They had promised a big gift but they hadn't given any hints. A computer? A car? A holiday in America?

The second young man, Victor, was awake lying in his prison cell. He was trying to work out what sentence the judge, out of the two possibilities, would hand down at his trial the following morning. Guilty or not guilty? Was he going to jail or would he walk free?

Expectation and uncertainty are wonderful things when it comes to receiving gifts. But they are suffocating and terrifying when awaiting an impending judgement.

There are some things that God has for us that we will only discover when we get to heaven. He wants us to look forward to these and to await them eagerly. He has blessings to shower on us in heaven that we currently have very little idea about.

There are other things God wants us to know for sure - right now. Our complete forgiveness by God is one of those things. God doesn't want to keep us living like Victor, nervous, uncertain, fearing the worst, wondering whether we will be convicted or freed. This is crippling and suffocating. It is a burden too heavy to live with. It cloaks everything we do: our thoughts, our actions, our prayers. It's not a question of whether we have sinned. Clearly, from the Bible and from what we know of ourselves, we have sinned and deserve to be punished. The question is, what verdict will God, the Judge, give?

Fortunately for us we do not need to wait until the end of our lives, fearfully wondering whether God will forgive us when we die. There is only one issue in God's court. It alone will decide whether we are convicted and punished for our sin or whether we walk free forever. That issue is this: Is our faith in the Lord Jesus or not?

In God's court, it is not a question of how much good or evil you've done in your life. In God's court the standard is high. One sin and you are entirely guilty. The only issue that remains is whether our faith is in the Lord Jesus or not.

Thankfully, this is something we can settle right here and now. We can be free and forgiven, radiant, beautiful to God, forever – and we can know this now. We can look forward to meeting God face to face with joyful anticipation, like Evan in the story above, rather than with uncertainty and fear, like Victor.

The good news

Why is this the case? Why is faith in Jesus the only issue when it comes to our sin and our punishment for it?

God created mankind to dwell with Him in loving relationship. This has always been God's purpose for us. Yet since Adam and Eve, mankind has been sinning. We have been living lives in disobedience and rebellion against God. A quick look around at the state of the world convinces us that this is true. God is just and holy. God hates sin. Since Adam and Eve's original sin, God has demanded that sin be punished. In God's court sin is a serious life or death issue. God's punishment for sin is death.

In the Old Testament, God commanded His people, the Israelites, to kill unblemished, 'perfect' animals to make amends or 'atone' for their sin. The unblemished animals died in the place of the people. People kept sinning. The sacrifices only accounted for their past sins, so they had to repeatedly sacrifice animals to keep on paying for their sins. They were never completely restored to God.

Yet, it had always been in the heart of God to restore all peoples to Himself. We were all guilty. We were dead in sin and separated from God. The only solution was for Someone else – Someone who was without sin - who would take our punishment upon themselves. That Someone was Jesus.

In His huge love, God sent Jesus, His only Son, to earth to die in our place. Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit and was born to Mary. Jesus is both man and God. Jesus walked the earth and lived a perfect, sinless life. Finally, He was crucified on a cross. In dying, Jesus provided the perfect sacrifice for our sins. God made Jesus, who had no sin, to be sin for us (2 Corinthians 5:21). All the wrath of God against the evil sin of the world was poured out on Jesus on the cross.

Just like the animal sacrifice, He died in the place of mankind. Yet, unlike the animal sacrifice, He not only atoned for sins done in the past, He took all the sin of humanity, for all time, upon Himself when He died on the cross (1 John 2:2). So even though He died 2000 years ago, Jesus took our sins and our punishment when He died. We should have been killed and eternally separated from God because of our sin, yet Jesus chose to die in our place. "But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed." (Isaiah. 53:5). The last words that Jesus spoke on the cross were, "It is finished." (John 19:30) Never again would a sacrifice for sin be needed. In God's court the punishment was taken entirely by Jesus.

Amazingly, the story does not stop there. Three days later God raised Jesus from the dead. Through the resurrection, the supremacy of Jesus was revealed. He reigns supreme over every power including Satan and death (Colossians 1:18). Death, the ultimate punishment for sin, no longer had power over Him or those who believe in Him (Hebrews 2:14-15). Just as Jesus was dead, so we were dead in our sin (Ephesians 2:1). Yet as believers in Jesus, just as Jesus was raised up into new life in the power of God, we have also been raised up into new life (Colossians 2:12). We are born again into the kingdom of God, free from the kingdom of darkness and the hold of sin (Colossians 1:13–14). The truth of Jesus' words in John 11:25-26, "I am the resurrection and the life", was powerfully declared to the universe. Jesus is our resurrection and our life. Sin brought death but through Jesus' resurrection, life triumphed.

So the punishment has been taken, sin has been paid for, new life has been birthed, but what does this mean for our lives now. How do we access the wonderful benefit of Jesus' sacrifice and resurrection? How are we declared not guilty in God's court and set free to live?

Accessing God's forgiveness

The simple answer is: by faith in the Lord Jesus and what He has done. We trust in Jesus, and by Jesus we are saved. When we trust in Jesus, we let Him take our place and our punishment. By faith in His resurrection we walk free from the prison of sin into abundant life with God. If we decide not to trust in Jesus' death and resurrection, we are volunteering to take the punishment for sin ourselves and we face certain eternal condemnation.

By faith in Jesus, we participate, in a spiritual sense, in Jesus' death and resurrection. By faith, we die with Jesus to our old life under the curse of sin, all our sins are entirely forgiven (Colossians 2:13) and we are raised with Him into a new life where the curse, the punishment of sin is no longer on us (see Romans 6 especially v.6). We are born again (1 Peter 1:3). We receive the Holy Spirit and eternal life!

By faith in Jesus, we are reunited with God. We are restored to God, completely accepted, and beautiful to Him. We are at peace with God (Romans 5:1). We have free access to the wonders of relationship with the Holy God. God does not condemn us, nor accuse us repeatedly for our sin (Romans 8:1). It is dealt with. Finished. He embraces us completely. Before we were God's enemies, but now we are His friends (1 Peter 2:9-10). Before we were separated from God, but now we can approach Him with freedom and confidence (Ephesians 3:12). Before we were orphans, now we are God's children in whom He takes great joy and delight (Ephesians 1:5). Before we were alone and longing for love, now we are the beautiful Bride of Jesus. These are just some of the wonders of life trusting our Lord Jesus.

When we reflect on Jesus' sacrifice, it is clear our salvation is the Lord's mighty work. We can never make ourselves beautiful by living a perfect life. It's impossible. We have all sinned and not lived up to the glory of God (Romans 3:10-12). Neither can we make God forgive us by doing enough good works. Paul explains this bluntly to the Ephesians, he says, "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast" (Ephesians 2:8-9). God forgives us because He is merciful and we respond to His mercy by trusting in Jesus. There is no other way to salvation and right relationship with God. We are restored to relationship with God, through the work of God, not our work. It is God's wondrous gift to us.

If you live now feeling like God wants to punish you, place your faith in Jesus. If you live now burdened by guilt over wrongs you have done, place your faith in Jesus. If you live now fearing death and hell, place your faith in Jesus. You can be confident that God's judgment against you for your sin has been taken by Jesus. Place your faith in Him. Thank Him for giving His life for you. Tell Him you are sorry for your sin and ask Him to fill your heart with the knowledge of His love and forgiveness as you live your life with Him and for Him. In Jesus we have total forgiveness of sins forever and restoration to right relationship with God. In Jesus we are forgiven once and for all. The sacrifice is done, once and for all. The punishment has been removed. We are forgiven completely and permanently.

God has not left us, like Victor in the story, unsure, uncertain and fearful about impending judgment. He does not want us to worry about our status with Him. He has forgiven us once and for all - forever. God, by His work through Jesus, has made our forgiveness sure and He has given us the gift of a new life walking with Him.

Jesus is standing with arms full - full of pardons for sin. These pardons are His to give and He gives them freely. He won them with His life. Joyfully he gives out pardons – legal documents declaring complete forgiveness for every sin: forgiveness for murder, forgiveness for lying, forgiveness for abortion, for selfishness, for child abuse, for jealousy, for practicing witchcraft, for greed, for stealing, for extortion, for addictions, for lack of love, for adultery, for apathy, for pride, for any sin you can name. Jesus forgives all and every sin. He just wants us to come to Him to receive His wonderful gift.

Reflection: Are there any sins in your past or present which you don't think God has forgiven?

Chapter 8

Pictures of grace

I have swept away your offences like a cloud, your sins like the morning mist. Return to me, for I have redeemed you. Isaiah 44:22

There is a saying, "You are what you eat". It is true for our physical bodies and it is true for our souls. Our destiny as God's people is to live full lives with Him. The key to this freedom is living confidently in God's grace and love. To do this we need to be feeding on the truth of His grace.

Confidence in God's grace doesn't come instantaneously. God's forgiveness can quickly become a legal fact that our hearts seem largely unconnected with. For God, our salvation and justification are not just legal facts which He has recorded in the book of life – they are His heart stopping passion! Jesus' death on the cross is like a great neon light that flashes out over all of time and humanity. It is the single greatest revelation of the mercy of God. God's mercy is to be our passion too. To live a life resting in God's grace, eyes fixed on this neon light, we need to develop a lifestyle of dwelling on the truth of God's love and desire for us. As we do this, over time, we will find it easier to accept our beauty before God with our hearts and we will increasingly connect with the truth emotionally.

In the Bible, God has provided us with a rich banquet of images which convey the truths of His grace. These images enhance the richness of these truths so that more and more we are captivated by wonder at who God is and what He has done.

Reflection: Since becoming a believer how has the knowledge of God's forgiveness changed your day-to-day life?

Cleansing

For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. Ezekiel 36:24-27

I will cleanse them from all the sin they have committed against me and will forgive all their sins of rebellion against me. Jeremiah 33:8

Let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. Hebrews 10:22

Imagine a time or remember a time when you have been working with really dirty or messy things. For example, you might have been repairing a car, you may have been digging a hole, you might have been cutting up a great deal of meat. Your hands are filthy. Then you take them to the sink and wash them with soap. When you have finished your hands feel new. Putting on a shirt that has just been cleaned, having a shower or a bath after a long time without one, all these experiences demonstrate the point. There is a wonderful feeling of newness and freshness after cleansing has happened.

As sinners we were filthy, full of sinful acts and thoughts, full of guilt. Through Jesus, God cleanses us from a guilty conscience. That doesn't mean we don't feel bad as Christians when we sin, but we are free from the guilt that condemns us. This is an important difference to understand. Guilt over a past sin can drive people into deep despair and depression. People will use any means (alcohol, drugs, pornography, denial, doing good religious works and so on) to try to distance themselves from their guilt, to try to escape it. None of it works. And even more significantly, none of these remove the fact of your guilt in God's sight. The only way to be truly freed from your guilt, cleansed from your sin, is through the blood of Jesus.

God wants to cleanse us from our sin, to wash it away. God does not want the stain of our sin to remain on us. Feeling condemned causes us to hide from God. God desires relationship with us. He has removed the legal consequences of our sin and He has also wants to remove the guilt from our consciences (Hebrews 10:22). He wants us to be free.

So far...

For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His love for those who fear Him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us. Psalm 103:11-12

In this passage, the image of geographical distance powerfully proclaims the completeness of God's forgiveness. In Psalm 103, God uses the infinite distances of the universe to reveal and stun us with His majestic grace. East and west never meet. They are opposites. Because of His love, which is as great as the heavens are high above the earth, God has removed our sins from us. He took them away. They are no longer near us. No longer do they hang around our neck like great weights condemning us. God has taken them from us. He laid them on His Son Jesus when He died, and Jesus paid for them, cancelling their power and curse.

When Aaron has finished making atonement for the Most Holy Place, the Tent of Meeting and the altar, he shall bring forward the live goat. He is to lay both hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the wickedness and rebellion of the Israelites—all their sins—and put them on the goat's head. He shall send the goat away into the desert in the care of a man appointed for the task. The goat will carry on itself all their sins to a solitary place; and the man shall release it in the desert. Leviticus 16: 20 - 22

This idea of God distancing His people from their sin was expressed to ancient Israel through the scapegoat (Leviticus 16). Under the Old Covenant, every year a goat was taken to the temple. Here the High Priest laid his hands on the head of the goat and confessed the sins of Israel for that year. The goat was then taken by a man out into the desert and released. The goat had been removed from the people of God, taking with it the people's sin. The Lord had removed the people's transgressions far, far away from them. In Jesus this is fully realised. Jesus took our sins upon Himself, rather than leaving them upon us. We trust in the power of Jesus' sacrifice and so we stand before God free from any condemnation for our sin – it has been completely removed from us.

New clothes

I delight greatly in the LORD; my soul rejoices in my God. For he has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. Isaiah 61:10

You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptised into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. Galatians 3:26-27

It is always good to get new clothes. There is something special about the first time you put the article of clothing on. It smells new, it feels new. You feel new. In these passages God touches on this experience of receiving new clothing to explain what He has done for us. In the Isaiah passage, the image of new immaculate clothing suitable for a wedding day is used. In Galatians it is Christ Himself that we are clothed with.

In Isaiah 64:6 our state of sinfulness prior to salvation is described in terms of clothing. It says, "All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags". Before we trusted in Jesus' death and resurrection we were clothed in filthy sin. We wore rags of shame. We stank with rebellion and death. We were in no way dressed for the throne room of the Living God.

Yet when we put our faith in the Lord Jesus, God gave us new clothes. Just as the son in the parable of the prodigal son was clothed with a new robe so we have been given new robes. The "robe of righteousness" and the "garment of salvation" have been placed on us. We are immaculately dressed and beautiful, fit for the courts of the King!

The fullness of this truth is found in the above verse from Galatians. When, by faith, we received God's gift of forgiveness and new life, we were clothed in Christ. God in his awesome mercy has given us His beauty. He has clothed us in His glory, in Christ. Jesus took our sin and gave us His glory. We now stand radiant and beautiful before God. We shine with a holiness and glory we cannot fathom.

An undeserved gift

As we continue to talk about different images and metaphors that the Bible uses to get across big ideas, it is impossible to leave out Jesus' parables. His parables presented awesome truths through stories, using everyday circumstances and language. This was the main way Jesus spoke of His Kingdom while on earth. Jesus talked quite a bit about forgiveness in His parables. One parable in particular powerfully conveys the unexpected, grace-filled way that God forgives and accepts us. The parable is recorded in Matthew 20. It describes how, in a typical day, a landowner pays men that he hires to work for him.

For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire men to work in his vineyard. He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard.

About the third hour he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. He told them, 'You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.' So they went.

He went out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour and did the same thing. About the eleventh hour he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, 'Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?' 'Because no one has hired us,' they answered. He said to them, 'You also go and work in my vineyard.'

When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, 'Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.'

The workers who were hired about the eleventh hour came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. 'These men who were hired last worked only one hour,' they said, 'and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.'

But he answered one of them, 'Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn't you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go. I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don't I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?' Matthew 20:1-15

Put yourself in the place of those workers, who were hired at the eleventh hour. You have been trying to find work all day and have found none. Maybe you have a family to feed and desperately needed a day's work to survive. By the eleventh hour (almost the day's end), you would have probably given up all hope. Then suddenly this landowner appears and hires you. You realise you only have a few hours of work so you only expect to be paid a small amount, according to an hourly rate. So you work but you know that it won't be enough to feed your family.

Then, at the end of the day, after only a few hours work, the landowner comes to pay you and he hands you a full denarius. You are stunned. This is a full day's wages, yet you only worked for a couple of hours. You are confused and wonder whether the landowner has made a mistake, but from the look on his face you know he knows what he is doing. You wonder why. You feel at once incredibly lucky, incredibly grateful and really undeserving. You shake the landowner's hand vigorously and thank him repeatedly. He blesses you and lets you go home to your family.

This parable reveals much about God and how we respond to Him. One of the reasons the parable speaks so powerfully and relevantly to us about God's acceptance of us, is because it talks about God's grace in the context of work. We often believe our acceptance by God is dependent upon work. If a person works longer they should be paid more, or rewarded in some other fashion. If a person works less, they should be paid less. We think that if a person does more 'good' deeds they should be accepted by God. If a person does more bad deeds they should be rejected by God. What does God say?

Through this parable, God speaks clearly about His terms for accepting us - we come and receive from God on His terms. The way God treats us is often not how we would expect to be treated. In His kingdom, God, like the landowner in the parable, is the one who determines what we, the workers, each receive. The point is not what the worker, the sinner, has done, but what God's great mercy accomplishes.

In the parable there are two types of workers who represent two responses to God's grace. The first are those who have worked the full day and have been paid a denarius. They represent those of us who are 'religious' and feel that we have done good deeds and lived good lives. We demand that God treat us well and reward us. We reason we are good enough for God, so good that He should accept us.

The second type is those who started work at the eleventh hour and were paid a full day's wages. Those of us who recognise that we have lived horribly sinful lives and should be condemned by a Holy God, don't want to bargain with God. We want God's mercy and we know there is nothing we have done that makes us worthy of it.

God's grace causes the 'religious' person to grumble and despise God and those who receive His grace. But for the person who knows they only deserve punishment and yet receives mercy, God's grace is the most wonderful thing in the world. They rejoice at God's grace just as the worker who only started at the eleventh hour rejoiced. For the person who knows their desperate sinfulness before God, God's forgiveness of us is a stunning gift.

Reflection: Which image of God's forgiveness speaks most powerfully to you? Try thanking God for his forgiveness using that image as the basis for your prayer.

Chapter 9

Feasting on God

While they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to His disciples, saying, "Take and eat; this is my body." Matthew 26:26

He has taken me to the banquet hall, and His banner over me is love. Song of Songs 2:4

What has changed as a result of the truth we've heard of about God and what He has done? Maybe, for you personally, not a lot yet. Maybe some bits of light are starting to break through as we consider the truth God has revealed through His Word. As I have said and will continue to say, growing in our understanding of the truth of God is a process and often it is a slow process. Hang in there!

We have these incredible truths about God, this rich banquet of food, but how do we eat? How do we digest these truths so that they become the nourishment that we need to walk confidently in God's grace? How do these truths become something that we believe with our hearts? That is the big question.

The growth of our faith in God and His truth is a mysterious process. It is a work of the Holy Spirit first and foremost. It is also something we will discuss in a lot more detail later in the book. We will look at the wonderful way God wants to use all of life to lead us into truth and grow faith and love in our hearts. For now though, I want to give some suggestions about how you might use the verses and the images we've looked at to begin to see truth take root in your heart. There is no formula. It is a work of God but we can participate in the process. The diagram below some practical suggestions which I hope will help.

Growing in the knowledge of grace

Meditating on the truth

Taste and see that the LORD is good. Psalm 34:8

To enjoy a good meal it's important to select the food carefully, sit down, put other things aside, and enjoy each mouthful, chewing and savouring each flavour. Psalm 119:148 says, "My eyes stay open through the watches of the night, that I may meditate on your promises." We savour truths of God's grace by meditating on them. This is one of the wonders of reading the Bible. It is God's word and it is living and active (Hebrews 4:12). We can return again and again to passages and images in the Bible and find new depth and revelation as the Holy Spirit opens our eyes to the truth of God. It is incredible.

So devote yourself to contemplating the images and Scriptures we have looked at. Write verses and stick them up around your house. Commit them to memory. Talk to other believers about these truths. Discuss them. Think them over. Pray about them together. Do what it takes so that you begin to really absorb these truths. Read Scripture daily, turn it into prayer. Just as you need to eat physically each day, so daily we need to eat spiritually of God's truth.

Most importantly, ask the Holy Spirit to reveal these truths to you. He is called the Spirit of Truth. Jesus said the Holy Spirit will lead us into all truth, so call on Him (John 16:13). He will be faithful and help you to eat and drink deeply of the truth of God's wonderful forgiveness and grace.

Believing that God loves and enjoys us

As you eat regularly faith will grow in you. These truths will begin to become your truths - the things that you believe with your heart. This takes time but it will happen. As you grow in your knowledge of the truth you will inevitably encounter truths that conflict with your old ideas about God and your way of living. At times it will be difficult to believe these new truths. Keep asking God for help. Ask Him to give you the grace to turn away from your old idea and actions to embrace the truth. The Bible calls this repentance. This process can often take time, but God wants to help, so keep at it.

God's desire for you is that you would grow more and more in your faith in Him. By His Spirit, as you go to Him in prayer and in meditating on His truth, He will grow faith in you. As this faith grows, my prayer is that you will begin to know and feel how beautiful you are to God. We long to feel beautiful and to feel like we are being enjoyed. The knowledge of our beauty before God will break the power that shame has had in our lives. Shame has dominated and crippled so many of us, but now we can begin to be honest and vulnerable with God because we are unconditionally loved by Him. He will not reject us, no matter how ashamed we are.

Having confidence in the truth will lead us to freedom.

Trusting and resting

There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. Hebrews 4: 9-10

As our faith in the truth of God and our knowledge of what He has done and how He feels towards us grows, we will learn to trust and rest. Many of us have been weary, very weary. We were trying to earn God's acceptance by doing good deeds, trying to live as 'religious' a life as possible, trying to do exactly what the pastor told us. But we can never live up to God's standard. God's standard is absolute perfection. We can never do enough good because we were all under the curse of sin, living lives in sin. If all our lives we had just committed one sin we would still have been completely unacceptable to God.

The good news that we have heard is that by faith in Jesus' sacrifice we are made perfect and holy. All our sins are forgiven, completely, forever. By God's work through Jesus, not our efforts, we have been brought into right relationship with Jesus.

Once I was teaching a group of women about God's grace from the book of Galatians. As I explained to them the completeness of God's forgiveness and acceptance of them, one lady in particular started to understand it. She suddenly exclaimed, "Wow, this would make life a lot easier!" She, like so many of us, had been struggling to win God's acceptance through her good deeds, but continued to feel she was not able to do enough. She was right. As she heard about God's grace, she realised that her old way of living could actually end and that through faith in God's grace she could actually rest, confident not in her own work, but in God's.

We don't have to wake up each day and worry about whether God likes us. We don't have to be concerned that if we lose our temper or miss a prayer meeting, He won't love us and will reject us. No! We are totally forgiven. God has taken us from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light (Colossians 1:13-14). He has put His Holy Spirit in us and has made His home with us (John 14:23). As those whose faith is in Jesus, we are totally forgiven and accepted – forever. Now we can rest confident in God's faithfulness, which is infinite, not in our own abilities, which are very limited.

I like to imagine us in terms of the imagery used in Song of Songs 2:3-6:

Like an apple tree among the trees of the forest is my lover among the young men. I delight to sit in his shade, and his fruit is sweet to my taste. He has taken me to the banquet hall, and his banner over me is love. Strengthen me with raisins, refresh me with apples, for I am faint with love. His left arm is under my head, and his right arm embraces me.

We are the Bride resting on a couch lying in the arms of our Bridegroom Jesus, resting. This is indeed how John the apostle is described as 'resting' with Jesus at the meal before His crucifixion (John 13:25). That is how we now are able to relate to God. We are safe. We know He loves us and totally accepts us. We can rest in His everlasting arms (Deuteronomy 33:27). As we have seen, as we rest He sings songs of delight and love over us. It's awesome!

We can therefore rest from our work with peaceful hearts, knowing that we are completely accepted and loved by God. Choosing to stop working for acceptance from God will enable us to experience the grace He wants to give, and increase our faith in His forgiveness.

Desiring more of God

The amazing thing about eating from God's banquet table is that the more you eat the more you want. This is not to say that God does not satisfy us, He does. It's just that after you have savoured the wonder of God you really can't get enough. This is a wonderful truth. As we grow in our understanding and faith in the truth of who God is our desire, indeed our love for God will grow. No one wants to spend time with someone who wants to punish them and enslave them. But a singing, delighting, joyful, loving, merciful God sounds like someone I would like to get to know. So just as the diagram at the start of this chapter indicates we will continue to hunger for more truth about God and grow in our understanding of His love and grace.

We will begin to want to spend time with God and to get to know Him. There is a world of difference between being told by your pastor that you must pray and go to church or you will lose your salvation, and actually wanting to seek God through prayer, Bible reading and fellowship with believers. From the outside no one will probably be able to tell the difference, but you will know and God will know.

As this understanding of God grows our boredom will lessen. We will become fascinated with God. We will grow in our desire to be with God and worship Him. Hopefully all this will cause us to be more grateful to God, to live lives that say, "Thank you, God!" Finally, we may even want to begin to share with others this grace God has shown us. Our response to God's truth will be to live lives of love, gratefully worshipping God.

Reflection: What things are you doing daily to enable you to feast on God's banquet and grow in your knowledge of grace?

Come with Me

Arise, my darling, my beautiful one, and come with Me. Song of Songs 2:10

Chapter 10

What do we do now?

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. John 10:10

Unconditional love, complete acceptance, rest. But then what? Now what do we do? How should we live?

Many of us have spent years trying to earn God's acceptance through good deeds. We have spent our time as Christians going to prayer meetings morning and evening, attending long church services, trying to generate enough faith and pray long enough, trying to do everything our leaders have instructed us to do, trying to do enough good to cleanse our guilty conscience and make God like us. But now we know that we cannot make ourselves acceptable before God by our good deeds. It is a gift through faith in Jesus. Wow! We have been working so hard and now we can rest. Our weariness can end.

But then what? If we are resting, what do we do? What happens now? Do we stop going to church? Do we stop praying? Do we just go back to living how we were before we were Christians, but happy because we are now forgiven? Paul reflected this thinking when he expressed the question to the Roman church, "What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase?"(Romans 6:1). Of course the answer is no, but the question remains – "What do we do now? How should we live?"

At the heart of this question, "What do we do now?" is a deeper question, "What is the point of our lives as Christians?" If our lives are not about trying to earn God's acceptance and love, and not about trying to make sure we can get to heaven, then what are they about?

Reflection: What has been your goal or destination as a believer? What have you believed is God's purpose for your life on earth?

Ticket to heaven

When I first became a believer, I thought Jesus was simply my ticket to heaven. I was on a camp at the time. In the years prior to this camp, I had seen no point to life and on a number of occasions had wanted to end my life. Then I heard about Jesus and about heaven. Someone at the camp told me that by faith in Jesus I could go to heaven. That sounded great to me. At least when I died I was guaranteed a good place to go. So I prayed to Jesus, got my ticket to heaven and relaxed. I was still keen to die, but I was happy now and looking forward to it, because I knew I was going to heaven.

This view of God suited me well, until a few years later when I met a number of other believers. They talked about God like they knew Him. They talked to Him and apparently He talked to them. They seemed to have a relationship with Him. Indeed, they seemed to love Him and live with Him. This got me thinking. Was being a believer in Jesus just a ticket to heaven or was it more than that?

The complete forgiveness from sin that we have by faith in Jesus, is not all that believing in Jesus is about. God's forgiveness of us is amazing. It is astounding. But God's plan for us is far richer than merely being forgiven. Forgiveness is just the beginning.

Abundant life

Jesus says, "The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full." (John 10:10) God's intention is that we live wonderfully abundant lives. I love that Jesus uses the word 'full' here. In chapter one we talked about our emptiness and our need for God. Here Jesus is referring to that need when He talks about fullness. The deepest need we have is to be unconditionally, wholeheartedly loved. Jesus wants to fill our need with His love. This is the basis of living life to the fullest. Abundant life is about us being filled with the wonderful love and presence of God and, in turn, giving this love away - loving God and loving others wholeheartedly.

We were made in God's image. God is love (1 John 4:16). We were made to receive the lavish love of God and to lavishly love God and others with this love. That's why we ache for love. Being extravagantly loved and extravagantly loving is the richest, most glorious thing we can do. When we are doing this, we are being the people God intended us to be. This is abundant, full life. It is only found in Jesus because only God can fully love us in the way we need to be loved. It is this abundant life with God that alone satisfies us. God alone fills our need, our thirst and we drink of God as we live with Him.

As I spent more time with these other believers my hunger for God grew. God, in His grace, met me in my hunger and revealed Himself to me more and more. Slowly, bit-by-bit my understanding of God, myself and the purpose of my life was transformed. I had spent so much of my life deeply ashamed of who I was. Yet God showed me that He was my Father and that I was His child that He cherished. God faithfully loved me and showed me how much He enjoyed me in my doubts and weakness. I started getting healed.

God introduced me to the power and the presence of the Holy Spirit. I learnt that God speaks. As my Lord, He is intimately concerned with the details of my life, and He has a unique purpose and plan for my life. He led me and continues to lead me to partner with Him in seeing His love displayed on earth. I discovered that He really can provide for my needs, including my physical needs. I learned that He is still healing and delivering people from demons today.

He began to show me the things He cares about and asked me to care about them too. I discovered that the Jesus that I read about in the Gospels was the same as the Jesus who I was walking with by faith. He is real. He is alive. He weeps, He laughs, He dances and sings.

As I started to get to know God and His love a little better I got hooked. Compared to being with the Living God every other ambition and dream I had pursued in the past seemed pretty shabby. Although it was a struggle initially, I started to give up the things I had held dearly – material wealth, a successful career, the need to be respected, leisure time – and I allowed God to fill my days and write my future.

At the time I felt I was sacrificing so much for God, but now when I consider the rich life He has blessed me with they hardly seem like sacrifices at all. God has led me into such a different life from what I thought I would live. It has proved to be so much richer than I could have dreamed possible. The abundance of His love, the privilege of partnering with Him in seeing the knowledge of His love come to others, getting to know what He cares for and caring for those things with Him, is just awesome.

I have days when I am full of faith and other days when I wonder if God even exists. But God has never left. He is so committed to me that I am beginning to believe that God is good and far more amazing than I ever thought possible. I still only understand a little of what it means to live with God but I like what I've seen.

Because we are entirely forgiven we can freely be in God's presence. We can meet with the Living God. We can go to Him unashamed, guilt free, confident of His acceptance and love. It's not just a nice theory. We can walk and talk with the Holy God. This is what Jesus died and rose for. He did not die and rise again simply so we could feel forgiven. He died so we could know and live with God in all His fullness and wonder. This is the eternal life that Jesus won for us. A life living as God made us to live – with Him, loving Him and loving others for eternity.

As God intended...

The diagram below clearly depicts the true purpose and richness of the blessing we have through faith in Jesus' death and resurrection. Our lives can be depicted as a U-shaped curve. The top left-hand side of the "U" represents the way that God created mankind to be – to be living abundant lives with God – loving Him and loving others and bringing about His purposes on earth. We see this in the opening chapters of Genesis. However, because of our sin and rebellion we all moved down the "U" and were cut off from knowing God or having relationship with Him. Rather than living abundantly, we were dead in our sin.

At the bottom of the "U" is the place where Jesus met us – at the cross. Here He took all our sins on Himself and endured God's wrath. His death enabled us to be forgiven by God. But Jesus did much more than simply freeing us from our sin - He gave us new life. The depth to which we had fallen in our sinfulness was vast, and likewise the height to which we are restored by Jesus is just as great. Jesus opened the way for us to be restored to God's initial purposes for mankind: to dwell with God, to live in deep loving relationship with each other and to carry out His purposes on the earth. His plan for us is that we grow more fully into this wonderful purpose; that we mature into an abundant life of receiving and giving God's love.

This is God's vision for our lives – abundant loving. This vision is expressed elsewhere in the Scriptures where it talks about us maturing as believers.

God's idea of maturity

Newborn babies are cute, but no loving parent wants their child to remain that small and vulnerable forever. They want their child to grow up to maturity – to be fully who they are meant to be. In the same way, God wants us to grow into the fullness of who He made us to be. We still know so little of God and we often have difficulty receiving God's love and giving it out. We are still just kids. As our Father, God desires the best for us. He is lovingly and wisely nurturing us. He desires that we grow as His children together into a glorious Bride who is fully mature, filled to fullness with love for our Bridegroom Jesus.

Reflection: What do you think it means to be a mature believer? Do you want to mature spiritually?

In Ephesians 4, Paul declares what he understands maturity to be. He writes: "It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God's people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ." (Ephesians 4:11 – 13)

Paul describes our maturity as our "attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ". What does this phrase mean? If we look at the context of the verse, in the next paragraph Paul goes on to say, "... then we will no longer be children" (v. 14). The language being used in this verse is language describing us as growing in our maturity in Christ like a child grows to become an adult. What we will look like as mature adults is like Christ. We will be fully like Christ.

Reflection: What do you think it means to be like Jesus?

Often, when people talk about being more like Jesus, they present an argument to live a more moral life. We are told that we should change our behaviour: we should not swear so much, we should not lie and so on. Living a life based on sound values may be one aspect of being like Christ, but is that the essence of what it means to be like Christ? Surely it goes deeper than just good behaviour.

Being like Jesus is not only about our actions. It is also about our hearts. Being like Jesus will involve us caring for the things that He cares for and doing the things that He does. In the same way that Jesus' heart of love drives His actions, so we will be driven in our actions by loving hearts. Maturing will see us growing more like Jesus inside and out.

When Jesus was on earth, He stated that the most important things in life are loving God and loving each other (Mark 12:30-31). What He was describing was the way He lived and the way He wants us to live as we grow to maturity in Him. This is the essence of what it means to be like Jesus. His vision for us is that we drink of the lavish, other-centred, sacrificial love of God and that we, in turn, love God and others with this love.

In Jesus' great prayer in John 17, just before his crucifixion, the final thing that He prays is that the love that the Father has for Him may be in His followers (v.26). This is astounding! Jesus is asking our Father to enable us to love Jesus the way the Father loves Him. And the Father is still faithfully answering Jesus' prayer by His work in us.

So, when we talk about maturing, we are talking about seeing that love that the Father has for Jesus, growing in us, that we may love God and others with that same wholehearted love. That is living abundantly! This is the essence of Paul's prayer in Ephesians 3: 17 - 19: "And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God."

To me, this is one of the most remarkable of all of God's miracles. Through the work of Jesus on the Cross, and the continued work of the Holy Spirit, God is causing deep love for Him to grow in my selfish heart. This is the central and defining feature of what Jesus desires and what being like Christ should look like. Maturity is not some behavioural or moral code. It's not about being blessed and wealthy. It's not about receiving lots of spiritual revelations and visions. Being like Christ is about loving: first of all loving God, and secondly, it is about loving each other the way God loves each of us.

This abundant life with God, this maturing into the fullness of Christ, begins now and never ends. Jesus said, "Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent." (John 17:3) Knowing God and living with God is our eternal occupation and it is our eternal life. God is infinitely rich, infinitely worthy and infinitely satisfying. This is my testimony and it's God's desire that it would be the testimony of everyone who follows Jesus. It's one of the reasons why I wrote this book. I am confident that full life is found only in the Living God.

We have a remarkable destiny as followers of Jesus. It is so much more than being forgiven, or a ticket to heaven. We are born again into a life of purpose and vitality - a life of walking with God, growing in our ability to receive His love and in our ability to give His love into every place and person in our lives. So how do we begin to live this abundant God-shaped life of love? We still have lots of doubts and fears about God. So what is God's plan to turn this wonderful destiny into our day-to-day reality?

Chapter 11

Come with Me

As he walked along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collector's booth. "Follow me," Jesus told him, and Levi got up and followed him. Mark 2:14

A letter arrives. On the envelope it has your name written with obvious care. Not typed, but handwritten. The ink is rich, it looks like gold. The envelope feels light in your hand. No stamp, no return address. Undoubtedly hand delivered. The letter is sealed. Sealed with wax. Who is this letter from? Someone must be pretty keen that only you receive it and read it. Maybe it's a cheque? You break the seal. No cheque but an invitation. To what? a ceremony? a concert? a banquet? You look again, surprised.

It reads, hand-written, "From the King." The King is writing to me, personally? How does he even know who I am? Why is he honouring me? You read on, "The King invites you to a life-long friendship with Himself. And a permanent room in His palace when you retire." Wow!

Hearing God's song

One day a friend of mine and I were in the kitchen drinking tea and listening to the radio. A song came on the radio which my friend obviously loved. The singer sang of the trials of life and love. My friend's face changed as he lost himself in the words and the music. After the song had finished, I asked him about the song and how he felt when he heard it. He said that the song touched his heart deeply.

I imagine that all of us can relate to that experience. There is something special about singing. Whenever we hear a song or sing a song that we love, somehow it seems to connect with us and touch us in a special way. It might bring great sadness, a whole host of memories, or it might give us a sudden feeling of freedom and lightness, or stir in us a great yearning to love and be loved. Sometimes, when we feel something strongly, we may feel that speaking about it is not enough – only a song can adequately express the depth of our emotion. Singing songs, hearing songs, touches our hearts in a unique way. God has designed things that way.

Through our lives, we have often hardened our hearts to protect ourselves from what people say or what we experience, but in some mysterious way song seems to be able to unlock our hearts and stir them.

I believe God also uses song to express his heart in a way that prose does not allow. He sings to touch our hearts in a way that nothing else could touch them. In the Bible God sings a song of delight and rejoicing (Zephaniah 3:17), a song of deliverance (Psalm 32:7), a song of His love and joy at our beauty (Song of Songs). Unfortunately, we cannot hear God singing literally. Not yet. But given the passion, the unique power of song, God's song is definitely worth reading.

One of the greatest descriptions of the loving relationship between Jesus and His Bride is in the form of a song – recorded in the Bible as Song of Songs. In this Song, God expresses to us the depth of His love. He longs for our hearts to be touched by this love.

The Song traces the story of the relationship between the Lover and His beloved from the time they meet to maturity as a loving couple. It is representative of our relationship with Jesus. The verses of the Song poetically describe a progression from when we first meet Jesus, to getting to know Him, the challenges we face, and our growth into maturity. Through it all, deep passion and devotion grows as the Bride gets to know her Beloved. This Song provides unique insight into how to live an abundant life with God.

Hearing the chorus and the verses

Most songs have a chorus and a verse. God's song is similar. In Song of Songs, almost as a chorus, the Bridegroom repeatedly states His love and admiration of the beauty of the Bride. This chorus has been the focus of the previous chapters. Like a beautiful thread woven through the fabric of the Song, the chorus is sustained throughout, constantly catching our attention and amazing us. In the same way, throughout our lives, God never stops singing to us of His love for us and our beauty to Him.

As Song of Songs progresses and the Lover and Beloved's relationship matures, the chorus is repeated, but also new verses are introduced. Just like the Beloved, we have been resting in Jesus' grace, eating from His banquet, as He has sung to us of our beauty. Now He begins a new verse. A verse filled with delight, excitement and the promise of abundant life.

All beautiful you are, my darling; there is no flaw in you. Come with me from Lebanon, my bride, come with me from Lebanon. Descend from the crest of Amana, from the top of Senir, the summit of Hermon, from the lions' dens and the mountain haunts of the leopards. You have stolen my heart, my sister, my bride; you have stolen my heart with one glance of your eyes, with one jewel of your necklace. How delightful is your love, my sister, my bride! How much more pleasing is your love than wine, and the fragrance of your perfume than any spice! Song of Songs 4:7-10

His call, His song, is full of His passion, full of joy, full of His delight over us. He is the happy God rejoicing over His people. Jesus is singing to us, "Arise, my darling, my beautiful one, and come with Me." (Song of Songs 2:10), "Come with Me ..." (Song of Songs 4:8). He is saying to us, as He did to His disciples long ago, with eyes blazing with love, "Follow Me". He is calling us into our destiny, into what were made for, into what He had ordained for us before the beginning of time. He is calling us to be companions of the Living God.

Reflection: What do you think Jesus' call, "Follow Me" means?

Jesus' call is a cry to enter into the incredible fellowship with Him and the Father that He won for us on the Cross. In John 17:20-21 Jesus says, "I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me."

God is one, yet He is three persons – the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Even before the universe was created God existed as three persons. So even before the universe was created there were loving relationships. The Father loves the Son, the Son loves the Father, the Father loves the Spirit, the Spirit loves the Father, the Son loves the Spirit, the Spirit loves the Son. The three of them, for all eternity, have been living in loving fellowship together. They have been giving love to and receiving love from each other.

Jesus is praying that in the same way that the Father and the Son fellowship and are one with each other, so we also would be one with them. Jesus wants us to be with Him in everything. We are His Bride after all! He loves us and enjoys our company. This is the loving fellowship that Jesus made possible for us when He died for us on the cross and rose again. For many of us, Christianity can become more about keeping a set of rules than about God and relationship with Him. But the truth is that Jesus is calling us to Himself. He is our destination. He is our goal. This is the beginning and the end point of our new abundant life in God – loving, deep relationship with God. This is a staggering truth and it is for each of us. This is our destiny in Christ.

So how do we answer this call? How do we respond to our Bridegroom as His sings with eyes blazing and calls out with fiery love – "Come with Me"?

We answer with a "yes". Our first "yes" is us opening our hearts to Jesus. When Jesus is singing "Come with Me, follow Me", He is saying firstly, "Open your heart to Me. Fellowship with Me."

Abide with Me

One of the most famous passages where Jesus talks about the life of fellowship with Him, the life of saying yes to His call, is in John 15. Here Jesus describes Himself as the true vine and us as the branches. As He often did, Jesus is using something in our everyday lives that we understand to teach us about Himself. In the passage, He repeatedly states these words, "Abide in Me". Just as a branch cannot live if it is not connected to the vine, so we cannot live life with God, apart from Jesus. In John 14:10, Jesus uses the same verb, that He uses in John 15, to describe the way that the Father dwells or is living in Him - the Father abides in Jesus. The same verb is used elsewhere in John's gospel to describe a person dwelling in a place. In John 14:16, Jesus describes the Holy Spirit as remaining, abiding in us forever. Abiding means staying, not moving on, remaining, making your home, living, dwelling in God.

Jesus is calling to us, "Look at my eyes. They burn with love for you. Stay with Me. Make your home in Me. Open your heart to Me so I can satisfy you with My presence and My love." Jesus loves us and wants us to have an abundant life. He is telling us the way to that abundant life. And that is to keep our hearts open to Him, loving Him and fellowshipping with Him in all that we do. Jesus' call to go with Him is first and foremost a call to be with Him. This is not just on Sundays or in designated 'spiritual' times but in everything we do – however large or small. Jesus is our home. We are to live in Him.

Reflection: What do you imagine a life of abiding in God will be like?

Responding to the call

Whenever we receive an invitation we can respond two ways – yes or no. If we think it is an invitation to something not particularly nice, or if we don't really like the person who has invited us, we would probably say "no". Likewise, if we have other more interesting or fun things to be doing, we might also say "no". We would think up an excuse: "I'm too busy", "I can't get there" and so on. We love receiving an invitation when we love the person who invited us and the event promises to be awesome. We say "yes" when we want to honour the person who has invited us.

How we respond to God's invitation will be similar. If we see God as a cruel, heartless tyrant, Jesus' invitation to be with Him will seem like a prison sentence resulting in a lifetime of slavery. We will give any excuse to avoid it. Or if we think that God's invitation is not a bad offer, but we have better things to be doing with our time and energy, then we will decline it.

However, if we believe God to be unfathomably kind and loving, then His offer is an invitation to an incredible adventure with the most powerful, trustworthy and caring companion imaginable. We will RSVP that very day.

Jesus is inviting us to come with Him. He knows we don't trust Him perfectly. He knows we will often still be suspicious of His call. He knows we will rarely respond instantly with wide-open hearts. God wants to help us open our hearts to Him. He does not condemn us for closing our hearts to Him. We remain forgiven and accepted. However it affects our relationship with Him. The longer we shut our hearts to Him and try to keep Him at a distance from us, the more dissatisfied and disillusioned we will become with God. Increasingly, we will be tempted to find satisfaction and meaning from other false gods – demons, money, food, success, other people, ministry, anything we place before God. God still loves us and accepts us, but a closed heart makes it really difficult to enter into fullness of life with God. As we will discover, a big reason that He is inviting us to come with Him is actually to help us open our hearts more.

God understands we are human beings not super angels. But He designed faith in Him to be possible for weak humans – for us. What He is looking for is a yes. "Yes I want to be with you Jesus, I've looked in your eyes and they are full of love for me. Yes I'm coming." The yes can be the very slightest opening of hearts to fellowship with God but it is still a yes to His call. It is us opening our hearts and desiring to continue to have our hearts open to Him so that we can receive His love. He can lead us and we can begin to be with Him in all that He is doing.

God has more grace, more power and more love to pour into our lives than we can imagine. Any need that we have He can fill. We do not need to hide from God until we feel we are capable of abiding with Him. We do not choose to go with Jesus because we are sure that we are able to do all that living with God will involve. We say, "yes" because though we have seen only a glimpse of who Jesus is, we want to be with Him. The key is focusing on the One who has invited you - the King, our glorious Bridegroom. Our response is a response to Him and His love. God is simply looking for a yes and He will give us all the help we need in our weakness.

Reflection: Do you want to say "yes" to Jesus' call? If there are things holding you back, be specific. Name them and bring them to God and ask for his help.

Chapter 12

Walking with Jesus

And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8

How many times have you heard these phrases when someone is talking about a child: "Oh, he looks just like his father" or "She does that just like her mother"? People seem to love looking at children and finding the family resemblance. Family resemblance fascinates us.

We are God's children. Part of our maturing into abundant life includes taking on God's family resemblance. This is something that the Holy Spirit loves to bring about in us. It happens as we walk with Jesus. We do this as we learn to walk with Him, caring as He cares and doing what He does.

Reflection: What do you think Jesus is doing now?

With His heart and by His hand

The essence of what Jesus is doing now is loving. This should come as no surprise. Our passionate Bridegroom is wholeheartedly loving His Father and wholeheartedly loving others. Jesus' way of loving is a beautiful union of His heart and His actions. Jesus' heart of love drives His acts of love. We see this so clearly in John 3:16, "For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son..." We see the same thing when Jesus raises a widow's son from the dead. Prior to raising her son, Luke says that, "When the Lord saw [the widow], his heart went out to her and he said, 'Don't cry.'" (Luke 7:13) This is why I like using the word 'wholehearted' so much. God's love rises from deep within His heart and expresses itself fervently in action.

Responding with a yes to Jesus' call, "Come with Me" will see us growing to love wholeheartedly like Jesus. God is not calling us to a regime of tasks in our partnership with Him. He is calling us to a life of being transformed to resemble Him. We will see how He cares for people and, by His Spirit, begin to care for them in the same way. As we share in God's heart, this will begin to fuel our action.

I can testify to this process in my life. Often as I have prayed for people or for nations, God has shown me what He thinks and feels about them and their situation. I am constantly confronted by the passion and intensity of God's heart – the grief, the joy, the longing that he feels. As God has shared His grief over the lost and His longing that His church would know Him more, I have found myself struggling to admit that God feels as intensely as He does. His heart is so huge that it overwhelms me at times.

Yet listening to God and hearing what's on His heart has been one of the most precious parts of getting to know God, of being His friend. Jesus explains this in John 15:15 when He says, "I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you." Certainly God calls us to open our hearts to Him. The wonder we will discover as we do this is that God too is opening His heart to us.

Reflection: What do you understand to be the main concerns of God's heart?

Jesus is working

Jesus' wonderful heart expresses itself seamlessly in action. This is how He loves the world. In response to a Pharisee's accusation against Him, Jesus said these words, "My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working."(John 5:17) In answer to the question, "What is Jesus doing?" a significant part of the answer is, "He is working". Though Jesus is in heaven, through the Holy Spirit, He continues to work, just as He says the Father continues to work. This also effectively answers our question, "Where is Jesus going?" He is going wherever His work needs to be done and, as we will clearly see, this means going to others.

Postmen deliver letters, bakers bake bread, engineers build bridges, but what kind of work does Jesus do?

Quite clearly from the Scripture's account of Jesus' life we know that He has done and is doing, a whole variety of tasks. We know that through Jesus everything was created (Colossians 1:15-16). We know that by Jesus' word creation is sustained right now (Hebrews 1:3). That's impressive work. From the gospels, we know Jesus healed and delivered people from demons. He cooked breakfast for them. He raised people from the dead. He taught. He prayed. He fished. He glorified God. He miraculously provided food. He died as a sacrifice for our sins and rose again. That was amazing work as well. Clearly it is impossible to itemise all the different tasks that Jesus did and will do through His Spirit – there are just so many.

When Jesus was on earth, He said this about the way He worked: "I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does." (John 5:19) Jesus did the will of God and He worked with God. Jesus looked for what His Father was doing and did it with Him. In looking for and participating in His Father's work, He was the Father's partner in seeing His will brought about on the earth in a great variety of ways.

Maturing into full lives of love involves us becoming a people whose actions spring from hearts in step with the passions of our Lord Jesus. As we work with God now, we work in a similar way to how Jesus did on earth. Jesus instructs us as His disciples to pray to the Father, "Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven." (Matthew 6:10) We walk with God, doing His will, bringing His kingdom on earth. And just like Jesus, as we do God's works we do them with God. We are, as Paul described himself and others, "God's fellow workers" (1 Corinthians 3:9). We fellowship with Him in heart and action. Jesus says that in the same way the Father sent Him, so He is sending His disciples (John 20:21). So we know we will be participating in a whole variety of tasks with God, just as Jesus did a variety of tasks with His Father.

Jesus' invitation to come with Him is an invitation to join Him in what He is doing – to care for what He cares for, to be with Him in His work, just as He fellowshipped with the Father in His work. Because of how beautiful, how good Jesus is, this is a privilege and joy.

Reflection: What type of activities do you think working with God would involve?

So what kind of work will we be doing if we are with Jesus, caring for what He cares for and doing His work on earth? Let's look again to the Bible for answers. When Luke collated his history and wrote his Gospel under the Holy Spirit's inspiration, he put certain teachings and occurrences together to make a point. The juxtaposition of three passages in Luke 10 is a good example of this. Luke is giving us an overview of what good works with God look like in their different forms.

Bringing the kingdom of God

The first passage is Luke 10:1-24 and can be summarised as the story of the sending of the seventy-two. If you can, take a moment to read it now. It is a record of Jesus sending out seventy-two of His followers to prepare the way for Him and to bring the Kingdom of God in power. He sends them out in pairs, gives them authority to heal the sick, and commands them to preach the gospel of repentance and certain judgement for those who do not accept them and their message.

It is an inspiring commissioning. Jesus spoke very clearly to them and gave them specific instructions on what He wanted them to do and how to do it and He also told them what not to do. There was a clear mandate, clear authority and as we see later in the passage, clear evidence of the Enemy being driven out and the kingdom of God advancing.

Their mission to bring the kingdom of God is our mission. In Matthew 28:18-20 Jesus says, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." What an amazing calling. We are called to go out proclaiming the Kingdom in power, with the confidence that the One who has all authority and power is with us. We are to work with Jesus making His kingdom and authority known. But is that all? We know that Jesus did many other acts when He was on earth and is continuing to do a great variety of works. Is He calling us to do those other things with Him too?

Loving your neighbour

Luke 10:25–37 records the story of the Good Samaritan. A man travelling between two towns is robbed and beaten and left by the roadside. Two people pass him by, ignoring his plight. Finally, a third person, a Samaritan, a social and religious abhorrence to the Jews, stops and cares for him.

The two people who pass him by are religious people - one is a priest, the other a Levite. They do not stop. Why? We don't know. Maybe they felt they had a particularly important piece of business to do. Maybe they felt they could not let anything get in the way of their religious service, especially a smelly, bleeding person.

It's easy to criticise the priest and the Levite for their lack of care but I am very aware that I often act just like them. I am much happier with the idea of seeing God do miracles than I am with stopping to help a person in need out of compassion. Yet this is how our Lord Jesus works. So often we see Him stopping to help those in need, caring for the poor and the downtrodden out of compassion. Clearly doing what Jesus is doing is going to involve more than evangelism and prayer.

Doing 'good works' with God is to be our lifestyle. This can involve preaching and praying for healing, but it can also involve us doing the shopping for our mother; helping someone up who has fallen over on the ice; giving a blanket to someone who doesn't have somewhere to sleep or listening to someone rather than ignoring them. Every day God has things for us to do with Him and what they might look like, as tasks, is as varied as our lives are.

Sitting at Jesus' feet

But that is not the end of Jesus' teaching. Luke 10: 38-42 records an incident at the home of Mary and Martha. Martha is busy with preparations, with doing good, with getting the practical things done. She sees the need, so she works hard at it. When the work is done then maybe she will rest, but first the work must be finished. Mary by contrast sits at the feet of Jesus, listening.

It is easy to get swamped, like Martha, by the need around us. As we seek to care for our neighbour as the Samaritan did, our lives can become 'needs led'. The need that we see around us can begin to dictate how we live. This is never what Jesus intended. Jesus is our Lord and our love. The first commandment is, "Love the Lord your God." (Mark 12:30) The second commandment, "Love each other" must never take precedence over the first. Mary understood this – devotion to Jesus came before all other things. We need to fellowship with God more than take care of the need and the practicalities that surround us. Our love for others will come out of our love for God as His love touches and changes our selfish hearts.

The 'good work' that God has prepared for us may be to spend time alone with Him each day, learning from Him and praying for others.

Reflection: Out of these three categories of works, which do you find yourself doing most naturally? Which do you struggle to do?

The variety and the breadth of works we can be involved in with God is huge. Yet often we emphasise the importance of the first category – the preaching and signs and wonders – over the other categories. The result is that people with abilities and gifts that suit evangelism and preaching are elevated above others. People with other abilities don't feel respected and don't feel valued by other believers or by God. This leads to resentment, jealousy and division in the church. This is not what God intends. Doing God's works with Him is for every believer and we are to do them together. Lets look at the way God has set things up.

Prepared by God

God has created each of us uniquely to play a particular part in His work. We see this clearly in God's call to Jeremiah, "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations." (Jeremiah 1:5) We may not all be called as prophets, but it is true for each of us that God has made us to play unique roles in His work. In Ephesians 2:10, Paul says we are "what God has made us to be" (NRSV), or in another translation, "we are God's workmanship" (NIV). The word that is translated 'workmanship' can be translated handiwork or artwork. We are God's handiwork, His work of art. He has made each of us uniquely. He has given each of us special abilities, gifts and passions. Each of us has a special place in God's heart and also in His plans on earth.

Paul explains this principle in 1 Corinthians 12, where He describes the Church, those who believe in Jesus, as Christ's body:

The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink.

Now the body is not made up of one part but of many. If the foot should say, "Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body," it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body. And if the ear should say, "Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body," it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has arranged the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body. 1 Corinthians 12:12-20

Each member of the body has a unique function. Without even the most insignificant part of the body, the body could not keep functioning. None of God's children are more valuable and important to Him than any other. God's works are incredibly varied but the variety and abundance of abilities and gifts within His Body, the Church, is equally large.

Not only has God gifted us specifically to do His works, He has also tailored specific works for each of us to do that are perfectly suited to the way He has made us. Paul says, "For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do."(Ephesians 2:10) God has great works for each of us to do - things that God is doing that He wants us to participate in. God has special works for you to do with Him that He has designed specifically for you.

It is quite incredible when you begin to realise the artistry and the care of God in His design and arrangement of these works. One of the things that I have really enjoyed as I have grown in God is actually discovering the abilities and gifts God has given me and watching the way He has led me into working with Him using those gifts. It's brilliant.

Reflection: In what ways has God uniquely crafted you? Given the way God has made you, what kind of works do you expect God has prepared for you to do with Him?

Corporate

God is like a conductor, conducting a massive symphony. He brings each instrument, each of us, into a place where we can play freely and in harmony with all the other parts of His body. We are His symphony. Working with Jesus will often require working with other believers. Jesus does this intentionally for good reasons. We will look at these reasons in a later chapter – Loving others. Suffice to say here that Jesus loves unity, and He loves when people are together, loving each other and loving Him. Works of love will involve us cooperating with other believers. They may be difficult but as we work together we will grow together in Christ. This will bring glory to God as we live the unity that He so desires for His people.

Jesus is doing a great variety of works that spring from His wonderful heart. We know that being with Jesus in what He is doing is not just about doing tasks but involves us sharing His heart and having our own hearts changed to care as He cares. So how are we to understand what God is calling us to? What is the unifying factor in all this great diversity?

Loving

Jesus wholeheartedly loves His Father and loves all people. Jesus is doing an incredible variety of things. In the Bible, we even see Him judging the nations and bringing God's vengeance against the wicked and Satan. Yet despite the variety, every single thing that Jesus does is done to love. Jesus, after all, is love (1 John 4:16). Sometimes we find it very difficult to understand how that is possible. But Jesus is God. He is perfectly loving. Even His anger is perfectly loving and is motivated by a jealous love for His Father and His people.

The work that Jesus does is loving – both in heart and action. If we are to walk with Jesus, our goal in every situation and in every task will also be to love. Love is always about others. We cannot love in isolation - we must go to others. No matter what the context, in church, out of church, at home, at work, we will be loving. No matter what the task - preaching the gospel, praying, healing the sick, cooking a meal for someone, forgiving someone, talking to a lonely person, our purpose will be to love. No matter what the method - response to a prophetic word from God, helping out someone in need, setting aside time to be with God, our aim will be to love.

Indeed everything that we do no matter how godly it may seem is empty and meaningless without love. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13:1-3, "If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing."

As we respond yes to Jesus' call, we begin to open our hearts to Him and walk with Him each day, forgiven and pure. As we walk with Him He shares His heart with us. Together we express His heart through acts of love. The essence of this wonderful union of our hearts and actions with God is love. Love flows from God's heart into acts of love which transform the lives of the people we meet. As God's people walking in the new life of Christ, it is what we do here on planet earth - we love. This is our family resemblance.

Reflection: Are you ready to say, "yes" to caring as Jesus cares and being with him in all He is doing? Great, go ahead and tell Him!

Chapter 13

Not earning, but loving

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 6:23

Dmitri really likes Alia. He wonders if she likes him. From how she acts around him he's not too sure. He decides he needs to do something to get her attention and hopefully earn her affection. So he buys her flowers, tries to gather his courage and presents them to her. She smiles, talks to him and then walks away. He realises it will take more flowers to earn her love.

Alex loves Lucinda. He knows she loves him. After seven years of marriage she has made that abundantly clear. He decides He wants to do something to surprise her, something that she will enjoy. So he buys her flowers, smuggles them home and arranges them in a vase before she returns from work. On seeing them, smiling, she bursts into tears and hugs Alex.

In the last chapter we were introduced to the idea of this wonderful partnership of loving that Jesus is calling us into. But when we mix our old ideas about work with this truth, things can become a little confusing. We may be okay with the idea of loving fellowship, but when we realize that Jesus is calling us to care as He cares, and do what He is doing i.e. works of love, fears and doubts about God rise up again.

Reflection: What are your fears about caring as Jesus cares and doing what He does? Write them out. Bring them into the Light.

I want to bring some light on this confusion and fear. In doing so I hope we will be able to see more clearly the contrast between our old life of trying to earn salvation and the wonder of the life that Jesus is calling us to as His Bride. This will give us the fuel to push on into the abundant life God has for us.

Religion v Love

Old 'religious' works/New works of love

Trying to earn favour and acceptance/Loving God and others

Separate from God/With God

Done in our own strength/Done in God's strength

Under in our own control/Under Jesus' Lordship

Not earning favour, but loving

Confusion about the concept of working with God stems principally from our old, wrong ideas about the purpose of our good works. Dmitri and Alex did exactly the same thing. They both bought flowers for a woman. Yet the reason they bought the flowers, their motives, were very different. Dmitri gave Alia flowers to win her love. Alex gave flowers to Lucinda out of gratitude as an expression of his love. Dmitri had no idea whether Alia liked him or not. Alex knew without doubt that Lucinda loved him.

In Ephesians 2:8-10, Paul highlights the difference between our old understanding and the new meaning that God has given to work through Christ. He says, "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing it is the gift of God – not the result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are what He has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life." (NRSV)

In our old way of thinking we were like Dmitri. We thought that by doing good works, 'buying flowers', we would earn our salvation and God's favour. We saw God as a strict boss. We believed that by doing what we thought were good, 'religious' deeds God would pay us for our work by allowing us to go to heaven when we died. Moreover, if we did enough good deeds on earth we might even become one of the people on earth that He likes and blesses.

Reflection: In the past what have been some of your motivations for doing "good works?"

But Paul states very clearly that our old way of thinking was wrong. He says that we are saved through faith, which is a gift from God. God's salvation is not the result of our 'good' deeds but it is God's gift of grace to us.

Alex becomes our model. Like Alex, we are confident of God's love. We don't have to worry about winning His affection by our acts. We are fully accepted by God, in Christ, and we are walking with Him. Now we can do acts of love, 'give flowers', out of gratefulness and love for Him.

Therefore, thankfully, walking and working with God does not violate the wonderful rest we have in Jesus which we talked about in earlier chapters. Even as we are working with God we are resting. How is this possible?

In the past, the main cause of our stress and exhaustion was trying to do enough good to earn God's salvation and favour. But now we no longer have to try to earn God's love. The issue of God's acceptance of us and our salvation is settled, finished. So we rest. Our hearts are at peace with God even as we are working with Him.

We really need to understand this difference before we continue talking about the works that the Father is calling us to do as Christians. If we continue to think in terms of good works as a means to God's acceptance we will start heading down a dead-end road. We are in no way discussing how to be saved, justified, made righteous with God or wanted or accepted by Him. This is entirely through faith in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

We are talking about life after salvation, about maturing in our knowledge and love of God and love of others. It is a new way of life. It confronts our selfishness. Yet in this new life with God, good works, which brought us no advantage as sinners, by God's grace and wisdom are now an amazing doorway into abundant life in God. This truth we will discuss in detail in the next section.

In our new life in God we work motivated by gratefulness and love. As people who were on the way to hell, God's salvation and His restoration of us to loving fellowship with Him is astounding. We have a lot to be grateful for! This gratefulness fuels our work. So, too, does love. We love Jesus and we want to be labouring with Him. This involves us caring for what He cares for. God is transforming us by His Spirit to be people who genuinely love God and care for others. We will still battle with our motives but as we grow in our relationship with God, increasingly we will find He is placing His love in our hearts so that we can love others. This is a wonderful contrast to the fear and self-centredness that characterised our efforts to earn God's love.

Not alone, but with God. Apart from Me you can do nothing. John 15:5

Another reason we may be confused about working with God is that we have old, wrong ideas about how good works are done. When we were doing our old 'religious' works to try to earn salvation, most of us worked in a similar fashion. Our religious works were something we did separate from God, in our own strength and that we controlled. God's way of working is very different.

Let's return to John 15 to see how Jesus describes the way works of love with God are done. If you can, take a moment to read through the chapter again. One of the main things that John 15 makes abundantly clear is that we cannot live the life of love that God has for us on our own. We need to be with God. We are the branches and Jesus is the vine. It is obvious that a branch cannot survive or bear fruit, unless it is connected to the vine.

In the same way, we cannot do any of the good works (i.e. 'bear fruit') that God has for us unless we do them with Him. In John 15:5, Jesus says, "If a man remains in Me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from Me you can do nothing." In doing God's works of love we are dependent on God. He is the source of these works. He prepares them for us to do. He leads us to them. He gives us the strength, the resources, all that we need to do them. And He partners with us in these tasks, doing the larger proportion of the job.

A simple picture of the reality of our partnership with God, and our dependence on Him in His work, is a father and a son digging a hole. If a father and his three-year-old son are digging a hole the workload is far from even. The father will do the majority of the heavy labour while the three year old may move a few handfuls of dirt. However, we can say that they are both digging the hole. The three year old enjoys 'helping' his father and the father enjoys the time spent with his son.

This is often how it is with God. We may be working with Him on a particular task, like reaching an area of a city with the gospel. We may feel like we are doing all the work. I certainly find it easy to think sometimes, when I am doing something God has told me to do, that He has left me to work on it on my own. But if we are working with God, then He is doing most of the work, like the father digging the hole, while we, like the child, are doing only a fraction of the job. However, we still play a necessary part of the work of reaching an area of the city with the gospel. Our part in the work is different from God's, but we are still working on the same task as God enables us. What a great partnership!

This is an amazing aspect of our oneness with God. As Jesus' Bride we are united and empowered by His Spirit to work with Him to see His purposes occur on earth. We are no longer limited to our own abilities and resources, we are yoked to the infinitely rich, infinitely powerful, King of the Universe, the Almighty God, doing His work, in His power and authority. By prayer in His name (John 15:7), we call on Him and as our wonderful partner He answers and His work is done - the Kingdom advances. We participate with God in His eternal purposes, not working in vain for temporary things but rather bearing fruit that will last (John 15:16; 1 Corinthians 15:58). We bring change by God's power and love to people's lives that is significant and eternal. Wow!

Reliant on God not self

Despite these wonders, contemplating a life dependent on God is confronting to our old ways of thinking and working. Being dependent on someone can be scary. It means you have to trust them. As people we tend to want to avoid being dependent on anyone or anything and least of all on an invisible God who we don't know very well. This is how we used to do our 'religious works' – independent of God, in our own strength. For many of us, men in particular, we took pride in being able to do our works on our own. We used these works to define ourselves, saying, "I can do this task, therefore I am significant."

When we realise that God is actually the one who is doing the bulk of the work, is guiding us and enabling us to do these works, our pride is challenged. The understanding that the principal way God's work is accomplished is through prayer further challenges it. We do not work in our own strength but it is God's Spirit who is enabling His works to be done (Zechariah 4:6). When we understand this, we realise we do not actually have any reason to boast. This is not an easy revelation. Dependence on God often involves us trusting Him and looking foolish. For most believers (certainly for me), it is a long slow struggle with God to actually acknowledge the truth of what Jesus said in John 15, "Apart from Me you can do nothing."

In recent years, as I have worked with God in setting up different projects, I have been taught this principle in a very real way. In the past, I had prided myself on being able to plan strategically and work out the best ways of doing things. Yet repeatedly God has led me into situations where I simply could not figure out the best solution, and neither could I get the resources to bring about that solution. God had to bring the solution and the resources or the project would not have proceeded. Even though it was a struggle, it has been a great joy and relief to see the abundant brilliance and power of God at work. It's an amazing feeling to know that we are not alone working to see the kingdom of God come on earth.

The apostle Paul explains the joy that lies in this life of dependence on God. Paul was taught this truth so powerfully by the Lord that he got to the point where he rejoiced that God, and not his own strength, enabled him to do the good works of God. In 2 Corinthians 12:9-10, Paul writes, "But [the Lord] said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong".

When we try to accomplish things for God in our own strength we usually achieve very little. We get tired and discouraged. But when we rely on God and His power and love there is real joy – joy because we bear fruit and because we fellowship with the Living God.

Prepared by God not us

God's ways of working also confronts our old habits of controlling the things we do. In John 15:16, Jesus says, "You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit—fruit that will last." The works we do with God are under Jesus' Lordship. The works we did before to earn God's favour and serve our interests, we did on our own and the task was under our control.

Now, however, God is calling us into working with Him doing what He has prepared for us to do. Our lives are filled with "good works, which God has prepared in advance for us to do." (Ephesians 2:10) We are no longer leading and determining what we do and when we do it, instead God is leading us. We believe that Jesus is Lord and we want Him to have leadership of our lives. We still choose what we do but we follow God's lead. Rather than our prayer being, "Please God bless this work that I am doing." Now our prayer is the prayer of Psalm 25:4-5 "Show me your ways, O Lord, teach me your paths; guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Saviour, and my hope is in you all day long."

Again, the process of releasing our control and following God's lead is something we will initially resist. As I said in an earlier chapter, I struggled for a long time to let God's plan for my life be the one I followed rather than my plan. But as I have begun to follow Him, His way has proved to be incredibly richer and more exciting than anything I could have imagined. This is God's intention. As we grow to understand the infinite wisdom and infinite power of our Lord Jesus and we see the blessing of the fullness of life He is leading us into, we will start to rejoice in the fact that He is our King and the One that we follow and obey. Obviously this takes time. Trusting God that His leadership is good is not easy initially but again God is here to help us to trust.

A life of partnership

God's call to us to work with Him is different from anything we have known. So understandably it can seem a little confusing initially. Like Alex, we give and work with God not to earn our salvation and favour from God, but because we love Him. We work not separate from God, in our own strength and under our own control but with God, depending on Him, trusting Him to be our Lord. This is confronting to our pride and independence. It is challenging because we are being called to trust a God whom we know so little. But again, if we actually humble ourselves and abide with Christ, the wonder, the importance and the power of our partnership with God are breathtaking.

What about us?

Abundant life, maturing to the fullness of Christ is about lavishly receiving and lavishly giving God's love. This is God's wonderful purpose for us. This is what it means to be fully human, to live as God always intended. We know God has a plan for how we should give His love, but how is God helping us receive His love by partnering with Him?

How is working with God fulfilling a huge part of abundant living – us being satisfied by God? It is easy to understand how God is loved and others are loved and it is great to appreciate the wonder of our partnership with God. However under pressure as we work, it can be difficult to understand how God is loving us. Initially, when difficulties arise, when we feel isolated and stretched, it may be tempting to think that God is trying to enslave us through work rather than love us.

This next section is about unveiling the beautiful wisdom of God in His call to us to work with Him. We will see that God in His brilliance is, indeed, powerfully loving us as we work with Him. The answer to the question of how we are being loved by God by working with Him is simply this: we are getting to know Him. Getting to know God is the key to our maturing fully and to living abundantly.

The wisdom of God's works

It was He who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God's people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.

Ephesians 4:11-13

Chapter 14

Knowing God

Those who know your name will trust in you, for you, LORD, have never forsaken those who seek you. Psalm 9:10

Tanya has a stall at the bazaar. Anna sees her every week when she buys her eggs. Every time Anna sees her they talk about the same things – the weather and the price of eggs. On occasions they talk about their families. Anna enjoys talking to Tanya but she wouldn't call her a good friend. Although Anna has seen Tanya once a week for the last year she still hardly knows her.

What would happen if one week, when Anna goes to buy eggs, Tanya invites her over to her apartment as a guest that evening?

Suddenly Anna's understanding of Tanya would increase dramatically. Now they are not just talking about the price of eggs and the weather. They are discussing in detail Tanya's friends and their families. Anna volunteers to help Tanya cook. As Anna helps Tanya prepare the food, she learns what kind of food Tanya likes. Anna sees that Tanya is very precise in the way she chops food, that she is very neat and cooks exactly how the recipe directs her. Anna also discovers that Tanya, who is fast becoming her friend, really likes having guests over. While Anna is cooking, she cuts her finger with a knife. Her friend stops cooking and kindly cares for her.

If the next thing Anna did with Tanya was to start a business with her, she would learn many more things about her friend. If they took skating classes, she would learn more. With each new activity, and the interactions between them that those activities required, they would grow dramatically in their knowledge of each other. With each new situation, they would discover things that they didn't know about each other, because they would witness how the other acts in the new context.

As we do more with God, we learn more of God

When I started following Jesus, I was keen to do what He wanted me to do. So I would go to God, ask Him for what He wanted me to do, try to get an answer and go away and do it. This seemed to me to be what God was looking for – someone who would follow His instructions. I knew that God wanted relationship with me but I thought that was covered when I spent time with God in the morning. In my mind, serving God was somehow not linked to relating with God. I thought they were completely separate.

Slowly though, I began to discover that God didn't see things that way. God saw doing His works as an essential part of getting to know Him. The difference was that He wanted me to do these works with Him, not apart from Him. If I did them apart from Him, I was doing a nice religious work. If I did them with Him I was receiving the most precious of riches – I was getting to know God better.

A life exploring God's diversity

God is incredibly diverse. We can spend our whole lives getting to know Him and we will only have just scratched the surface. What a joy to be able to dive into a fathomless ocean of richness and wonder. This is the life of discovering God and it is for each of His children. God has so many names, which are used to describe Him in the Bible. Names reveal the essence of a person. He is the Creator, the Healer, the Saviour, the Redeemer, the Messiah, the Father, the Spirit, the God Who Hears, the Bridegroom, the Lion of Judah, the Lamb of God, the Suffering Servant, the Prince of Peace, the I Am, the Alpha and Omega, the Sovereign Lord, the Judge, the Holy One of God, our Friend, the Comforter, the Author of our faith, the Son of Man, the Good Shepherd, Mighty Warrior, the Word, the Bread of Life, the Way, the Truth, the Life, the Light of the world. And these are only some of the names of God.

God is zealous for us to know Him. He knows that when we actually get to know Him our souls will be deeply satisfied and we will be freed to love more. Through different circumstances God has revealed truths about who He is to the people of God throughout history. These names of God were revealed to God's people as they followed Him into different situations. When the Israelites learnt new names for God, they learnt more of the character of God. They would never have learnt these truths about God if they had not followed Him.

God wants to do the same thing with us right now. Obviously the Bible is the bedrock of our understanding of God – our main source of revelation about Him. But God wants to fill our whole days with revelation of who He is. The way His creation testifies about Him is an example of this (Psalm 19). Just as He did for the people of the Bible, God wants to reveal Himself to us as we walk with Him, sharing His heart in many different situations. God's way of revealing Himself to us is wonderfully interactive. When we consider again our desperate need for truth about God, this process of constant revelation about Himself displays His kindness to us.

The way this process works is surprisingly similar to how Anna got to know Tanya. Anna and Tanya spent a whole year only meeting in one place, talking about one topic. It was when Anna said "yes" to Tanya's invitation to come to her house, to cook with her and to meet her friends, that she began to discover who Tanya really was. As they worked together and relaxed together they got to know each other more and more.

I used to only meet with God once or twice a week at church or at some quiet point in my day. We didn't talk that much. I didn't know God very well at all. God seemed more like a stranger than a friend. I struggled to be honest with this God that I knew so little about. I also felt like He wasn't interested in me.

Yet as God started to show me that doing His work was about being with Him, loving as He loves, things started to change. As I did these works and began to abide in God, life moved from being drab grey with splashes of colour to being filled with blazing technicolour. My relationship with God wasn't contained to a half hour in the morning. God, I discovered, could fill my entire day.

Just as Anna got to know Tanya so much more as they did different tasks together, so I am learning so much more about how amazing God is through doing all manner of different things with Him. As I'm beginning to serve the poor, I'm learning how much He cares for those who are suffering. As I'm starting to pray more, I'm seeing His power and His desire to see His kingdom brought on earth. As I'm working together with fellow believers, I'm beginning to see the uniqueness of how God has created each of us and of God's great love for each of us. As God is leading me into things I never thought possible, I'm discovering He is the faithful provider who is able to supply all our needs. This is God's desire for my day, and for my life.

We are following God, and the more we are with Him doing what He is doing, the better we will get to know Him. Our understanding of God will bloom, as we abide in Him, as we walk with Him, as we do the works of love he has prepared. In the same way that you cannot really know a person by simply reading information about them, so you cannot know God merely by reading about Him. You have to experience life with God to know God. The big issue is not what we are doing – it's who we are doing it with.

This truth is incredibly liberating and exciting. It makes you look at living and working with God in a new light. Our days and our lives suddenly become a whole lot richer. Getting to know God is not just about a sermon at church or a passage in the Bible, although these things are helpful. Getting to know God is our full-time, life-long occupation. We are living with the Sovereign Lord, with the Creator in His world. He is working in every facet and situation in our lives, to reveal Himself to us. To God there is no spiritual place and un-spiritual place. The world is His. God intends that our lives are a journey discovering the wonders of who He is.

A good question to be asking as we begin to walk with God is, "What is God revealing to me about Himself through this situation, in this work of love?"

I like to think of it as treasure hunting. It is not always instantaneous. In fact, sometimes it takes some digging to find more of God. There are days when I walk away feeling blank – my main question is not what I have discovered about God but where is God? However like treasure revelation about God can appear even in the muddiest, messiest corners of our lives. It's a journey and we keep seeking. It is more than worth it. God is breathtakingly awesome, His character is richer, His wisdom more wonderful than anything else. Life is about uncovering these unending riches, enjoying them and inviting others to share them.

Reflection: Which situations in your day-to-day life have you seen as opportunities to get to know God? Have you divided your life into 'spiritual' and 'non-spiritual' activities?

The more you see, the more you love

A wonderful thing happens as we get to know God as He is. We begin to love Him.

When I got married I loved my wife. After I got married I realised I hardly knew her. If I compare the love that I have for her now it is hard to believe I actually loved her at all when we got married. I did. But my love was so small, so immature compared to what it is now. And we have only been married five years! Over the five years since we got married, I have gotten to know her far better. I have done so many things with her, shared so much of her heart. As I have gotten to know her more, I have grown to love her so much more. Clearly when I say, 'know' I don't mean 'know about' I mean 'know'. I didn't read a book about my wife and store all the facts I could in my head. I lived with her and experienced life with her. Through this process I got to know her and I grew to love her. Facts would never have produced the love I have for her.

This principle is multiplied many times over when it comes to God. My wife is a wonderful person but she's not perfect. Yet getting to know her has caused me to love her more. How much more will this happen when it comes to God? God is infinitely wonderful and infinitely good. The more we get to know God, the more we love Him. As we experience all of life with Him, as He reveals Himself to us in different situations and ways, we will grow in our love for Him. It is a simple principle stated clearly in the Bible's teaching and record of peoples' experience with God.

For example, in the Old Testament, as we watch Moses do amazing acts with God, we see him grow in humility and love for God. In the New Testament, as the disciples spent time with Jesus, doing what He was doing, they grew to love Him. In Acts, as Paul and the early church worked with the Holy Spirit to see the kingdom grow, we see them grow in revelation of and love for God. We could go on and on.

Jesus prays to His Father, "I have made You known to them [believers], and will continue to make You known in order that the love You have for Me may be in them and that I Myself may be in them." (John 17:26) Jesus is saying He has revealed God to us and will continue to reveal God to us, so that our love for Him may increase. In 1 John 3:2 John writes, "We know that when He appears, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is." When we see God face to face we will be changed to be like Him. We will see Him clearly, in person, in His glory. This revelation will change our hearts into hearts full of abundant love for Him and others. I'm looking forward to that!

What is happening on earth as we grow in our knowledge of God is a dim reflection of what will happen when we actually meet God in person. God is so wonderful, so kind, so awesome, so loving, that when we actually discover and trust more of the truth about Him, rather than the lies we have heard, we will naturally grow to love Him. It's so simple, but so effective. God has such stunning wisdom. He has constructed an awesome means for us to daily be growing in love for Him and others. As we fellowship with Him in doing His works of love, through those works we get to know Him.

As I have begun to fellowship with God and gotten to know God more, I have found love for God growing in my heart. It has not been instantaneous but I know without doubt that it is genuine. To me that is a stunning miracle. God is so aware of my inability to love, so He has determinedly set about to free me and enable me to love.

Deeper still...

His passionate desire for me and for you is abundant life – life drenched in His love. Love genuinely grows as we get to know God. But it is not a spectator sport. We see God in our lives, and because we see how good He is - we love Him. But this process of getting to know God and the depth, the dynamism and richness of our fellowship with Him is far greater than merely being witnesses to remarkable events. It is an internal revolution.

Our life is with God and in God, because God by His Spirit is in us. God's desire is to free us at our very core, to be transformed at the very depths of our heart to be wholehearted lovers of God. God is touching and transforming our hearts. He knows our hearts better than we do. He knows our frailty and our fear. He knows we still find it hard on a daily basis to open our hearts in fellowship and love to Him. So in addition to all His other characteristics, there is one crucial feature He is wanting to reveal to us in as many ways as possible. This characteristic of God is the key that will unlock our doubting, fearful hearts to enable us to receive His lavish love. This key is His faithfulness.

Chapter 15

Trusting God

His faithfulness will be your shield and rampart. Psalm 91:4

One evening after work, two husbands decide to buy chocolates for their wives. They return to their homes with their gifts. The wife of the first husband is ecstatic. She loves chocolates and she loves surprises. She feels understood and wonderfully loved that her husband had thought of her and gone out of his way to buy her a treat.

When the husband of the other wife returns home, his wife refuses to open the door and makes her husband use his key. When he presents her with his gift of chocolates, she glares menacingly. She assumes the worst. She guesses he is trying to manipulate her. She wonders what he has done, what guilt has driven him to stoop so low. The last thing she is feeling is loved.

Two couples, two boxes of chocolates, two very different responses. Why?

The importance of trust

Trust is incredibly important. It is a crucial ingredient in all loving relationships. If we do not trust someone it is very difficult to receive their love. They may doing loving actions, but if we do not trust them we will rarely interpret what they are doing as loving us. Instead we will be suspicious. We will explain their actions as being done for any motive other than love.

The two husbands above did exactly the same action – gave their wives chocolates. Yet the two wives interpreted this same action in very different ways. The wife who trusted her husband interpreted his gift to be a gift of love. The wife who did not trust her husband interpreted the gift as his way of manipulating and deceiving her.

What the recipient believed about the giver's character determined what impact the giving of the gift had upon the recipient. This principle is true for all relationships including our relationship with God.

Can God be trusted?

Can God be trusted to be loving in all things - loving to people, loving to us? As people learning to live with God, this question is central. In our day-to-day walk with the Lord, we are confronted by the world and the mess we see around us. Where is God and what is He doing? How is He possibly being loving and faithful? Most of have trusted someone in the past and had that trust broken. Being betrayed can wound us deeply. It can be difficult to want to trust anyone including God. We know from the Bible that God is faithful. But it is not something we can quickly convince our hearts of. The questions continue to gnaw at us.

It is comforting to note that in reading the Psalms, the Bible's record of other people's prayer lives, we see that the issue of God's trustworthiness and our trust in Him are central themes. The psalmist cries out, "Why, O LORD, do you stand far off? Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?" (Psalm 10:1) We are not alone in our questions. They have been the subject of believers' thoughts and prayers for thousands of years.

Reflection: How do you see your beliefs about who God is impacting your ability to trust Him?

Trust and love go hand in hand

The less we trust God, the less we are able to receive His love or to recognise His goodness in our lives. The opposite is also true. The more we trust God, the more we are able to receive His love and recognise His goodness. Revelation of God's faithfulness is crucial to our ability to trust. It is only as we trust God that we will be able to receive His love and live in the fullness that He intends for us.

Getting to know God's faithfulness will unlock a flood of love for God, because as we trust God we will open our hearts to Him. As we open our hearts to God we will be able to receive His love more. This will enable us to love wholeheartedly in a way we could never have imagined.

Clearly if God is serious about us maturing as Jesus' Bride, He must have a plan to grow trust in our hearts. We need healing and we need to know His faithfulness personally.

Growing trust

Reflection: Think of someone you trust. Why do you trust that person? Think of someone you do not trust. Why do you not trust that person?

Usually the process of trusting someone or not trusting someone develops in a familiar pattern. We usually trust a person because they have shown us over time and involvement in our lives that they are trustworthy. Or we will trust someone because another person that we trust or respect has told us that they are trustworthy and we choose to believe that person.

A similar process happens in the case of distrust. We have all had the experience of being betrayed or let down by other people. This causes us to instinctively distrust other people. Our natural tendency is to not trust someone who we do not know, and only to trust them once they have proved that they are reliable.

With God, growing in our trust in Him is principally a work of His Spirit. The Spirit works in a great number of ways, that I cannot adequately understand or describe, to bring about trust in God in our hearts - there is no formula. The Spirit uses all manner of things to form trust in us.

However, similar to the way we grow in our trust of others, the Spirit also grows trust in God in us. This occurs in two main ways: through the testimony of others and through our own experience.

The testimony of others

The first way is the development of trust through hearing the recommendation of other people. If I wanted to install new windows in my house I would need to find a tradesman to do this. I might ask a friend who installed their windows and, if they did a good job, ask the same contractor to install mine. I could also see their handiwork for myself in my friend's house. I would then trust them to do a good job for me too. In a similar way our trust in God grows when we hear a recommendation, someone's testimony, and we choose to trust God more on the basis of that testimony.

The main source of testimony about God is the Bible. Written by humans but inspired by the Spirit, the Bible records God's trustworthiness through history. It is God's word, declaring to us very clearly, "Trust God. He saved the people of Israel according to His promises; He saved Daniel from the lion's den; He caused Sarah to have a child even though she was barren; He healed the sick; He sent Jesus to save us" and so on and so on. The Bible is an amazing record of the true God moving through human history proving His trustworthiness.

In our lives, the Bible forms the bedrock of our understanding of God and His faithfulness. Everything else we experience and think and feel should be placed up against the Bible. God's character is clearly revealed in the Bible. What we believe we learn about God from experiences will never contradict the Bible. If it does, we need to rethink what we believe we have learnt. In life, if we just look at our current situation, it is sometimes very difficult to believe that God is loving us. We cannot see how God is loving us in the moment, so we may think God has left us and is not trustworthy.

The Bible is brilliant because it gives us a solid history of God's perfect track record. So even in those moments when we look around and wonder where God is and what He is doing, we can read the Bible and be comforted by the history of thousands and thousands of years of God faithfully guiding His people through life. We can take comfort in the fact that the Wonderful Counselor, the Good Shepherd, the Spirit of Truth, the Ancient of Days of the Bible is the wise, all powerful, Guide who is leading us through our lives on earth and into eternity with Him. Our trust in God is not based on what we see about us in the moment, but rather on what we have been told by a very reliable source, the Holy Spirit, of God's involvement in history.

Knowing that growing in our trust in God is key to our maturing, we want to be reading and meditating on the Bible regularly. It is a unique source of clear information about God. It is a huge breath of fresh air in a world awash with deception and confusion.

Our testimony

The second major way that God is maturing our trust in Him is through our personal experience of God's trustworthiness in our lives over time. Again, it is a similar process to how we grow trust in other relationships. As we spend time with people and get to know that they are trustworthy we begin to trust them. Over time, as we witness God's faithfulness in the way He interacts with us, our trust in God will grow.

God is committed to seeing us grow in our understanding of how incredibly faithful He is. In our lives He has prepared situations where He is able to show His character and, in particular, His faithfulness. Often these situations occur as we say, "yes" to His invitation "Come with Me". God has designed life in such a way that by being with Jesus, and doing what He is doing, we will grow in our trust of God. Through this we mature hugely. The next chapter is dedicated to exploring this dynamic, wonderful process.

Called into freedom

The wisdom of God is amazing. His call to us is His grace to us. His invitation to us is His mercy. As we enter into fellowship with Him and work with Him, doing the works He prepared for us to do with Him, God reveals His faithfulness to us. As we learn we can trust God, we will be more and more liberated to receive His love. We can be healed. God's call to work with Him is not a call to be enslaved. Instead it is an integral part of His plan to free us into an abundant life of love.

Chapter 16

Experiencing God's faithfulness

O LORD, you are my God; I will exalt you and praise your name, for in perfect faithfulness you have done marvelous things, things planned long ago. Isaiah 25:1

How does God's plan to show us His faithfulness through our lives, work in practice? To answer this question I don't want to use a nice little vignette from my life. I want us to contemplate thousands of years of history - life-giving history. I want to look at the history of our family, the people of God. I want to examine how the Eternal God has been carefully working through the grit of people's lives for thousands of years, determinedly revealing His unshakable trustworthiness to them. This God, with His wonderful track record, is our great heritage as followers of Jesus. He is our confidence.

If you study many of the main characters in the Bible - Noah, Abraham, Israel, Moses, the judges, Samuel, David, the prophets, the apostles - a pattern emerges. God calls a certain person, or people, to Himself. Often the call is to do something that is far beyond their natural abilities. With the call He makes a promise. All they have to do is say, "yes" and go with Him. The success of the call is dependent on God fulfilling His promise. Instantly, God has created for Himself an opportunity to prove His faithfulness. This was His plan back then, and it is His plan now. God wants to display His faithfulness on the stage of our lives.

God calls and promises

God called Noah to make an ark, declaring that the world would flood but that Noah and his family would be saved. God called Abraham to leave his home country, and promised him descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky. God called Moses and declared that He would, through Moses, deliver the people of Israel out of captivity from Egypt. To Joshua, God promised victory over all the nations that occupied the land He had promised to Israel. God called the shepherd David and promised that He would be King of Israel. At Jeremiah's call, God declared that he would be a prophet to the nations. To Mary, God promised a child who would be the Son of God. When God called Paul, He promised that through him He would turn many Gentiles from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light. And we could go on.

In all these situations God called the person, and promised that if they followed Him, He would do mighty things through them. These were things that they could never have accomplished by themselves. The message was clear. If God was not faithful, the person would be proved incredibly foolish or worse. But if God was faithful, then mighty deeds would be accomplished.

In responding to His invitation, by saying, "yes" to God's call, each person gave God a unique opportunity to reveal His faithfulness. Note that the person did not call God and give God a task. God called them, and showed them clearly how He intended to show His faithfulness to them, through their partnering with Him in His work.

The response?

How did the people of the Bible respond? Sometimes they rejected God's call. For example, Israel rejected God numerous times and broke her covenant with Him. The Pharisees of the New Testament rejected Jesus' teachings and plotted to kill Him. When God's call came to them they were secure in their current life and didn't want to change what they were doing. The rich young ruler of Luke 18, and the people who turned down the kings invitation in the parable of the wedding banquet in Luke 14, also said "no" to His invitation.

A number of people in the Bible responded by saying, "yes" to God's call. That's not to say they were all full of faith - often they were frightened and full of doubts. Moses, Zechariah, Gideon, Saul, Jeremiah and Thomas all reacted this way. Yet despite their fear, they said, "yes". There were also some people who dropped everything and followed God. David, a number of the prophets and a number of Jesus' disciples zealously gave themselves to God. Levi got up and left everything at Jesus' call. Mary responded with joy at the angel Gabriel's message. Whether they responded in fear, trepidation and doubts or in instant trust, these people, when they heard God's call, said, "yes".

So what happened next? Did God act instantly and do exactly what He has promised? Usually not. Rather than instant fulfillment, there was a time lag, there were difficulties and struggles .... and then God did exactly what He had promised.

Time lag

Abraham had to wait decades. God had called him and he followed. Yet for years no child was born to his wife, Sarah. It was only when she was ninety-nine years old and it was biologically impossible for her to have the child, from which Abraham's numerous descendants would come, that God enabled her to have a child. The same phenomena occurred for Isaac and Jacob and their wives. David, too, waited decades to be made King. For the disciples, it was fifty days between the time when Jesus promised the Holy Spirit and when they received Him. It was not decades, but it still required patience and trust.

Difficulties

For others, the wait was not as great but the difficulties they encountered before God fulfilled His promise, were huge. Moses was called by God and yet God's promise of Israel's deliverance did not happen in the time and way that Moses had expected. We get a glimpse of Moses' struggle in his complaint, "Ever since I went to Pharaoh to speak in Your Name, he has brought trouble upon this people, and You have not rescued Your people at all."(Exodus 5:23)

For Joshua it was years and years of constant war before the land which God had promised Israel was completely conquered. The ministry of the apostles was characterised by difficulties such as imprisonment, stonings, floggings, riots, government opposition and other forms of persecution. Many of the Psalms speak of God's people's experience in this place of being called, promised to and yet waiting for the promise to be fulfilled. Anguish, desperation, longing and doubt gush forth. Psalm 89:46 is a cry which has been prayed by most believers at sometime in their lives, "How long, O Lord? Will you hide yourself forever?" Jesus Himself cried out on the Cross, "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?" (Matthew 27:46)

The unknown nature of the path

For most of these followers of God, the information they were given by God when they were called left much of the way ahead for them unknown. God had promised them something but they had very little idea about the path that would lead to that promise being fulfilled. When Jesus called his disciples He told them very little about what lay ahead. We don't see Jesus saying, "Let's go to Jerusalem together. First you'll be spending some time in Galilee, you'll see some miracles there and you'll have your faith challenged. At Jerusalem I'll be killed and then three days later I'll be raised to life. Then a while later you'll receive the Holy Spirit in power, you'll be a pillar of the church, a preacher of the gospel, and finally be martyred. How does that sound? If that sounds good to you, meet Me tomorrow after work or if not, just come when you think you're ready. I'm easy. I'll work around you." The only information Jesus added to His command, "Follow Me", was, "...and I'll make you a fisher of men" (Mark 1:17).

It was as the disciples responded to Jesus and journeyed with Him that they understood more of what they were going to do with Jesus. At that initial point when He called them, He told them very little about what that would actually mean. They had to trust Him.

Reflection: Have you had similar experiences where God has called you to do something, but then you have encountered a time lag, difficulties and unknowns? How did you respond to them? Did you recognize them as part of God's growing of you at the time?

The people of the Bible were real people, trying to live life. They are wonderfully raw and inspiring. They struggled even as they tried to remain faithful to God's call. Many of them experienced persecution and suffering. The letters of the New Testament often refer to the suffering that churches are experiencing. They are rich with encouragement for those believers to persevere. Constantly facing serious difficulties and suffering, it was easy for them to start doubting God. These people of the Bible were faced with the same question we are faced with in our lives today – is God trustworthy and faithful?

Why the struggle? Why the difficulties? Why the lack of knowledge before they committed to following? Why the wait? That's a big question. We may not be able to answer all the questions about why certain difficulties and struggles occurred, but looking at the experiences of the characters in the Bible we can clearly see God's good purposes being brought about. Through the wait, the struggle, the questions, the confusion, God was growing their trust in Him.

Transformed by struggle

God is always at work to bring good from difficult situations, to bring life to His children from painful struggles (Romans 8:28). Each of these people in the Bible who persevered through the challenges they faced, emerged from them transformed. Their faith grew, their hearts were softened, their character was profoundly changed.

The apostle James gives deep insight into the process that occurred as these people of the Bible struggled and persevered. He is not writing from a theoretical base. He died himself for his faith. He is writing with the wonderful calling and love of Christ before him. He says, "Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything." (James 1:2–4) Into the midst of the struggle God's word and perspective comes bringing fresh wonder at God's wisdom. God is maturing His people through the struggle. God is freeing us into the very thing we long for – to live more abundant lives in Him.

All these people who endured the struggle continually chose to believe God. This is not to say they didn't have doubts but they kept following after God. In the struggle, in the doubt, in the questions their faith was tested. They were tempted to try to gain what God had promised through some other means. David was tempted to kill Saul rather than wait for God's timing for him to be king. Israel was tempted to rely on their own strength in battle. Indeed Abraham attempted through Hagar to fulfill God's promises of numerous descendants. Yet despite their weakness they continued to choose to believe God over a period of time under consistent pressure and testing. David's experience of being pursued by King Saul for years is an obvious example. This choosing required a great deal of perseverance. In this highly pressurised environment with God's help perseverance bloomed in His people. It developed out of the testing of their faith.

To appreciate the importance of this process we need to appreciate the value of perseverance. The reason that perseverance is so valuable is that it is an essential stepping-stone in our maturing to be like Jesus. James says, "Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking in anything." (James 1:4) This is incredible wisdom - through leading His people to persevere in the struggle, God was leading them deeper into Himself, into maturity in Christ. When we begin to understand this perseverance becomes as valuable as diamonds, and the struggle and doubt - a precious, holy time.

Paul the apostle, another who gave his life to God's call, testifies to this glorious process. He says, "And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope." (Rom 5: 2-4)

Character is formed as a result of the choice to persevere. This is what we are longing for as we look to live abundant lives. The character Paul talks of is Jesus' character - the character of love. This process of persevering in the struggle uniquely opens the way for God's character of love to be formed in us. In our despair, our doubts, our questions as we follow God waiting for Him to fulfill His promise, He is transforming us. By His Spirit as we continue to walk in His direction more and more we are taking on the family likeness, we are becoming like Jesus.

I don't know entirely how persevering in following Jesus produces Jesus' character in us but I know it is true. When in the grit and mess of life, in the midst of doubts and fear we choose to worship God, to follow Him our hearts are transformed. A deep work is done. Deep hunger for God grows. Its all very well to worship God when you are feeling blessed and encouraged but when you feel you have nothing, when despair clouds your vision, in that place worship is sweetest. There is a wonderful purity stirred in your heart. There is fellowship with Jesus that no other experience brings. Nothing else remains, only God. This is wholehearted worship, wholehearted love. This is the purpose of our beings.

This worship was part of the journey of the people that followed after God in the Bible. As we journey with God, we too can join in this worship. In that place like no other we will find the sufficiency and glory of God.

The promise is fulfilled

To each person in the Bible who responds to God's call with a yes and continues to follow God, God proves Himself faithful. God provides an heir for Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He gives the Promised Land to the armies of Joshua. David is made King. Paul takes the gospel to the Gentiles and sees many saved. Moses leads the Israelites out of Egypt. God was faithful to His word.

If you could ask King David whether it was worth the wait, or Moses whether it was worth persevering through the difficulties, what do you think they would say? I think the essence of their answer would be – undoubtedly. It is always worth it to trust God.

The joy and the wonder that these followers of God experienced when God showed His faithfulness is awesome. Moses sings following the Lord's deliverance, "Who is like You – majestic in holiness, awesome in glory, working wonder?" (Exodus 15:11). David sang out, "I will extol the LORD at all times; his praise will always be on my lips. My soul will boast in the LORD; let the afflicted hear and rejoice. Glorify the LORD with me; let us exalt his name together. I sought the LORD, and he answered me; he delivered me from all my fears. Those who look to him are radiant; their faces are never covered with shame. This poor man called, and the LORD heard him; he saved him out of all his troubles." (Psalm 34:1-6)

There is a wonder, a reverence and a devotion in these followers as they revel in the stunning work of God. When you wait for something, struggle for something for a long time, and finally receive it, there are few things that compare with the experience. To have that personal experience of God's faithfulness is breathtaking and certainly more than worth the struggle. For these people in the Bible, God's faithfulness and love was no longer something they had simply heard about from others. They saw it with their own eyes, in their own lives. Devotion and gratitude to God exploded in their hearts. They too had become witnesses of God.

Witnesses today

This same experience can be ours today. Just like the characters in the Bible, God is calling us to be with Him, doing what He is calling us to do. As our walk is by faith, walking with Jesus will always require us to trust in Jesus. So we too can enter into the blessed transformation that happens through perseverance, we too can be witnesses of His work.

When God first called me to serve overseas, my wife and I were working and saving. We estimated we needed $20,000 before we left to cover our airfares and set up costs. By the end of June we had saved $5000. We were doing okay. We were planning to leave at the end of January, and needed the $20,000 by the end of December. At the end of June God told us to give the $5000 dollars away. When God said this, two things happened very quickly. Until then I had thought I trusted God as my Provider. Suddenly I realised I didn't. What I actually believed was that the money I had saved through work could be relied on, but that God could not. The second thing I realised was that if we gave away the $5000 we would have no hope of being able to save enough money to go overseas.

A struggle ensued. God eventually won. We gave the money away and tried to smile. December rolled around and we had very little money saved – about $500. The wrestle, the fear, the anxiety was slowly crushing me. Eventually I gave up. I don't think I graciously decided to trust in God's loving arms of provision - I just gave up. Worrying was too hard so I decided to leave it with God. Just before Christmas I got two phone calls in the space of an hour. The first was from my wife, saying that we had just been given a cheque for $10,000. The second was also from my wife, saying that we had been given two more cheques for $2,500 each. $15,000 in one day! The exhilaration and gratitude we felt was fantastic. God had burst into our lives in such a tangible way. Our confidence in Him was strengthened far more than if we had managed to earn the money we needed ourselves.

God faithfully provides. He's a good Dad. I still have days when I panic but God is slowly teaching me that He is faithful. As I follow Him, He will provide. Was trusting God worthwhile? Absolutely.

This kind of lesson can happen in so many different situations. It doesn't matter how sensational or mundane the situation may seem, the important thing is that we are growing to trust God. God may be wanting you to help your neighbour by cooking a meal. It is a situation where you choose whether to trust God or not. Do you trust God that this meal will have an impact on your neighbour or do you resent God for giving you a task that wastes your time? Do you admit to God that you are selfish, and ask God to give you His love for your neighbour? When He does you can rejoice knowing His faithfulness.

God may be calling you to work with Him to see a new church planted in your city. He may promise you that He will save many people and grow the church. This will obviously require trust in the Lord. It will be difficult, and the struggle will inevitably reveal what you really trust in. Will you rely on your own strength and understanding, rather than the Lord's, in trying to see the church grow? It will require you to persevere. If you hold fast to God, abiding in Him even though you struggle and doubt, you will be transformed. What an awesome joy it will be when God proves that He is faithful to His word, when you see the church growing, just as He promised it would when He called you.

Follow and trust

God is calling us to follow Him and trust Him. We step out in weakness and doubt, but we do it because we are hungry to know Jesus and be with Him. We know that the struggle is not unusual but something that we should expect, because everyone throughout the Scriptures struggled too. We know that, by God's grace, the struggle will produce perseverance. And this will form God's character of love is us. We will be freed to live wholeheartedly. God, in His time, will be faithful to His promise. We will become joyful witnesses of our abundant, faithful God. It is an incredible process - a deep mine of priceless treasures. Priceless truths about the character of God are being revealed to us and priceless works of transformation within our hearts are occurring. I have seen, and continue to see, the truth of this process in my life. As I understand it more, my appreciation for God and His goodness is growing and growing. Again, I marvel at God's wisdom.

We have an incredible heritage in the Lord Jesus. As God's people, we can stand and look in awe at the thousands and thousands of years that God has been faithful in people's lives. The history of God's people, our family, is not a record of the acts of super-humans. It is a record of the faithfulness of God displayed on the stage of weak, struggling, doubting people trying to follow God. God has and continues to faithfully love and free His people as they experience for themselves the abundant, unending faithfulness of God.

This is the genius of God's wisdom. As a result of our experiences of living and working with Him a precious change occurs. He calls fearful, suspicious, doubting people like me to Himself and takes us with Him in His work, so that we might see for ourselves, over time, that God is faithful. We begin to know personally that God is trustworthy. Our hearts start to open as we worship Him in the struggle. As we choose to follow Him, our suspicions and doubts about God begin to melt. We begin to trust His Word and His presence. As this happens we are more able to receive His love. We start to enjoy the huge waterfall of God's love that He is pouring into our hearts.

Reflection: Think of times when you have witnessed God's faithfulness. What role did risk and struggle play in that experience?

Chapter 17

Loving others

This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down His life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. 1 John 3:16

On the night before He was crucified Jesus did an interesting thing. He rolled up His sleeves, took a towel and did the job the lowest servant in the house should have done - He washed His disciples feet. Having washed their feet, He said, "Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you." (John 13:14-15) Jesus served His disciples and said we should serve each other. Jesus has called us to love each other as He loves us.

Jesus' example and Jesus' call to serve are inspirational. The first time I really came face to face with people living like Jesus was when I joined a group of believers who were serving the poor. I had only been there for a couple of days. We were sitting around talking. I was tired. One of the team got up and asked, "Would anyone like a drink?" "Thanks for asking," I thought. "I'd love one." The next meal someone else did the same thing. Great. In fact whenever anyone went to get food or a drink they offered to get some for the others in the room. I thought this was fantastic. Then I went to get a drink for myself. I left the room where were sitting and went to the kitchen. I was about to pour a drink... and then it hit me. I hadn't asked the others if they wanted one too. In fact I hadn't thought of them at all. It took all the will power I could muster to pour five other drinks before I returned resentfully to the living room.

Here I was serving God, serving the poor, and yet when the rubber hit the road, in day-to-day life, I had no desire within me to help people. Verses like, Philippians 2:4–11 came rushing into my head. "Who am I?" I wondered. "I'm supposed to be a follower of Jesus – the Servant – and there is nothing in me that wants to serve at all. No love for anybody."

When I started to try to work with other believers, doing more than just pouring drinks for them, my inadequacy became even more apparent to me. Rather than the wonderful miracle of unity I had hoped for I was confronted by how much I resented the way God had gifted others. At times I felt I didn't have anything to contribute. At other times I felt no one else had anything to contribute. It amazed me at how annoyed I got over the smallest of things.

Rather than peace and unity, conflict and resentment seemed to be the only things present. Quickly I saw that my heart was not full of love for others but rather it was cold, fearful and selfish. I found that as I worked with others I struggled to trust anyone. Instead I feared them. I got hurt and I hurt others. I disappointed people and they disappointed me. I found myself needing to say to people that I was sorry. I needed to learn to forgive people the way Jesus had forgiven me.

These kinds of experiences presented me with a choice. I could either stop trying to work with other believers and ignore them, or I could ask God to give me His love.

Breathing God's love

I don't think that everyone is as selfish as me but I will say this: it is impossible for us to love God and others without first receiving God's love. It is easy for us to sit in a room and sing some songs and believe that we love each other. But when we start to serve together, it usually doesn't take too long before we discover we don't actually love each other very much at all. Indeed there are some people we find almost impossible to love. We might be able to be polite to them, but our hearts are a mess of poor motives and resentment.

This is far from Jesus' call for us to love as He loved, laying down our lives for each in service. We have seen that God is calling us to wholeheartedly love – to care as He cares, and act as He acts. God's love is pure and selfless. Anything else pales into insignificance. The fact is we can't love God or others the way He longs for us to - the way we were made to.

God's solution is simple. He wants us to love with His love. Only as the pure, sacrificial, lavish love of God flows into our hearts can we hope to begin to love God and others with this kind of love. To me, the process is similar to breathing. It is impossible for us to expel breath unless we first breathe it in. And, like breathing, we need to be constantly receiving God's love to be constantly giving it out to God and to others. We cannot hope to do the latter without the former.

Over time I realised what I had to do. There was no love in me for others. I had to find it elsewhere. So I went to God. For several years now, I have been asking God to help me love others. Slowly, very slowly I am beginning to grow in love. It has not been easy. As with all these other processes of change we have discussed, it takes time and I constantly need to go back to God for more grace and love. That's the idea! But I am discovering that God's love is abundant and, unlike my resources, it is unlimited.

The abundance of God's love gives me confidence to face a hurting world and to step out and give. I may not have what is needed but there is always enough of God's love. Its wonderful to realise I am not a bucket of limited love being poured out but a hose through which God's unending love can gush!

God is helping us to breathe. He is helping us to grow in receiving and giving love. He is doing this in just the way that we have described. He is revealing Himself to us as we live and work with Him. He is showing us His faithfulness so we can trust Him and open our hearts to receive His love. And He is calling us to love others. Abundant life, maturing, is about loving God and others. His call to love others is a call to freedom as it drives us to cry out more for the pure love of God. God, our Provider, will undoubtedly answer this cry. Jesus says, "Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!" (Luke 11:11-13) As we cry out, God will pour His love into our hearts by His Holy Spirit and we will be changed. This is how we are freed to live more like Jesus.

Reflection: What's your default resource that you reach for as you attempt to love others?

Corporate work grows corporate love

Maturity is a corporate thing. It's not about becoming a lone spiritual guru. It's about us, Jesus' Body, getting together, working together, and together living lives of love. Paul describes this process clearly in Ephesians 4:16 when he says, "From Him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work" (emphasis mine). We are built up together, not as individuals. God's call to work together is a big part of His plan to free us to live this abundant life.

As individuals we each have a responsibility to respond to God's call to go with Him. But an integral part of the process of maturing in love is our corporate participation in the works of God. It's not a competition to see who gets there first or achieves the most. Our maturity is corporate. To be maturing we need to be helping each other grow into living with Jesus. We are to carry each other's burdens and walk together (Galatians 6:2). God has designed things this way. He wants us to be one as He is one (John 17:21). He has given us all unique gifts, as Ephesians 4:7-11, 1 Corinthians 12 and Romans 12 discuss, and created us as a Body which needs every part to function.

God has many works of love that He is calling us, His Body, to do, that are impossible for individuals to accomplish on their own, such as the Great Commission of Matthew 28:18 20. This is intentional. When we work together - with each other and with God - each doing our part, we will grow dynamically in love for God and for each other.

The first step in this process is the revelation that we need God's enabling to love each other. As we've seen, the context of working together quickly shows us this is true. God will grow His love for others in us as we together seek to serve others. We don't rely on our own ability. Instead we ask God daily for His unending, unquenchable love.

As we love each other, we love Jesus

This love for each other that God will grow in us is precious. Just how precious it is to God is revealed in what Jesus says about Judgment Day in Matthew 25. He describes His judgment of the peoples of the earth, as being similar to separating sheep from goats. To those who have loved others with God's love, who have had compassion on the poor and the outcast, Jesus says amazing words. He says, "I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me." (Matthew 25:40). When we love each other, we are loving Christ Himself. As we show love to others, Jesus says that He feels loved by our actions.

Jesus said, "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love another. By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you love one another." (John 13:34-35) We will be known as Jesus' disciples if we love one another. This love for each other is not something we can just make ourselves do, it is something that God will grow in us through the struggle of life, trying to serve each other. God has specifically designed many of the good works He is calling us to; to be corporate so that this love may grow by His grace. Loving each other is essential to our maturing together.

Reflection: How important has loving others been in your understanding of life with God?

God in us

God has great wisdom. His intention for us is that we live wholeheartedly, being all that God made us to be. This is a process - it is maturing. By saying "yes" to God's call, He is freeing us to receive His promise of abundant life. By calling us to Himself, He is showing us who He is. As we see the truth of who He is, especially His faithfulness, we are opening our hearts to God. As we seek to work with Him and others we are realising more and more our need for His love. And now with our hearts opening in response to His faithfulness we can begin to receive it.

I really pray that we will get a hold of this amazing truth. It is one of the great mysteries of the gospel. God is not standing apart from us demanding that we follow Him and love Him and others. God is working and living in us by His Holy Spirit. Romans 5:5 says, "And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us." God has poured out, and will continue to pour His love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit.

We have amazing hope as we contemplate our goal of maturing into wholehearted love. We know that it is impossible on our own but God has not left us alone. As He reveals who He is, He is freeing our hearts to be open to Him. Into those open hearts He is pouring the most wonderful of all things – His love. Rather than a container of water being poured out for others, we are bubbling fountains overflowing with the purity and wholeheartedness of God's love in us. Hallelujah! The life of love is good! God the Father is freeing us wonderfully to be His Son's cherished Bride – to love our Bridegroom as He loves us.

The supremacy of love

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

1 Corinthians 13:13

Chapter 18

Our purpose

Place me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm; for love is as strong as death, its jealousy unyielding as the grave. It burns like a blazing fire, like a mighty flame. Many rivers cannot quench love; rivers cannot wash it away. If one were to give all the wealth of his house for love, it would be utterly scorned. Song of Songs 8:6-7

The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love. Galatians 5:6

Discovering the essence of life

One of the chief aims of this book has been to understand the essence of what we are doing on planet earth as believers in Jesus. I believe God made the answer to this question simple. Certainly our lives and this world are incredibly complex, as indeed God is incredibly complex and infinite in His nature. There are mysteries and wonders that are beyond our ability to fully comprehend.

But I do not believe that God wants us to be confused about the purpose of our lives. God has specifically designed relationship with God for humans – for us. It is not just for super-humans, super-spiritual people but for everyone who puts their faith in Jesus. God created us and created a way into loving relationship with Himself that is accessible for all people, whatever our background, experiences, nationality, age or personality. There are complexities and challenges, unknowns and paradoxes. These are designed to drive us to ask questions and to seek God; they are not a barrier to knowing Him.

Journeying with God

A classic image used to describe followers of Jesus is the pilgrim, the traveller, the alien, journeying till they find rest in their true home (Hebrews 11:16; Psalm 84:5-6). My hope is that some of that sense of process and journey with God has been expressed through the pages of this book.

Most journeys have a destination or, at least, a goal. What is the goal of our journey with God, what is the destination? Unlike most journeys, our life with God is eternal so maybe talking about a destination is impossible. Rather than asking what the destination of our journey with God is maybe it is better to ask, what direction is it headed?

Reflection: How has your understanding of God changed as you've read this book? How has this affected your understanding of the purpose of your life?

God's direction and purpose for our lives is surprisingly wonderful. It is certainly quite different from what I had expected when I first realised I needed Jesus to get to heaven.

God will satisfy His needy, weary people with Himself. He has not enslaved us forcing us to pay for our sin. He has completely forgiven us through faith in Jesus. To His people, to those fearing rejection, He has drawn near and chosen us to be His only beloved Bride forever. He has completely accepted us and loves us unconditionally. He enjoys us and delights over us. The colour and the vibrancy of His heart are amazing. He boldly declares our beauty and will gently heal our shame, our wounds. To those trying to live up to an impossible standard, He speaks of His rest. He can satisfy our longing, hungry hearts with Himself and His limitless love.

Our happy God is singing to us. Our King is inviting, calling us to Himself. We are His friends, His Bride, His eternal companion. We are learning to abide in Him, in deep close fellowship with Him, in all things forever.

We can walk with Him, caring for what He cares for and doing what He is doing - loving Him and loving others – living the family resemblance. We can work and walk with Him not in our strength and control but under His wonderful leadership and empowering. We are partners with our Bridegroom in building His Kingdom. We no longer work for God's acceptance, but we serve him out of gratitude for His love. Our work with Him is a gift to Him.

In God's great wisdom and love, He will set us free as we walk and work with Him - free to be who God created us to be, free to live abundant lives. By faith in Jesus' death and resurrection, we are totally forgiven and accepted into loving relationship with God, but God doesn't stop there. He is maturing us. He knows our hearts, our fears, our selfishness and our inability to love. But through participation in His works, in life with Him and others we will be freed from our fears and selfishness. We will be freed to trust. We will get to know God in His diversity and richness personally.

His faithfulness will unlock our hearts. As we gratefully open our hearts to God we receive His abundant, lavish love. Our chasm of need can be filled by God's unconditional, extravagant love. By His Spirit, love for God and love for others will rise up in our hearts. God, in His genius, will use the opportunities to love that we encounter everyday to free us to experience the best thing in all the universe: being loved and loving.

This has been our journey thus far. So where is our journey headed?

The supremacy of love

I hope that one thing, at least, has clearly stood out from the pages of this book. This whole journey, the whole point of this life is love – being loved, loving God and loving others. The Scripture quoted at the beginning of this chapter from Song of Songs is a good attempt at trying to express this truth that is more wonderful than words can convey. I love what David says in Psalm 63:3, "Because Your love is better than life, my lips will glorify You." David was someone who loved the Lord with all his heart. David loved the Lord with this passion because he knew a little of what God's love was like. And even with the little he knew, he declared that God's love was better than life itself.

Our whole beings, our minds, our hearts, our souls, our spirits, our bodies are created to be receivers of the awesome love of God and givers of this awesome love. There is no higher pursuit, no deeper knowledge, no value more noble, and no richer experience. There is nothing more profound, nothing more wonderful, nothing more exhilarating, nothing more satisfying in all the world, than God's love. In this universe, in this creation that God has made, His love is supreme.

The voluntary nature of love

God is calling us to Himself. But He is not coercing us. God's goal for us is a life of love, and love, by its very nature, cannot be created through coercion. Love is, by definition, voluntary. You cannot force someone to love someone else. Love is always a choice. In the beginning when God created us, He gave us the ability to choose whether we would trust Him and live according to His ways, or choose not to trust Him and live our own way. Adam and Eve chose not to trust God. We were given free choice to enable us to love. Through Jesus, God gives us grace to choose to love Him. When we choose Him, we are loving Him. Indeed in our day-to-day lives, under the pressures we face in this world, under the pressure of the Enemy, every time we choose to follow God, no matter how weak we might feel, we are loving Him. It's glorious!

Love is the expression of who God is. Perhaps the best description of love in the Bible, and probably in all literature, is found in 1 Corinthians 13:1-13:

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Love is the summation of God's character. This is the character that God is shaping in us. He is maturing us into a people who are like His Son - people who love God and love others like Jesus does.

We are designed to love. God has made us all in wonderful and different ways, but the end goal of all that He has made us to be is loving. Everything we do is all about loving God and loving others. We evangelise to love God and others. We plant churches, we pray, we serve the poor to love God and others. We are creative – we write, we sculpt, we paint - with the goal of loving God and others. We war against the Enemy, we rule and reign with Christ responsibly because it is a unique opportunity to carefully and consistently love God and others. We work, we sing, we cook, we rest, we shop, we give, we spend time with our families, we resist the temptations of the Enemy, we make decisions for truth and justice in our workplace, we choose to obey God even when it seems ridiculous, we live our lives, we do all these things to love God and others.

He created us to be loved and to love. We were lost, cursed, dead in our sin, entirely shut off from God. Yet God in His great mercy and love sent Jesus to save us. For us, Jesus sacrificed Himself. This is love. God loving us. God came and sought after us. He revealed Himself to us. He loved us. He made us His Bride. He knew that we were entirely unable to love Him and love others. He placed His Spirit in us to release His love in our hearts. He knew that our hearts were bound by lies and deceptions, selfishness, fears and unforgiveness yet He set His heart to the task of freeing us. He sings to us of our beauty and His own beauty and character. He touches our hearts with His love.

He calls us to Himself to be with Him in loving relationship always in all that He is doing. Knowing that our hearts are still so cold, so trapped, so immature, in His great wisdom, He calls us to work with Him. Even our weakest "yes", our most frail opening of our hearts, He loves and accepts. He leads us to acts of love with Him and with others. As we do them, we do not understand His purposes. We cry out against Him, yet He continues to love us. Slowly as we get to know Him more, through our partnership with Him, as we finally realise how truly cold our hearts are and how in need of God's love we are, He can set us free. God comes and answers our prayer for His love to be in our hearts.

As we are freed, we will be in awe of God. God, in His great love, will transform our hearts. Selfish, flesh-loving hearts can be filled to overflowing with the most pure love of all – God's. We can enter into our destiny as people. Quite simply we are being set free by the Almighty Lover to be lovers – lovers of God and lovers of others. It's simple.

Chapter 19

Leaning and longing

Who is this coming up from the desert leaning on her lover? Song of Songs 8:5

I don't know how you feel after reading the last few paragraphs of the last chapter. Maybe you read them a week ago. Maybe you just finished them a minute ago and can't wait to finally get to the end of the book. I was excited writing them, very excited actually. Everything seems to make sense and fit. My life seems to make sense, my purpose here and also my eternal purpose. Forever I will be growing in my capacity to receive love and growing in my ability to love God and love others. Wow! I love it. I think it's awesome. God is fantastic! Maybe right now you feel that way too. But what will we feel like two hours from now? Tomorrow morning? Two weeks from now? Two years from now?

In this final chapter I want to talk a bit about the practicalities of living in this truth we have been talking about. I certainly will not be able to give the topic anywhere near the attention it needs but it will be a start, and hopefully helpful. What we have discussed is the truth. These are not just bright ideas that will light our hearts for a while and then fade away. They are the truth. But how do we walk in the truth day in day out? How do we keep going on those freezing mornings on the way to work when the truth seems like nothing more than a vague memory of a warmer time?

Reflection: What are you looking forward to about living a life of love with God? What are your fears and concerns? Tell God about these.

Dependent on God

The starting point, I believe, is understanding ourselves and understanding the environment we are in. Firstly, we need to understand that we are dependent on God. We are unable to love God the way we desire to love Him on our own. We get excited about God for a few moments and we decide we will never ever doubt again and will live wholeheartedly for God, and then the next moment we find ourselves feeling bitterness towards someone; we remember a sin that we still don't feel forgiven for; we find our hearts flooded with pain over a past experience; we are tempted and give in to some temptation which we thought we had beaten, and we feel defeated.

We should not be surprised that this happens to us. We need God. We are so used to thinking in terms of trying to live life on our own, for ourselves, by our own strength. We are not used to seeing our lives as deeply linked to and dependent on God. In our lives the truth about God that we trust and live in is constantly being challenged. We encounter circumstances in our lives where we are tempted to dismiss what we know is true about God. Moreover, Satan roams around trying to ensnare us. He tries to discourage us, lie to us, cause us to accuse God and generally tries to lead our hearts away from loving God and loving others in any way that he can. Under the pressure of our daily lives, we can find ourselves drifting into accepting these lies and living not in love but in selfishness. We can begin to struggle alone thinking falsely that God is not willing to help. We long to love God more but we can become distracted by false promises and temptations, the pressures and anxieties we encounter in life.

We need God. We are weak and often feel unable to love the way we desire to love, and we easily believe the lie that God condemns us and is not wanting to help. It takes time to learn and change, to depend on God, to know that He will always answer when we call.

Reflection: In your day-to-day life, how much do you find yourself depending on God? Are there things you particularly struggle with trusting to God e.g. finances? children? Again, let's tell our Lord Jesus about them!

The nature of the process of growth in love

Another aspect of our situation, which can cause concern, is the very nature of the way God grows love in us. This has been stated elsewhere in this book but I believe it is necessary to reiterate it here. God's work of growing love in us for Him and others is a slow work. Just as it takes time for a person to grow physically, so it takes time for us to mature into love as followers of Jesus. We should expect this and not let it frustrate us. An eight year old should not be upset about being an eight year old and work furiously so that next year they can be forty. An eight year old should enjoy being eight and enjoy learning the lessons that are important for an eight year old to grasp.

Developing spiritually is a little different to organic growth, because we can choose to remain immature, but the lesson that development takes time is very important. We need to be content with where we are and focus on cooperating with God in how He is growing us, rather than trying to change everything instantly so we can look like a wise old believer. God is growing us in His time, we just need to ensure we are opening our hearts to Him and cooperating. God is revealing Himself to us and He is growing us in love. He will not stop doing these things. It is a process that will last as long as we live. It's not about reaching a certain level of love or maturity. It's about growing closer and closer in relationship with God and deeper and deeper into love.

What are those good works again?

Another note I feel is probably worth mentioning again is on the nature of the good works God is calling us to. I imagine that by the time some of us have gotten to the end of the book we may be feeling anxious about how to work out what the good works are to make sure we are doing them. Relax, and go back and re-read the section on the good works discussion from Luke 10 in the chapter titled, Walking with Jesus.

The good works God is calling us to are works of love. We may hear Him speak directly to us about them; or He may have just arranged in advance for us to 'accidentally' run into someone in need of loving; or it may be that we know that we need to be spending regular time with God on our own each day to ensure that our love for Him is what we put first.

Really our whole day is full of opportunities to love. This is what the good works are – opportunities to love. So we can relax. We just need to be spending our days with God. If God has a specific task that He wants us to be involved in, He is able to make that clear to us if we are walking with Him. We can ask Him if we like. Remember it's all about relationship with God. These acts of love will be done as we fellowship with God. We don't need to worry about the works, we just need to focus on walking with God and He will lead us and empower us to care and act with Him.

Leaning

In short, we need to remember who God is and what God desires. God knows we are weak, and He knows that we are battling with our old ways of living and thinking, with Satan and with other different anxieties. Our weakness is no obstacle to God's purposes in our lives. God has not left us alone and unable to deal with these challenges.

The Enemy, the Devil, is trying to tempt us and lie to us about God. The best thing we can do is cry out to God. We need to be asking God for grace to remember the truth about who He is. When we feel under siege with lies, we need to turn to our solid source of truth, the Bible. It is also helpful to talk to other believers and pray for each other. As we remember the truth about God, we will realise that He loves us, that He chose us and that He will carry us faithfully through life to the be with Him. We are His. He has defeated Satan on the Cross. All authority in heaven and on earth belong to Jesus (Matthew 28: 18).

As I said in the last chapter: God made living with Him on earth possible for human beings. God has placed His powerful Holy Spirit inside us. We are not alone. Our weakness is not an obstacle to God but rather an opportunity for God to show His glory, His love for us and His amazing grace and empowering. As we have noted elsewhere Paul understood this and made that amazing statement, "when I am weak, then I am strong". Paul was able to say that because he understood the truth that the Lord spoke to him, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." (2 Corinthians 12:9)

Our weakness is no obstacle to God. The real obstacle is our pride. It is our pride that says we can live life and follow Jesus in our own strength. God says that He resists the proud but gives grace to the humble (James 4:6). Humility involves us recognising the truth of our situation before God. First and foremost we will always be receivers from God. God created us. God sought us out and gave us new life in Jesus. God forgave us and gave us His Spirit. We are now sustained by the grace He gives. We receive from God, and then we give. It is impossible for us to live any other way. Trying to live a 'good life' apart from God might sound right but its impossible - and its full of pride. God wants to give. We need to receive from God, then give.

So we do not need to be anxious about our inability to love God the way we want to. We can rather rejoice. In our weakness we can cry out for help, for we know that God will embrace us and help us. It is when we turn from God and start believing we can love Him and others on our own, without His fellowship and help, that we should be concerned.

When thinking about this issue of weakness I always find it comforting to consider the people God fellowshipped with and worked with in the Bible. Looking at them we can believe that He wants to fellowship and work with us. David's life is a good example. God described David as a man after His own heart (1 Kings 14:8). Many of the Psalms were written by David. From these Psalms and the historical record of His life found in 1 & 2 Samuel and 1 Chronicles, we can see that David lived passionately for God. Yet we also see that even as he desired after God, he committed adultery and he organised someone's murder (2 Samuel 11).

Did God desert him? No. God rebuked him for his sin through the prophet Nathan but God did not abandon David (2 Samuel 12). David knew that God loved him. David did not run from God rather he turned to God, opened His heart and confessed His sin to God, trusting in God's forgiveness. David knew that God desired his worship, real worship from his heart. He said to God in Psalm 51 which he wrote after God had rebuked him through Nathan, "Surely You desire truth in the inner parts.." (v6). He prayed, 'Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.' (v10). David was confident of God's love so he went to God to receive God's grace in his weakness.

Looking at the disciple Peter's relationship with Jesus we can be similarly encouraged. Jesus called Peter the Rock. He was clearly a passionate man with natural leadership abilities. He loved Jesus. On the night before Jesus' crucifixion, He told His disciples that they would all desert Him. But Peter vehemently disagreed with Jesus and passionately declared that, "Even if I have to die with You, I will never disown You." (Mark 14:31). Yet only a few hours later, we see Peter disown Jesus just as Jesus said he would. What is Jesus' response to Peter's failure?

In John 21 after Jesus is resurrected, we see Jesus forgives and restores Peter. Jesus seeks Peter, who has gone fishing. Jesus asks Peter three times whether he loves Him. Three times Peter declares his love for Jesus. Jesus knew that Peter loved Him. I believe that by asking these questions Jesus wanted Peter to understand how much he loved Jesus. Peter's response to Jesus was renewed passion. We see clearly from Peter's life in Acts that Peter's confidence in God only grew as a result of this experience.

God knows our frailty better than us. What He is looking for is our desire to grow in love for Him and others. This is expressed through our perseverance in coming to Him and asking Him to help us keep our hearts open to Him. Even that is difficult to do at times. We need to keep asking Him for help and not allow the Enemy to deceive us with lies that God condemns us for our weakness. He does not. We are beautiful to Him and He enjoys us no matter how much of a failure we may feel.

Finally, Jesus said to his disciples, "I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you." (Matthew 17:20) Its easy to feel like we have no faith and that before we can really walk and work with God we will need more. But Jesus says if we have just the tiniest seed of faith we can move mountains. This is the graciousness of our God. He takes what is small and frail and in His power does mighty things.

We are frail and weak but our desire is to love God and others. So we ask God for help. Constantly. God shows grace to the humble (James 4:6). God's grace is our confidence. "Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need." (Hebrews 4:16) As we walk with God let's keep going to God and asking for grace to keep our hearts open before Him. As we walk through life with God we don't try to stand on our own, we know He wants us with Him. Rather, in our weakness we lean on Him and His strength and in that way, we walk and love together.

Longing

The Spirit and the Bride say, "Come!" Revelation 22:17

As we lean on God in this life, we also long for God. We have already spoken about the desires within us to feel beautiful, for constant companionship, for unconditional love, to be accepted and enjoyed, to be fascinated and so on. Not having those needs met causes us deep pain. We have talked about how a true understanding of what God thinks of us and His lavish love will start to meet those needs, because only God can satisfy them. This is an incredibly wonderful truth and reality.

However, we will continue in this life on earth to ache. We live in an age of faith. We believe but we do not see. We see through a glass dimly (1 Corinthians 13:12). Jesus says we are not of this world in the same way He was not of this world (John 17:14). Our citizenship is in heaven (Philippians 3:20). We are aliens and pilgrims here (1 Peter 2:11).

It seems to me that the more I understand of God and His love the more, not less, I ache to be free from this world and to go to be with Him. That's okay. God is growing in us a deep desire and longing for Him in our hearts. Anyone who is engaged to someone they love, longs for their wedding day. In the same way, we, as the Bride, long for Jesus and the wedding day at the end of this age when we will see Him face to face.

We do not live trying to deny the ache. We live with the ache. The ache, I believe, is God given. It is God's gift, which speaks to our hearts and reminds us that we were made for God and we are going to be with Him forever. It is this ache which is the echo of the final cry of the book of Revelation where we, the Bride, join with the Spirit and cry, "Come!" In reply to our call our Bridegroom Jesus sings out, "Yes, I am coming soon." (Revelation 22:20)

The song of the Bride

Leaning and longing we hear His song.

Leaning and longing we turn,

Leaning and longing we see His face

Leaning and longing we burn.

Come to us, dear Bridegroom

Come to us, we pray

You have satisfied our weary hearts

We await the wedding day.
