The Lord your God is with you; he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing. (Zephaniah 3:17)
I’ve done way too much talking this week. Just read this verse a few times, savor it, thank him for it.
Have a wonderful Friday.
If only you would slay the wicked, O God! Away from me, you bloodthirsty men! They speak of you with evil intent; your adversaries misuse your name. Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord, and abhor those who rise up against you? I have nothing but hatred for them; I count them my enemies. (Psalm 139:19-22)
Wow. Right in the middle of this psalm celebrating the wonder of God’s love and care for me, I get a call to holy war. What’s that about? If you do a little study on this verse, you find that it echoes the ancient Near East covenant language between King and Vassal. The vassal swears that any enemy of the king will be his enemy.
Are you impressed with my scholarliosity? I love those study bible footnotes.
But God is a God of love, right? Aren’t we supposed to love everyone?
Show me where it says that in the Bible.
Well, Jesus said, “Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you.”
Oh yeah, he did…huh.
I’ll admit—this is a toughie. I’ll be happy to hear from any of you who have thoughts about this passage. It seems to me that, in light of the gospel, we should be pretty careful about hating people. There is plenty for us to hate—the ways of the world, the devil and his schemes, our own flesh—plenty that rises up against God. People seem pretty far down the list.
I think this passage is a call to total allegiance. You have a God who knows every thought you have ever entertained and loves you anyway. He surrounds you, literally, with his love and protection. Pledge your fealty to him again. Go forth into your Wednesday as the sworn enemy of all that stands against him.
Serve the king who loves you.
For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; all your works are wonderful, I know that full well. (Psalm 139:13-14)
You were made by God, my friend. Do you know that? Seriously…are you really realizing that the Lord of the entire universe, he who put the stars in their places, he who designed the atom, he who called it all into being just by the force of his will—he knit you together? Every fiber of your being was specifically designed by him. You didn’t come off an assembly line; you didn’t rise from the muck. You are no accident. You were custom made by God.
You are his work; you are wonderful.
Know that full well.
Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise up on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me; your right hand will hold me fast. (Psalm 139:7-10)
There is simply no place that God is not. I love this image. Overwhelmed by God’s presence, I try to flee from him—but there is nowhere to go. Wherever I run, he is already there, waiting to guide and protect me.
Question for today: Where, and why, do you try to hide from God?
…and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God (Ephesians 3:19). This is kind of Part 2 to yesterday’s thoughts. This love that surpasses knowledge…a love that is more than my brain can contain…frankly, that he loves us at all is mind-blowing—wouldn’t you agree? To be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God…to be so full of God that there’s no room for anything else. You know what that makes me think of? It makes me think of the scene in It’s a Wonderful Life when Jimmy Stewart is wooing Donna Reed. He talks about lassoing the moon, and bringing it down for her. She could then swallow the moon, and the moonbeams would shoot out from her fingertips and the ends of her hair. That’s what this verse makes me think of. Paul wants us to be so full of God’s love that it pours out of us—shoots out of us in all directions. He seems to say that, if we could just grasp the giganticatiousness of God’s love, we would be filled to capacity with his…well, with him. Chew on that as you move through your Friday. Pray that God would help you to know his love, that you might be filled to the brim, and pour out into the lives all around you. God runs a full-service station. Fill ‘er up. By the by, this concludes the first week of One-a-Days. I hope you find them of some value. Please leave me some feedback to let me know if you like this new direction. Tomorrow should bring a regular, full-length post. Happy Friday.
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… (Ephesians 3:17b-18).
If you only knew.
We can’t understand God’s love. It is totally beyond our brains. We can use metaphors—parent and child, husband and wife—but ultimately, they fall short. Can you imagine a trillion of something? I’ll give you a hand. One trillion seconds equates to about 31,000 years. Which you also can’t imagine, since you’ve been around less than a hundred years.
Most of you.
The problem is, we’re so stinking finite. How do we grasp the idea of an infinite God, and his infinite love?
It’s a good problem.
I think that, the more we can understand of the sheer magnitude of God’s love for us, the more our problems will shrink in comparison.
Is God’s love big enough to cover…?
Does God love me even though I…?
Can God’s love handle all the…?
If you only knew.