Our true purpose is to be loved by God
I think my biggest learning this year is the realisation that my daily purpose is to learn to receive Gods love everyday in every way He wants to love me and in return I can then love Him with all of myself, because now I can, and then out of the excess (because of the overflow of living waters in me) love my neighbour as myself.
You can never give to God or to people what you don’t have. Love isn’t something we can fake till we make it. We just have to get it and what better way than from the God who is Love and the source of true Love.
A child's self-love grows on the soil of Parental love. A child that receives unconditional parental love everyday grows with confidence and a radiance that is simply beautiful. That child can love the parents back, not out of a yearn for approval but because the child is already approved by the parent and has learnt how to love from observing the parent and experiencing love from the parent.
An abused child would grow with self hatred and out of the excess of that hatred, abuse other people. A neglected child would grow up with emptiness and out of that lack seek to be filled unhealthily.
We are still in the fallen state of Adam where we hide ourselves in shame for fear of rejection. We hide because we feel we’re not doing enough even though God chose to die for our sins when we weren’t doing anything. In context, your child can never be anymore of a child to you to earn your love — true parents love their children from the very moment they laid eyes on them.
In terms of effort, I’ve also learnt that my performance or acts of righteousness can never buy or earn Gods love, rather they are more useful in the area of sanctifying me so I can be more like Christ but never to justify me because I am already justified in Christ by faith. I am already accepted because He took my place and gave me His place because that’s what love does and just what every mother or father would do.
God wants a relationship where we can receive His love first and then love Him back in return and from the overflow of love, we can then love our neighbours.
Every sin or shortcoming isn’t rooted in love, if you really look at it. Perfect love leaves no room for sin for sin is driven by fear — fear of not having enough, fear of loosing something, fear of missing out, fear of failing, fear of rejection, fear of coming short etc.. but perfect love drives out all fear. Fear leads us to making poor decisions that can lead to torment, loss and eventually death — sin.
It is only in love that we can walk in Gods holiness but never outside of it. Anything outside of love is religion which isn’t what God is looking for.
