He Loves Me

My thoughts today are stemming from a friend's Facebook post I read this morning. Her status read:

"Overwhelmed today by the reality that Jesus loves ME. He knows the real me, the me no one else knows, yet He STILL loves me."

This caused me to think about how Jesus really does love each of us individually. Not just because we attend a certain church or live in a certain country. We can become so caught up in our identity in where we "belong" that we forget Jesus loves us, not our affiliations. To go even deeper is to realize how much He loves us even when we don't love ourselves. This revelation is what changes lives. Most of the sin we see in our world stems out of our need to feel loved. We search for acceptance. We want to feel loved unconditionally. However, the only place to find truly unselfish love is in the arms of Christ.

Think about the biggest secret you have in your life. It may not be something current, but something from your past that you would never want anyone to learn about you. It may be that you never acted on a thought you had, yet you would be horrified for anyone to even know you had the thought of doing something so shocking. Guess what! Jesus already knows. He knows every action and thought you have ever had. And He still loves you. He still loves me. When those around us deem us "unloveable," Jesus still loves us with a love beyond comprehension. In fact, to me, this is what it means to be Christ-like. To show love to those we would rather not love is evidence of Jesus' love in us. The truest sign of Christ living in us is our ability to love. If we find ourselves lacking the ability to show love to anyone, we need to pause and reflect on how much Jesus loves us.

I love the faith of children. When I ask my 6 year old how she knows God loves her, she simply responds, "because He just does." She doesn't feel a need to go into all she does for Him. She doesn't say it's because she goes to church. She doesn't say it's because she was nice to her sister today. Oftentimes we want to make this all so complicated. It really isn't. He simply loves you. Not because of your race, size, clothing style, church affiliation, or number of hours you volunteer.

"In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another." 1 John 4:9-11

Listen to this song. We all know it, but it's always good to take time and truly reflect on it's simple lyrics.