“Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” - John 15:13 (NIV).
A young man was desperately in love with a girl, or so he thought. But his love had actually turned into some sort of monstrous jealousy. He kept trolling her, trying to make sure she was always in his grasp and there was no chance for a rival. He always found a way to get into her phone to unlock all her secrets.
The problem with this approach was that the more the young man tried to control the young lady the more she turned her away. Eventually she withdrew from him altogether. This made the young man so desperate, and he thought of doing her harm that he had to be taken for counseling. There he was told that “if you love someone you must let them go! What is yours will always come back to you.”
Such is God’s love for us. It is not a controlling love. God’s love for us has let us free to go about anywhere we hazard, just like the prodigal son (Luke 15: 11-31). He lingers back waiting for us to return at any hour. Then His arms are all outspread for us, happy to be back home.
Prayer for today: Lord Father in heaven, today I pray that I grow in the knowledge of your unconditional love.
Related upcoming events
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19/04/2024 - 20/04/2024 All day“See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland” ( Isaiah 43:19).
Just before fire was unleashed down on Sodom and Gommorah, Lot was told to pack up with his wife and two daughters and leave their homestead. Now, once out of danger, “But Lot’s wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt” ( Gen 19:26). Perhaps here we might pause and ask why she was bothered to look back.
Of course it could have been that old “curiosity killed a cat” mistake! Yet, it could also have been Lot’s wife was not sure where she was going and longed for her old life back. This is a common error. There was nothing stirring to look back. Just before Lot’s neighbors had attacked his house eager to rape his visitors. “They called to Lot, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us so that we can have sex with them” ( vv 5). Was there anything worth looking back to!
The case of Lot’s wife could be anyone else’s experience. The Lord has plucked you out of some mess. You have been delivered to a new life. Yet, somehow you decide to look back, as though there was anything good and worth longing for. Sometimes it is a bitter past you have been delivered from. Other than rejoice in your new blessings you keep being drawn back!
A wise caution goes, “As a dog returns to its vomit, so fools repeat their folly” ( Proverbs 26:11). If the Lord has just led you out of a certain mess why look back like it was much better! Instead look ahead, for “he who made a way through the sea, a path through the mighty waters, who drew out the chariots and horses, the army and reinforcements together, and they lay there, never to rise again, extinguished, snuffed out like a wick: Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past” ( vv 17- 18).
Prayer today: Lord Father God of Abraham, maker of heaven and earth, I thank you for delivering me from the darkness of the past and I look forward to a bright new future in you, this I pray in Jesus’ name!
