The letter didn’t say what you thought it would. The results weren’t what you were expecting. The opportunity wasn’t what it first seemed. The relationship failed. When the thing we’ve pursued confidently, wholeheartedly, lets us down, we’re stunned, hurt and confused.
The soul stinging from the slap of disappointment needs the never-giving-up, never-letting-go, nothing-held-back, never-stopping love of God. God, who seems to start off every conversation saying, Don’t be afraid. I will lift up your head (Psalm 3:3). I will pull you from the pit and set your feet on a rock, a firm foundation (Psalm 40:2). I will strengthen you and help you (Isaiah 41:10). I choose you (John 15:16). I desire you (John 17:24). I’m coming for you (John 14:3).
Long ago, even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. His unchanging plan has always been to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. And this gave Him great pleasure. Ephesians 1:4-5
Loving you makes God happy.
Sit with that for a minute. Loving YOU makes God happy. You give Him great pleasure. He delights in you. When God created mankind, He “looked over all He had made, and he saw that it was excellent in every way” (Genesis 1:31). Have you ever thought about the fact that you’re included in that verse? All that He made – Adam, Eve, the earth and the animals, you and me. Excellent in every way. Exceedingly good.
That’s not all. God says through the prophet Jeremiah, “I know the plans I have for you… They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope” (29:11). They’re plans for restoration, reconciliation, abundance.
It doesn’t feel like that’s true when the rain is still falling and the wind is still howling and we don’t have anywhere else to go because that door we were confident He would open remains stubbornly closed.
Does it mean we’re unloved if we have trouble or calamity or are persecuted or are hungry or cold or in danger or threatened with death? No! In spite of every single one of these things, overwhelming victory is already ours because Jesus loves us (Romans 8:35,37, paraphrase).
The enemy just wants us to be overwhelmed. He wants us to be certain that all our hopes will come to nothing, that our dreams are marked for destruction. That in the end we lose everything.
But God wants to overwhelm us with victory.
We who have fled to him for refuge can take new courage, for we can hold on to his promise with confidence. This confidence is like a strong and trustworthy anchor for our souls. It leads us through the curtain of heaven into God’s inner sanctuary. Hebrews 6:18-19
Where does this anchor lead us? God’s inner sanctuary, His throne room, where “we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most” (Hebrews 14:6).
Hope without mercy can never sustain us. But hope in a God who shows compassion toward us, who loves us? Who has promised that His purpose is to give us a rich and soul-satisfying life (John 10:10)? That hope is strong and trustworthy. It’s powerful. It enables us to bravely and audaciously ask God to bring His plans for us to fruition. There’s no fear of what He might do to us, because we know that He’s imagined something far better for us than we could possibly dream of for ourselves.
God can do anything, you know – far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us. Ephesians 3:20 MSG
We don’t hope that God is merciful or that He will respond to us with mercy. We hope because He is merciful. God described Himself by saying “[I am] the God of compassion and mercy! I am slow to anger and filled with unfailing love and faithfulness. I lavish unfailing love to a thousand generations. I forgive iniquity, rebellion, and sin” (Exodus 34:6-7). There is nothing to be afraid of in this kind of love, from this kind of God. It’s full of confident expectation that better is coming.