Who among you experienced at the height of being and “feeling” so in love utters promises to your loves ones that sometimes are expressively unattainable? I heard one said, “I will reach the moon and stars for you just because “I love you”? Or “I will do ANYTHING for you!” Or “I will take care of you FOREVER!” Hmmmm … words, words, and words, and after a few years, when the feelings fade away, with it are the promises. And because of failed promises, our hearts have grown callused and stone hard to believe spoken promises, gearing us to believe that “promises are meant to be broken!” and that “there is NO true love or there is NO forever in love.”

Then, we come to hear and begin our journey with God, Who is a covenant-keeping, promise-fulfiller God.  But because of our painful experiences brought by failed promises that hardened our hearts, it makes us hard to believe that His promises are all YES and AMEN!

But God Who is RICH in mercy with abounding and enduring love is patient.  He never desires anyone to perish but for all of us to come to know Him and have eternal life.  He is ever compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth (Exodus 34:6).

Praise the Lord that He is the same yesterday, today and forever.  Praise the Lord that whatever He says, He will do.  Praise the Lord that He did not give us promises based on His “feelings” like what humans do, but they are grounded and rooted on Who He is and He IS love and His love is for eternity for you and me. It is a kind of love that there’s nothing more we can do to make Him love us more and nothing we can do to make Him close the door.  His love is SET.  His love is STEADFAST.  His love is fixed and founded in TRUTH.   Praise the Lord that our God is NOT man, that He should lie, or a son of man, that He should change His mind. Has He said, and will He not do it? Or has He spoken, and will He not fulfill it?” (Numbers 23:19 ESV)  His love is established at the highest level, the most powerful force that no one can come against it nor stop it to the extent of giving us His only Begotten Son to die for you, to die for me, that we can be reconciled back into His arms.

Before the fall, He already had a glorious solution in mind on how to fully and perfectly redeem us by the power of His love.  He wasn’t taken by surprise by the disobedience that happened in the Garden of Eden for He is an Omniscient, the ALL-knowing God.  All the while He knew and all the while He knew what to do.  Praise the Lord!  Nothing indeed and no one can stop Him from pursuing His beloveds to woo and invite us back into His presence, to walk and talk with Him in a cool of the day once again.  He desires for us to be restored back into His embrace.  He desires to be known by us.  He desires to be close to us.  In truth, He desires to dwell in us.

But God is a HOLY GOD.  Nothing that isn’t holy can come near Him. He hates sin. He judges sin.  Left on our own, there is NO WAY we can come close to Him.  BUT our God is so FULL OF LOVE that He gave us JESUS and by the power of His blood we have been declared RIGHTEOUS, HOLY and BLAMELESS.  His mercy and grace made it possible for our faith to partake what has been made available.  Holiness isn’t initiated by us doing holy things. Our doings are results of our being MADE holy.  We have been washed by the Blood of Jesus Christ and have been made blameless before the eyes of our God.  NOW He Who is the judge exhausted all His anger and wrath at the body of Jesus Christ at the cross that left you and I who BELIEVE nothing else but HIS LOVE and are reconciled back INTO Himself whom He created to be FOR Himself.  No wonder He said in His word,

“You are to be holy to Me because I, the LORD, Am holy, and I HAVE SET YOU APART from the nations TO BE MY OWN”. (Leviticus 20:26)

To be His own means that we partake of the divine nature of Who He is, not by might nor by power, but by the Spirit of God.  The more we choose to spend time in His presence and worship Him, the more we are changed from the inside out.  Being constantly and consistently exposed to His presence we can never stay the way we are.  We always become Who we worship.

“His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us to His own glory and excellence, by which He has granted to us His precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.”  (2 Peter 1:3-4 ESV)

All this time I have been meditating on His love, His grace, His mercy, His compassion, His favor and His faithfulness.  Then, when I asked the Lord to take me deeper into the knowledge of Who He is, He opened my eyes to see that He is JUDGE.  Ohhh boy … honestly, “holy fear” 🙂 gripped me!  I backed off for a moment and thought about how HOLY He is.  Then, I realized that “the LORD’s anger burned against Uzzah because of his IRREVERENT ACT of taking hold of the Ark when the oxen stumbled; therefore God struck him down, and he died there beside the ark of God. (2 Samuel 6:6-7)  No one was allowed to touch the Ark because of its sacredness.

I stopped at this point and really came before the Lord to reveal to me how this fear and trembling heart of mine are to be dealt with.  My heart wasn’t at peace at all.  Shortly after, while I was partaking communion, He reminded me of His perfect love that casts out all our fears away.  He lovingly opened my eyes to see the very reason why Jesus died at the cross, that we can come BOLDLY before the throne of grace to obtain mercy and find grace in my time of need.  He dug deeper into my heart that the Blood of Jesus MADE me holy for the Holy Spirit to abide in me forever.  Now, I cannot just come near Him, but He took it much more further that we can think, dare, or imagine. NOW He lives inside you and I, and us being IN HIM forever.

Praise the Lord that He didn’t leave me orphaned in this thought, but He FATHERED me back into His loving arms that made me appreciate MORE the beauty of Jesus and highly, increasingly regarding His finished work than I used to before.

There is ONLY ONE WAY to be reconciled back to our Holy God and that is through JESUS CHRIST.  If there were other ways, then it would be cruel for the Father to send His Son to die for us.  “Yet it PLEASED the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief. He shall see the labor of His soul, and be satisfied, by His knowledge My righteous Servant SHALL JUSTIFY MANY. (Isaiah 53:10-11)

The fall wasn’t the end after all. The fall opened the door for the Lord to truly reveal to us that He passed ALL the love tests and demonstrated it perfectly, pursuing many to come to the knowledge of Who He truly is, a Good, Good Father, Who is always committed to our good, the God Who keeps His promise forever.

Prayer:  Heaven Father, thank You, for Your great and steadfast love that endures forever.  Thank You, Jesus, for keeping Your promise that IN YOU, nothing and no one can snatch us away from You, not even our wildest thoughts that brings fear.  Our confidence is in Your faithfulness that You Who promised is faithful to the end.  Holy Spirit, teach us not to grow weary, tired and take for granted what Jesus has done. We  desire to press on to know You deeper and deeper to keep fresh revelation come, flowing in and through us as we continuously long for Your presence day in and day out, seeking for glorious encounters every single day. Amen!