Fearfully and Wonderfully Made: Made for a Purpose—LOVED: Part III
(also see previous posts: Fearfully and Wonderfully Made: Made for a Purpose—LOVED: Parts I and II:
In the two previous posts, we’ve talked about God’s LOVE being primary and choosing to abide in Jesus and His love for us.
A place to start ABIDING is to focus on who Jesus is.
Theologian Dallas Willard said: “The most important thing in your life is not what you do; it’s who you become. That’s what you will take into eternity. You are an unceasing spiritual being with an eternal destiny in God’s great universe…”
The “with God” life is not a life of more religious activities or devotions or trying to be good. It is a life of inner peace and contentment for your soul with the maker and manager of the universe.[i]
That’s the whole point of tending to the soul — to fill us so completely with his presence that the brilliance of his love shines through us.[ii]…God wants you to focus on him. To be with him. “Abide in me.” Just relax and learn to enjoy his presence.[iii]
We do this moment-by-moment, day-by-day…not all at once.
God says your significance is rooted in who you are—not in what you do. (This has been a life-long struggle for me!)
Take a moment to reflect:
--What intentional practices do you pursue so that you remain connected to Jesus?
It may only require a few minutes of your time to engage, daily, with powerful, exhorting, soul-feeding Scripture, with prayer, by communing with the Holy Spirit, in worship, etc.—and, over time, old habits of wrong-thinking will be replaced ever so gently but firmly and permanently with God’s thoughts about you.
Jesus promises that as we stay connected to Him and as we obey Him, His joy will be in us and that joy will be complete.
And, obedience looks like obeying His command “Love each other as I have loved you.” When you aren’t clear on the next thing, you can still be committed to loving those around you.
A thought that has been hugely helpful for me in recent months, thanks to JhéDienne Adams…UMin intern who lived with us year before last. She heard this at a retreat about a year ago from Jill Edward (adapted):
“We have two identities in Christ. We are beloved children of God and we are servants of God. They are both true, but the order in which we believe them matters. If I know myself to be a servant of God first, I will serve to earn my daughtership. If I know myself first as his daughter, I am moved to serve him. We are to know ourselves first as beloved daughter of God, and only then are we truly free to serve him, and to serve him faithfully.”
I can honestly say that I often have this reversed…thinking of myself as a servant of God first…which leaves me trying to achieve things to earn God’s favor and human recognition…when instead, I need to (as JhéDienne reminded me not long ago) “rest at His feet from the privileged position of being His beloved daughter.” I also think that this is a particular challenge for some church communities.
I hope that you want to live the WITH-JESUS-LIFE. The life of abiding. Remaining. Resting in and obeying Him. Letting Him help you BE and become who you really are. The security of that connection to Christ enables you to freely live out your unique purpose….and To Live as He lived.
There is a Jeremiah 31:3—card that sits on my main bathroom counter—for all to see. It says: I will always love you.—God
Dolly Parton and Whitney Houston have nothing on the God of the universe who said it first…and always…for eternity…to you and to me…
On your sheet of paper, now add to “Jesus loves me” the word “always”
Also add to “Lord, help me remain in Your love” the word “always”
There are times when we do not feel God’s love or believe that He is with us. The Psalmist talks of just such an experience when he says, “Lord, where is Your former great love, which in Your faithfulness you swore to David?” (Psalm 89:49). God is not upset by those kinds of questions from us. But He answers continuously through His Word and His Spirit with assurance after assurance, with steadfastness and consistency: “For the Lord is good and His love endures forever; His faithfulness continues through all generations.” (Psalm 100:5)
And, Scripture is clear that we haven’t earned nor deserved all of this wonderful grace and love and affection from God. (Romans 5:8; John 3:16-17).
There is nothing you can do to make God love you more than He does. There is nothing you can do to make God love you less than He does. He loves you. Period.
This week, bask in that knowledge that nothing you have done or can do can change God’s love for you...
I end with this—recently ran across this Freakanomics—No Stupid Questions--interview transcript from June 25, 2023:
[Excerpts from an interview between Angela Duckworth--chief scientist of Character Lab. “Grit” researcher. Professor, University of Pennsylvania] [Mike Maughan--MIT professor, a host of Freakanomics.][edited by me for space reasons]
MAUGHAN: …I know a lot of rich people who want to be famous. I know a lot of famous people who want to be rich. And I know a lot of rich and famous people who want to be happy…I think there has to be this point where, if you’re going to be happy, you have to be able to get to a point someday when you say, “I have enough.”…that doesn’t mean that you can’t always be striving to become better, to do more, to learn more, to improve, but that’s different than this peace or equanimity of just saying like, “I have enough. I am enough.”
DUCKWORTH: Is this the idea of grace? I’ve been in correspondence with Bob Emmons over the last years, he’s a very well-known psychologist… known particularly for his work on gratitude…We’ve been corresponding and trading papers. But Bob Emmons also…had a lot to say about the concept of grace and he sent me an article that he co-authored…it was about the idea that in some religious traditions, you are loved…by God, not because you have fulfilled certain expectations, not because there were goals and you met them, but just because. In other words, “You’re loved and you’re okay, not because you met expectation, not because the prediction error was zero or positive, but just because.” I have to say, when I was talking to him…somebody who spent two decades studying goal-pursuit and how people set goals and make plans and having a gritty goal and being resilient, grace could be blowing all that up. You know, not being valued because of your ability to achieve things…the last thing I emailed Bob was, “I need to go and, think about this really hard because it’s blowing my mind.”[iv]
God’s gracious love. It blows the mind.
In our lives, not everything can be a priority. There are many, many things we CAN do…but only a few MUST-Dos.
Our MUST-Dos are receive the Lord’s love…abide in Jesus and “walk in the way of love.” (Ephesians 5:2)
Please take the sheet on which you wrote
“I am precious and honored in God’s sight.”
“God loves me completely.”]
“Jesus loves me”.—“Always”
“Lord, help me remain in Your love.”—“Always”
and put it in a prominent reminder place this week! Commit to reflect on it and pray over it—until you truly believe these things!
Continued in the next post: Fearfully and Wonderfully Made: Made for a Purpose—LOVED: Part IV
Shirley Giles Davis, author of the God. Gifts. You. Your Unique Calling and Design workbook, Your Unique Design Class Guide, Your Unique Design Facilitator Guide, and Gifts-Calling-Purpose blog, is a consultant, coach, facilitator who has worked with faith-based organizations, nonprofit agencies, and leaders in a diversity of fields for over 30 years. She has also been Equipping Ministries Director at her church since 1999.
Photo © Shirley Giles Davis.
All rights reserved.
[i] Soul Keeping John Ortberg Location: 1,779
[ii] Soul Keeping John Ortberg Location: 1,795
[iii] Soul Keeping John Ortberg Location: 1,797
[iv] https://freakonomics.com/podcast/is-it-okay-to-be-average/