My debt of Love

Written by Mantebeah Elizabeth Matilda Abena.

“Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love" (NIV) 1 John 4:8

In my storms, I have sought the presence of God. The presence, that is peace-giving and longsuffering. I sought wisdom to know God’s plans for my life and to stay focus, walking steadfastly in His path as He directs.

Surely, I am not the only person who may have sought the Lord in the most difficult moments. We all have such experiences. How well we get to stand tall in the face of the storms is dependent on how well we sought Him. How close we drew to Him and how persistent we were with our demands.

In these few years of walk with the Lord, I have learnt at His feet the most important backdrop of our Christian journey – LOVE. The Bible says God is love (1 John 4:8). There is nothing real other than knowing you are loved by a higher power. Many of us feel comfortable and exercise a sense of pride in knowing that our parents, partners, friends etc. love us, yet the knowledge of being loved by God seems so far-fetched a concept for us.

Beloved the love of God is real! And so real in our most challenging times! Have you ever been disappointed because God never answered your prayers? Ever felt neglected when you called on God with no answer? Ever felt lonely in spite of invoking the presence of God in a seemingly frightening hopeless situation? There are over a million such situations.

What am I driving at? In our most difficult moments, we lose sight of God’s love. We forget that God gave permission to the enemy to test Job (Job 1:8-12). It’s our human nature and I am not innocent here. I have had my fair share of breakdowns. And I have learnt that it has all been God’s plan for grooming.

Taking time off lately to access the situation, I have made a striking remark, and that being, I have seen God’s love at work most in my turbulent times. I see Him in the moments of breaking me for what breaks His heart. It was in the challenging storms of tears that I have felt comfort from His hands. In my confusion, one thing has been clear and persistent: God’s love, God first, God is Lord over all, God is in control.

Gideon fought and won with 300 men (God’s plan) instead of the initial 32000 men (Gideon’s plan). The storms are not over, yes! But one thing must be understood, God loves us more than we can ever imagine and nothing, absolutely nothing can stop His love for us! Not even the storms of poverty, grief, emotional instability, sickness, barrenness, stress, family challenges, economic crisis, academic difficulties, uncertainties, confusion among many others.

In the face of this word of wisdom, I understand my debt – my debt of love. We owe God much love in our storms. We owe Him our songs of praise, our time, our resources and above all our heart. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, strength, soul and mind is the golden message to us today. May this message remind all of us who have forgotten the extent of God’s love simply because we are in distress or may feel God has disappointed us!

Heaven has been opened for those who dared to love God irrespective of what and how they felt. It is pure wisdom to know God on this basis and to follow in their stead. I have made a choice to love God, it’s my debt. What about you?

Sustaining grace for difficult times || More

Joomla SEF URLs by Artio

We use cookies on our website. Some of them are essential for the operation of the site, while others help us to improve this site and the user experience (tracking cookies). You can decide for yourself whether you want to allow cookies or not. Please note that if you reject them, you may not be able to use all the functionalities of the site.