God is Not a Man

I have long known that I struggle with believing, really believing that God love ME. Oh, I know,  ♪Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.♫  And I can easily tell others that God love them. And I can corporately include myself when I say He loves everybody. My head gets all that. And my mind can repeat all of that by rote.

But my spirit has a harder time grasping the reality of God looking down on my tiny little piece of the world and that He, the awesomely wonderful creator of the entire universe, can pick out just me and love just me. Perhaps you struggle with that concept, too. We can look to our childhoods and blame our fathers or mothers for not doing this or that - or for doing this thing or that. But there comes a time in every person’s life when we have to look to ourselves and figure how to see things in light of Scripture.

My struggle with believing that I am loved individually by God is not even about all my innumerable flaws and sins. I believe with all my being that Christ died for all sins of all mankind and that every single individual human being can come under the blood of Jesus by simply trusting Him to wash them clean and by letting that choice affect the everyday choices of life. And from the depths of my soul, I am so grateful for God’s plan of eternal salvation. And grateful for how that plan works out in living here on earth. He is the only great and merciful God.

But it seems like I am a face in the crowd of those who trust in Jesus. The Bible tells me that all things work together for good to those who love God. (Romans 8:28) I believe that to my core. But He does that for everyone who loves Him, right?

As I've mentioned before, I’m nearing the end of Breaking Free by Beth Moore, and in the homework, she has helped me see the possible cause for my struggle with this concept. Numbers 23:19 clearly tells us, that “God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill.” NIV

I think even though I have tried hard not to “put God in a box” and have warned others not to do the same, I have mostly seen God through my human eyes and somehow think that just as in human love, especially by that of friends, God's love ebbs and flows. Human love can be affected by distance as people move, time between visits, misunderstandings, severe disagreements in beliefs, PMS, so many variables in human love. But God is NOT human. And, I guess that as a human, I don’t even know how that would look. But I have to believe that His love for me is not the same as friends that have come and gone. Or my indifference to those ebbs and flows. God is not man and He fulfills His promises.

He promises that His love is unfailing. In fact, in John 17:23 Jesus said that God the Father loves us as much as He loves The Son. And He surely includes all of believers in that because just 3 verses before that, and in the same line of thought, Jesus said, "My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message,that all of them may be one..."  And in John 10:16, He talks about having other folds of sheep that will be brought in – that is the Gentiles. So I guess it’s true – God loves His people as much as He loves Jesus. Wow! Let that sink in.

Beth Moore encourages her students to do a word search for “unfailing love" in the Bible. If you do that, it is clear that God’s love is unfailing – unlike human love. I have been trying to repeat daily, God has unfailing love for ME. I believe it, Lord, help my unbelief.”

“…The LORD your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing."  

Zephaniah 3:17 NIV

To Be WITH His People

I have long struggled with the notion that God loves ME. I know He does - in my head. But in my heart it seems like a distant concept. And that goes along with the interpersonal struggles I've had of feeling unlove-able and unlove-ing. And the way that translates into my relationship with my God and Savior, is a problem.

That's why the obvious theme throughout the Bible is so comforting - so loving. God says over and over - and over that He wants to be the God of His people. And to be WITH them. That theme is woven into the very heart of the Bible. He often spoke about the day when "He would be their God and they would be His people." I think that is all He has ever wanted.

It must be something like this: when I talk about my relatives in the hills of eastern Tennessee, I often refer to them as "my people." I feel a bit of pride when I say that and think of the manners of speech, the old ways that I remember from my childhood - of  the faces that make up my family. My people were resourceful, independent, strong.

That must be akin to how God feels about "His people." In the Old Testament alone I have a list of at least eleven times when he told Moses to tell the people or Jeremiah, Ezekiel or Zechariah to tell the people those very words. (And I've probably missed some.) Often times it was in a warning because they had turned their backs on Him. Still, He longed to dwell among His people, walk among them - to be their God and for them to be His people in their hearts (Levititcus 26:11-12). In Jeremiah 3:19-20, He said it this way as He grieved their rebellious hearts:
   
     "How gladly would I treat you like sons [and daughters]
     and give you a desirable land, the most beautiful
     inheritance of any nation. I thought you would call me
     'Father' and not turn away from following me. But like
     a woman unfaithful to her husband, so you have been
     unfaithful to me O house of Israel." NIV

You can hear the pain in His tender words. In Ezekiel 34:31 He says,

     "'And you, my sheep, the sheep of my pasture, are MY people, and
     I am your God,' declares the sovereign Lord." NET

But, as we know, Israel would fall into idolatry and rebellion over and over again. Still He longed to be their God. So He sent Jesus the Christ to atone for their sins and to make a way for them to be, at last, His people in their heart. And, as is so clear in the Bible, this plan for redeeming His people to Himself was extended to all people of every nation and ethnicity - any who would come to God by faith in Jesus' sacrifice. Jesus made that clear in John 10, where He says many times in that chapter that He is the Good Shepherd and that He knows his sheep and his sheep knows Him. In verse 16, He says,  

     "I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also.
     They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd."

And don't we take comfort in John 14 where Jesus says that He is going to His Father's house to prepare a place for us and that He will come back to get us so that "you also may be where I am." He prayed in John 17:24 that He wants those who God has given Him to be where He is and to see His glory."  It is and always has been the heart of God and of His Son, to be the God of His people and to dwell among them.

And finally it will happen, just as He wants. In Revelation 21, John was seeing the vision of the new heaven and the new earth and he says, "I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, 'Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God." That is all God has ever wanted!

God loves His people, so much that He sent Jesus to buy them back. And I am included in His people by faith in my Redeemer. I am loved. He desires to be with me. And with you.

Oh, happy day! Happy forever!



(For reference, if you want to look up verses, the list I mentioned is:
Exodus 6:7, Leviticus 26:11-12, Jeremiah 7:23, 11:4, 24:7, 30:22, 32:33, 32:38, Ezekiel 34:30-31, 36:28, 37:26-27, Zechariah 13:9, John 14:2-3, 17:24, II Corinthians 6:16 and finally Revelation 21:3-4)