Closing the Gap Between What You Know is True and What Feels True Right Now

Praise God, He loves us first! In fact, He has loved you and me from the beginning of time. Beloved, did you know that you were on His mind as He walked in the Garden of Eden? As surely as He called “Adam, where are you?”, He was already thinking about calling you and calling me to Him too. As certainly as He knew exactly where Adam and Eve were hiding and why they were hiding, He knew every mistake you and I would make, every time we would be unfaithful to Him – AND – STILL – He calls us. Why?

Because He LOVES us!

Jump back into 1 John 4 with me and let’s review verses 9-10 and 19.

⁹ This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. ¹⁰ This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.

¹⁹ We love because he first loved us.

Now, let’s take a walk through the Old and New Testament together:

• In the Garden, right after Adam and Eve ate the fruit, God told the serpent that the offspring of Eve would bruise his head (Genesis 3:14-15).
• Speaking with His disciples, Jesus said that He saw Satan fall like lightening and that He gave His disciples authority to trample on snakes and overcome all power of the enemy (Luke 10:18-19).
• In the Garden, God covered Adam and Eve’s nakedness with animal skins; their disobedience could only be covered by the death of an animal because the wages of sin is death (Genesis 3:21; Romans 6:23 ).
• Telling of the coming Messiah, the prophet Isaiah said that He would be pierced for our sins, that His life would be an offering for our guilt, that like a lamb led to slaughter, His death would satisfy the debt of our disobedience (Isaiah 53).
• In Romans 6:23 we see that “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
• When John the Baptist saw Jesus coming toward him, he called out “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29).
• In John 3:16 we read, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son to whosoever believes on him shall not perish but have everlasting life“.
• In Jeremiah 29:11, the prophet recorded “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

Dear heart, rejoice in the undeniable fact that God loves us first! Our Everlasting God knew that Adam and Eve would eat that fruit damaging their fellowship with Him and He knew what He would do to restore it.

He is El Roi, God Who Sees, He knew that you and I would think, and say, and do all of the rebellious, stubborn, reckless, stupid things that we have thought, said, and done that have damaged our fellowship with Him and still HE LOVES US so much that He laid out a perfect plan to restore our fellowship with Him, to prosper us, to give us hope and a future through our Savior and Lord Jesus Christ.

The evidence of God’s love is in His perfect plan of redemption, a plan that begins and ends with the greatest love of all, that Jesus – God’s only Son, perfect, blameless, sin-free – laid down His life on the cross for you and for me and picked it up again three days later so that we too may have life, a life in which we are never separated from God, not even by death.

And Beloved, if that’s not sweet enough encouragement for today, let me share one more thing with you that is so very important to understand: Jesus Christ bore every sin of every person because God doesn’t want anyone to die and be away from Him (2 Peter 3:9). This means that Jesus paid the price not just for the sins that you or I committed before we came to know Him or before we knew better, He also nailed every sin that we would ever commit or even think about committing to the cross with Him (Colossians 2:14). Truly God is the Lord Our Righteousness!

Today’s Reflection – Consider sharing your thoughts in the comments to start a conversation around the “table” together.

1. What does tracing God’s redemption plan through the Old and New Testament reveal about God? about how God interacts with us?
   • What other verses can you find and/or share to dive deeper into God’s plan to reunite us with Him? To show that He loved us first?
2. How does tracing God’s redemption plan help you better prepare to meet the enemy in battle when he tries to tempt you into sin, distract you with busyness, or beat you up with past or predicted failings?
3. Two of God’s names are Yahweh-Tsidkenu, the Lord Our Righteousness, and Yahweh-M’kaddesh, the Lord Who Sanctifies. If you haven’t read about them yet, I encourage you to do so. Then, consider how God’s redemption plan reveals even more of His character.

Allow Me to Speak This Blessing Over You

Cherished Sibling, may you remember this day and each day that you are a beloved child of God. May you walk in the powerful knowledge that God has always loved you. May you receive courage in knowing that at the beginning of time when the Father made His plan of redemption, when the Son agreed to be our sacrificial lamb, when the Holy Spirit prepared to dwell within our unredeemed flesh, YOU were on the Father’s heart and mind; Jesus was agreeing to take on ALL of YOUR sin; Holy Spirit was preparing to deliver all of God’s good, good fruit, His direction and guidance into YOUR life. God called you to Him as surely as He called for Adam and Eve and He will continue calling you all of your life for He is the Good Shepherd. Beloved, may you walk in God’s love, showing love to others first, even when they do not love you back or love you well for even when you did not love Him, He loved you first. May each day find you loving Him more and more. Amen (let it be so now).