Beauty of God's Love

CWO quote for November 9, 2007

"Love is beautiful, but it is also terrible--terrible in its determination to allow nothing blemished or unworthy to remain in the beloved."~ Hannah Hurnard ~

It’s funny sometimes how we view love. We think of it as an avenue of getting all we want, doing what we please, behaving as we wish. After all we sound off, “If you love me you’ll let me do this,” “If you love me why did you punish me.” “If you loved me…” and the list goes on and on.

For anyone who has had kids they know why they discipline their children. However, we don’t understand why God does it to His own children. After all we try to reason, if He loves us He’ll let us do whatever we want, right? Wrong. That kind of thinking got Adam and Eve kicked out of the garden! God’s love for us is as beautiful and stunning as love can get. However within that love, God like any parent, expects His children to behave, to be unblemished and worthy.

One day as I was talking to someone regarding God’s rules and commands they were having a hard time understanding why such a loving God would be so strict. To get my point across I told them they should stop disciplining their six children when they got out of hand. They looked at me as if I was half nuts. I told them that evidently they didn’t love their children because they were disciplining them when they went against the rules. How dare they, if they really loved them they’d allow them do as they wanted, act as they wanted, break whatever rule they want with no consequences.

It didn’t take much of a spiritual brick wall to fall on them to understand that discipline is a part of love that helps complete its beauty. As God is determined to complete that beauty in us through His discipline we need to be willing to accept that love in the form it is given. As Proverbs 3:11,12 (NIV) says “My son, do not despise the Lord's discipline and do not resent his rebuke, because the Lord disciplines those He loves, as a father the son he delights in."

We are loved. We have a parent who cares. He wants to shape and mold us and that takes discipline. It’s an avenue we need to exercise in ourselves to get rid of those things in us that shouldn’t be. The problem with us, that God doesn’t have, is we often carry it to the far extremes. We get too hard on ourselves, too hard on our kids resulting often in abuse. Others swing wide to the other side and don’t care enough to take the time to do what needs to be done as far as correction goes and it leads to neglect and further problems.

We throw up our hands at onlookers and tell them, “Well this is just the way I am.” An attitude that may work for the onlookers but God would never accept that and neither should we. We have moved too far away from the fear of the Lord. Fear of His discipline and rebuke. Once that begins to happen obedience begins to lack and we become like the prodigal child who does as he pleases. We need to put God back on the throne of our heart and lives where He belongs and accept His beautiful love as it is given, discipline and all.

CLOSING THOUGHT: We should never doubt the true beauty of God’s love. He cares enough for us that He will do whatever it takes to save us from our own self-destruction. It’s important that we don’t try to take advantage of that love by using it, as we want it to be used. Accepting the part about it we like but rejecting it when it gets too personal. Especially when it touches on those things inside of us that shouldn’t be there, the very behavior that God in His word tells us to put off or get rid of.

God knows that we are far from perfect, Praise the Lord! He knows how easily the blemished and unworthy things can enter in and take root. What He is concerned about is getting them out just as quickly as they enter. A short-term terrible action that has eternal results that is worth the pain of the disciplinary achievement done to accomplish this. Eventually we all see the end result of good parenting, the end result of good disciplining and we will see not the end but eternal result of God’s love as well. We love you Lord, thanks for loving us.

Our lovely host this week is Bonnie over at Ink It Blog. Drop in and read and share with others regarding today’s quote. In the meantime, enjoy the love God has for us by praising Him for caring enough to not accept the things in us that shouldn’t be.