I love you with the fury of a hurricane, the relentlessness of the sea, the boundlessness of the sky. My love is wider and deeper and fuller than you can imagine. It is like no other love you’ve ever known – I love you because you were made to be loved by me, not because I need something from you.
I have great plans for you, because my love for you is infinite. It doesn’t matter what you’ve done or where you’ve been, my love for you will never run out. I will never abandon or fail you.
I know the things that hurt you, and I know the mistakes you’ve made. I see the brokeness around you and inside you. I see the hunger for my love that you can’t satisfy with anything else. I see the meaninglessness of a life separated from your true identity. I am able – if you are willing – to rewrite that story.
If you are honest, you know that there is more to your existence than what you can see. That’s because I planted eternity in your heart, so that you would find me.
All I ask right now is that you put aside what you think you know about me, and consider what I have to say. Abandon your fears and prejudices for just a moment – because if I am who I say I am, you can’t afford to miss me. I dare you to open your heart just a crack, to hear my story that is your story.
All your life I have reached for you, longed for you. I am God, and I want you to find me.
I am the God who loves
God is good, and everything he does is good. He overflows with joy and delights to saturate us with his generosity. His character is love – the kind that is unselfish, unstoppable and uncontainable.
We were made by him and live through him. We are the object of his wild affection, created to be loved by him and to love him. When we are living like this, we are fully alive. We are full of hope, freedom and peace. We are complete in our identity and purpose, and we have a destiny that is too beautiful for words.
I am the God who sees
The problem – the reason we can’t live this kind of life – is that we have rejected God’s plan for us. Every one of us has turned away from him. Our abandonment of God’s way of love is what invites evil into our lives and our world. In rejecting God’s protection, evil has gained rights over us.
Where there is no punishment for evil, evil rules. It enslaves, oppresses and destroys. It takes possession of every human heart that gives even the smallest permission, consuming like a cancer until it kills. We see evil all around us and in us cause havoc through injustice, greed and selfishness. Because evil leads to pain and death, a loving God can’t accept that. Evil can not be a part of his beautiful plan, so it must be destroyed. Which means that we, as people who have been claimed by evil, must be destroyed.
I am the God who rescues
But the God who loves justice also loves mercy: he desires both because of his fierce love for us. He found a way to transfer our debt to death onto himself, so that he could pay for it with his own life. He sacrificed his perfect son so that we would be rescued from death. He has paid the debts of sinners so that they could be his sons, the penalty of delinquents so that they could be his daughters. He defeated evil’s power over us when he defied death and returned to life, giving us the opportunity to enter real life – his life.
His life is eternal, abundant, and free. It welcomes us back into relationship with him, where we find our joy and purpose. It makes us new, giving us a fresh start. It transforms us from slaves to sin to free children of God. This payment has been made for everybody, including you.
I am the God who restores
The good news doesn’t stop at transforming our own lives, it is the promise of our world transformed. God’s plan is to restore the whole earth to him, to the beauty and rightness that he has created it for. He is going to make all things new. He is creating a new heaven and a new earth, where there won’t be any more pain or evil. And he wants you to be a part of that.
What if I’m real? What if I’m good? What if I’m the source of your life and the hope of your future?
What if I really can heal, restore, set free? What if you were made to love me – that in loving me, you could find your purpose, wholeness, freedom and joy?
I am the God who stands at the door of your heart and knocks. Will you let me in?
