Under the Waterfall .....of Grace: Perfect Love

Perfect Love

If anyone in this universe truly typifies Perfect Love, it's obviously God. Many of the characteristics of Perfect Love are listed for us in 1 Corinthians 13. As I read through this list, I realized that my view of God in the past has been the exact opposite of what the Bible says He is like, being Perfect Love.

I have seen Him as impatient, yet 1 Co. 13 says He is patient with us, bearing ill-treatment from us and never giving up on us.

I have seen Him as harsh, yet 1 Co. 13 says He is kind and gentle with us, with a kindness that melts away our own harshness.

I have seen Him as pushy, even rude. Yet 1 Co. 13 says He does not force Himself on me or others; He leaves us free.

I have seen Him as using us as pawns for His own ends, treating us as expendable tools to bring Him "glory", since it's "all about Him". Yet 1 Co. 13 says He is not self-seeking, pursuing selfish advantage, or demanding His own way; He cares more for others than Himself.

I have seen Him as easily provoked, irritable, exasperated with me, and quick to take offense. Yet 1 Co. 13 says He is not touchy or quick to fly off the handle but instead calm and longsuffering.

I have seen Him as keeping a record of sins I committed. Yet 1 Co. 13 says He takes no account of the evil done to Him and pays no attention to a suffered wrong.

I have seen Him as not putting up with my poor behavior, willing to give up on me if I didn't perform well. Yet 1 Co. 13 says He puts up with anything, bears up under even our poor performance, is always supportive, never gives up on us, and is loyal to us no matter what the cost.

I have seen Him as looking for the worst in me, constantly noticing my faults and being disappointed in me. Yet 1 Co. 13 says He is ever looking for and assuming the best about us, with unfading hope for us no matter what the circumstances.

I have seen Him as someone whose love for me could run out if I messed up too much. Yet 1 Co. 13 says His love endures everything without weakening, can outlast anything, always perseveres, and never looks back but keeps going to the end. His is a love that will never fade or come to and end. It's the one thing that still stands when everything else has fallen. His love for us will last forever!

I has helped me when I've come across a certain teaching or idea about God to simply ask, "Is that the way Perfect Love would act or think?" He is so much kinder, gentler, more loving and more beautiful than I ever imagined!

Grace Means...

Grace means there are no demands on you today..you do not need to 'do' anything or 'become' anything - you already ARE all you were meant to be, as a gift (something given, not worked for, something already yours, experienced and enjoyed here and now by simple faith - by seeing it is yours), by Jesus' work on your behalf.

You already ARE righteous, loved, accepted, at peace with God, empowered, free from sin's power, strong, holy, pure, and ONE with God, together with Him forever.

You are His child, included in the royal family, and the inheritance is yours in Christ!

There is nothing left for you to do because Jesus did it all and will manifest it all in you! You are free! Free to enjoy a love relationship with the most Perfect Love of all - HIM!

The Experience of Grace

Grace strikes us when we are in great pain and restlessness. It strikes us when we walk through the valley of a meaningless and empty life. It strikes us when, year and year, the longed-for perfection does not appear, when the old compulsions reign within us as they have for decades, when despair destroys all joy and courage. Sometimes at that moment a wave of light breaks into our darkness, and it is as though a great voice were saying, "You are accepted. You are accepted, by that which is greater than you, and the name of which you do not know. Do not try to do anything, do not perform anything, do not intend anything. Simply accept the fact that you are accepted." If that happens to us, we experience grace. (Paul Tillich)

Accepted..

Grace overcomes shame, not by uncovering an overlooked cache of excellence in ourselves but simply by accepting us, the whole of us, with no regard to our beauty or our ugliness, our virtue or our vices. We are accepted wholesale. Accepted with no possibility of being rejected. Accepted once and accepted forever. Accepted at the ultimate depth of our being. We are given what we have longed for in every nook and nuance of every relationship....There is a weightlessness about grace. It has the feel of a fairy tale; what makes it a very special fairy tale is that it is true. (Lewis Smedes)

About Me

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I am an ordinary person living an ordinary life in the Southern US, a wife and mom, a lover of quiet walks in the woods, summer sunrises over the ocean, reading books aloud to my kids, family movie nights, and just enjoying this wonderful life that is chock-full of grace and acceptance and love. I'm finally learning how to love myself and love my life, all because of the waterfall of Grace, the Loving Presence of our Papa God that gently bathes me within and without, and these posts are my thoughts on that wonderful grace washing over us all and carrying us along in its current throughout our lives. Isn't it wonderful to be on this journey of life and grace together? I thank you for stopping in to visit! I'd love to 'meet' you if you wish to leave a comment or send me an email..blessings to you today and always.. :)

The Gospel of Grace Is..

The Good News of Grace is that God out of His great love and grace and favor toward the world, sent Jesus to take away our sins, and He isn't counting the sins of the world against them! Wow! We are free to be friends with God again, for He's already friends with us. And not only that, He has taken us with Him out of the realm of sin and death and into the realm of His resurrection life! He included all humanity in Him in His work - we died with Him to sin, and we are alive with Him to God! Truly, it is finished!

This is the good news! Repent (change your mind about your status with God) - He isn't against you but FOR you, favoring you and having mercy on you! The incarnation, death and rising of Christ are God's love message to us, to prove we've always been in God's good graces and to give us the real, living relationship with God that we were created for. There is no way to be OUT of His favor, love, grace and acceptance, no way to be out of Him or His life! Jesus showed us that, so we can enjoy forever the relationship of Love with our Dad that's always been our right and privilege!

He has already taken away your sins on the cross and isn't counting your sins against you. He has brought you into harmony with Himself (reconciled you; He always felt harmonious towards us, we were the ones holding back, feeling we might be rejected because of our sins) by exchanging your sins for His right-ness (by removing our sins from us, He gave us a way to feel clean inside and worthy, reconciled our minds to the idea that we were okay with God..this was done for our benefit, not God's. Our Daddy has always been okay with us and never needed a sacrifice in order to forgive us or to make us acceptable in His eyes!) And He has taken you up to the bosom of the Father, accepted and beloved and alive in Him! (Death is conquered! Only Life awaits!)

He is looking at the whole world with the same love and tenderness that He has for His Beloved Son, Jesus! So open up your heart and agree with this and get to know Him! Faith (simple, happy confidence in Him coming from what He did for you - "Wow, Jesus, You did all that for ME! Thank You!") opens the door and allows Him to bring into your experience the newness of life that He is within you! Yes, within you! The scripture says that God reveals Christ, not outside of us trying to get in, but IN us waiting to be seen and known in intimate fellowship!

Isn't it wonderful to think that, since He sustains us all and holds up the whole creation, and we truly live and move and have our being in Him - He is already in us and has been in us all along, just waiting to be discovered and enjoyed! We can open up and receive/welcome Him in fellowship, greet the One who is there within us with the smile of simple childlike faith (remember faith just means seeing what He already did, what is already so!), and He fills and overflows us, makes every part of us truly full of His very own Life! We start to experience the eternal life that is our right! We start to manifest it in this earthly realm, in these earthly bodies! He bursts forth from within your innermost being like a river of living water, His Spirit flooding your life and spilling out! His very own life, joined with us forever!

Yes, His very own life joined with us forever! In the incarnation, God joined Himself to man irrevocably and permanently. So He became the new representative of our race, not Adam - in fact, He had prior claim to us all along, for before creation even happened God chose us to be IN Christ! It was through Christ that we were even created! So He has always been our true head and source of life, always had the strongest claim on us! So all that He did is effective for all of us. When He died, we all died with Him to all the old lies, confusion and ways of life..and when He rose, we rose with Him into the newness of His life!

What a Savior, what a Redeemer (Rescuer)! He came down and joined with us where we were in death and then conquered that death state and separated us from it forever, bringing us up into the glory of His resurrection life! Wow! You are not of the old but all new like the first day of creation (an even better than that, for you're not in the likeness of Adam but in the likeness of Christ)! See and know yourself as He has always seen and known you since before time began - so innocent and pure before Him, so beloved and precious, His very own dear child! You are fresh and sweet like a newborn baby, untouched by evil, innocent and pure - a new person with Him as your very life source - thus, your being, bound as it is to God's life itself, which is eternal, will never die!

All the old is gone and all things are new! You are a new creation, which is really the original you God always had in mind from before time began, now finally realized and manifested in this world! You are righteous (sinless and in right relationship with God) and having a good, new nature (Christ's own nature) so that you naturally love and trust God! You are perfect before Him, with no stains, faults, or anything amiss at all! You are accepted and acceptable! You are loved and lovely!

You are bound up with Him, locked into the love circle of the Trinity forever! He is in heaven and you are in Him, and you are on earth and He is in you! Inseparable union, infinite bliss! You have the same relationship and same fellowship with the Father that Jesus has! You are one with God and have perfect harmony with Him, perfect fellowship with Him at all times - you can talk to Him about anything, He is the Friend you've always wanted, He will be loyal where others could not, He understands you perfectly, He delights in you.

And you are a complete and whole person! This is the way your life was always meant to be - a person filled with God's Spirit and in perfect love relationship with Him!

Nothing is required of you in this life - you are free to bask in Him and His love and be happy in Him, for He will do it all, and you'll find yourself full of new desires to love people, new hope for the future, new authority and freedom over evil, new joy and peace, new strength, new freshness of grace-gifts falling on you every day!

Every day will be a day of just receiving His love and radiating that love back to Him and being a reflection of His love to the world. They are going to want what you have, because they'll see the unconditional love, the satisfaction, the freedom and joy! They'll be attracted to the blessed, full life you have! And Jesus will be glorified and lifted up!

Hallelujah!

You're Under a Fountain

You are accepted and you are the righteousness of God no matter what you do, no matter how much you fail, no matter when you fall into sin - you are STILL the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. It is not based on your obedience - it is based on the obedience of Jesus Christ....I don’t care how bad your sin was, get up, you’re under a fountain. When you fall, when you fail under a fountain, the fountain does not fail, it keeps coming over you. You are clean, you are righteous in Him. The more you believe this, the more victory you will have over sinning. Come on now, say amen. Give Him a shout just for the heaven of it. (Rob Rufus)

From the Quote Book

You are not your own enemy. There is nothing wrong with you as a Christian. Steve McVey
God's love will never fail you. Jamie Weeks
God never humiliates, shames, or belittles His young'uns. Mike Fitzpatrick
God never loved you for a reason. Wayne Jacobsen
Knowing that God does not expect anything from us is the only way not to despair. Watchman Nee
I need do nothing for God: that is deliverance from the law. Watchman Nee
We are all we were ever meant to be: one with the One who is life. Dan Stone
You don't have to grow, change, or be good to be loved. Brennan Manning
There is nothing you can do that would cause God to love you any more or any less than He does right now. Steve McVey
You have received the life. You cannot - you cannot - fail to manifest it. Dan Stone
No matter how great we think Him to be, His love is always greater. Brennan Manning
Jesus Christ loves us as we are, and not as we should be. Brennan Manning
A real gift never puts the receiver in debt. A real gift is only to enjoy. Lewis Smedes
Jesus not only loves you, He also likes you. Mike Yaconelli
With grace, failure doesn't make any difference. David Seamands