He Came to Our World to Bring Us to His World

He entered our natural world so we could enter His supernatural world.

He entered our temporal realm so we could enter His eternal realm.

He entered our brokenness so we could enter into His wholeness.

He entered our sinful world so we could enter His righteous world.

He entered our pain so we could enter His healing.

He entered our despair so we could enter into His hope.

He entered our loneliness so we could enter into His love.

He entered our sorrow so we could enter His gladness.

He entered our darkness so we could enter His light.

He entered our prison so we could enter His freedom.

He entered our death so we could enter His Life!

Grain, Wine, Oil

 He makes grass grow for the cattle,

   and plants for people to cultivate—
   bringing forth food from the earth:
   wine that gladdens human hearts,
   oil to make their faces shine,
   and bread that sustains their hearts.       Ps. 104:14-15

I have been thinking on three things that are often used in the Old Testament as symbols of God's abundant provision:  the grain, the wine, and the oil.   I guess I'd never thought about it much, but they are listed in the offerings that were to be given in the Temple, and they are listed in prophetic writings as things that God would provide for the people, showing that their needs would be satisfied. 

I can see how they also seem to be symbolic of the New Covenant.  At the Last Supper, Jesus said the bread was His body, broken for us, and that the wine was the cup of the New Covenant, representing His blood shed for us.  Upon Jesus' ascension into heaven, where He sat down because He had finished the work of redemption, the Holy Spirit was poured out from heaven at Pentecost.  1 John speaks of us all having an anointing from the Holy One, here the Holy Spirit's presence in us being compared to anointing with oil.

The grain/bread represents Jesus' body broken for us.

The wine represents His blood shed for us.

The oil represents the Holy Spirit poured out on and into us.

I love how these three things summarize the work of grace that God has done in us!  Christ in His body represented all people.  He was the second Adam.  He died AS US on the cross, bringing down the old creation self, with its sinful nature controlled by the evil one, down into the grave, never to rise again!  Christ shed His blood, dying FOR US, taking away our sins on the cross so that we are completely forgiven and free of those sins, past, present, and future, free of them forever!  Our sins will never be counted against us.  Yet all this, wonderful as it is, was just a prelude, a preparation for the whole goal and purpose of the work of the cross:  that God might live IN US  and THROUGH US by His Spirit!

Jesus rose from the dead and ascended into heaven, presenting His perfect sacrifice in the temple not made with hands, in heaven itself.  The work was perfect, it was a perfect sacrifice that took away every sin and destroyed the hold of the sin nature on humanity.  The vessel of human lives could now contain God, the human temple was now be ready to be filled with the glory of God, just as His glory cloud had filled the temple in Solomon's time.   So He poured out the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, and now we by simple faith can receive this wonderful promised Spirit - the life of God Himself within us to regenerate us, to indwell us, to baptize or fill us with all the fullness of God Himself!  This is how we were meant to live!  To have perfect union of our spirit with God's Spirit.  To have a Friend within us so that we are never alone.  To have Someone to actually live for us and handle everything we face!   To watch as the the One who is Perfect Love loves the world through us.  We walk through this life actually imparting Jesus to people.  And we live in a perfect, unchanging, permanent fellowship with God Himself by His sweet Spirit within us!

The verse says that grain strengthens our heart - Jesus killed off our old self and old heart and gave us a new and strong heart - HIS very own heart and nature within us!  Sin shall never again be our master.  His own righteous nature is ours, a nature that naturally loves and trusts.

The verse also mentions that wine gladdens the heart - His sacrifice has made us totally forgiven, clean, perfect and righteous before Him, we have the wonderful gladness of knowing we are accepted,loved and taken into His arms forever!

The verse mentions the oil that makes our faces shine - He has given us His very own Spirit to live within us, to fill us full, to make us shine with His own glory.  We are in union with God forever.  God's own Spirit lives in us to fight for us, pray for us, love for us, live through us, and be the Friend to us that we have only ever dreamed of!

I love the New Covenant and how complete it is!  We have it all in Him!

Failure Makes No Difference

Ever since Adam and Eve ate from the tree of knowing good and evil, we humans have tended to see ourselves, God and our relationship with God in terms of performance. Adam and Eve hid from God out of fear because they were ashamed. They felt their sin made their relationship with God change and God’s stance towards them negative, even though this wasn’t true - for God came looking for them and lovingly desired fellowship with them even after they sinned. Failure makes no difference to God! God is always welcoming towards us, always accepting, always open, always friends with us. Our performance thinking blinded us, though. We thought failure made a difference. We believed a lie that we were inferior and separated from God and needed to perform better to get back in His good graces. Humanity has spent a long time trying to earn God’s favor and presence through self effort, trying to do what’s right and stop doing what’s wrong, trying to improve ourselves. Yet whatever we did, it never seemed to be enough to get rid of those feelings of separation, inferiority, and shame, never enough to make us feel comfortable about ourselves or about approaching God.

So Christ came to take us out of this performance thinking into the reality of His grace and love. Since we felt inferior and ashamed to even be in God’s presence, Christ united Himself with us in the incarnation and infused us with His own perfection - His perfect obedience and righteousness - so that we are perfect with His perfection and righteous with His righteousness. This is a gift of pure grace! 

We are forever perfected in Christ, once and for all and for all time. We are as righteous and perfect as can be; we can’t get any more righteous, complete, perfect or holy than what we are right now in Him. No failure on our part could ever undo what Jesus did or change one iota of His righteousness and completeness, which is given to us in our union with Him. This banishes any idea of inferiority or “not being good enough!”

But there is more that Christ did for us! In uniting with our humanity, Christ took our humanity where we could never seem to get it to - right into perfect fellowship with God! We died with Christ to sin, separation anxiety, shame, performance systems, and inferiority, and we also rose with Christ and ascended to heaven with Him to the ultimate place of love and communion in the Trinity family circle. So we have the perfect relationship with God because we are included in Christ’s relationship with the Father. Could anything ever alter that relationship? No! 

So what happens between us and God when we fail?  Nothing! Our failures don’t change a thing in our relationship with God. We are still kept whole in His perfect love. We are still perfect before Him. We are still righteous. We are still one with Him in perfect harmony and friendship. According to God, we never fall. We always stand righteous in the righteousness of Christ, perfect in the perfection of Christ. We are always included in Christ’s perfect communion with the Father. That’s what He did for us, so that we can feel good about ourselves and be confident in God’s presence, so that we can feel safe, welcomed, loved by Him, even if we don’t perform perfectly, even if we fail. It was never about perfect performance to earn God’s presence; it was always about a love that was present no matter what our performance!

Isn’t grace so wonderful? Isn’t God so wonderful?

Poem from God: I am Love

(In this poem, I imagine God, who is Love, speaking to us...)

I am Love. 

My love is going to surround you.  

It's going to overwhelm you.  

It's going to melt all your defenses and destroy the best arguments you've put out as to why you don't deserve that love.  

The sin that seems so prominent to you, that you think would keep Me from ever loving you...  

The hideous failures in your past, the addictions or struggles of your present, your insane fears of the future - all things you think would stop My love from coming to you..

They are nothing against My Unconditional Love!

My love is an unstoppable, unconquerable force in your life.

It's like a mighty fountain that just keeps flowing over you.

I am going to pour out Me love on you unconditionally, and there's not a single thing that could stop Me. 

I am going to wipe away every fear that would make you draw back from My love.  

I am going to conquer every lie that would make you doubt that love.  

I am going to eradicate every struggle you have in believing in this love is for you!  

My gushing and flowing waterfall of love wears down the hardest stony walls of fear, shame, guilt or confusion.

My Love will overwhelm you like a wild and wonderful wave of affection.

My Love will not fail!

I am going to let you feel My embrace.   

I am going to saturate every corner of your being with My liquid love filling you up. 

And you are going to experience a love like you have never known!

You are going to know and be assured that you are loved by the Perfect Love you've always dreamed of having.  

You are going to be immersed in My love that has no beginning and no end, My love that has flowed in love for you from all eternity. 

You are going to be overwhelmed, undone and swept out to sea in My Love.

You are going to float freely and lightly in my great wide ocean of Love.

And we are going to enjoy this bond of love together forever!

Love defeats every lie that would keep its Beloved from enjoying that love.  

Love sets the Beloved free to trust in that love.  

Love sets its Beloved free to really know, sense, experience and enjoy the greatest Love in the universe!

Perfect love CASTS OUT fear...

NOTHING shall separate us from the love of God in Christ..

Love NEVER FAILS..

:)

Asking Some Questions to Julian

Sometimes I think of how Julian of Norwich's book, Revelations of Divine Love, is answering all the 'what about ____?'' questions that can come up when we find out God is all-loving and no-wrath.  Since that is so different from the religious things we've heard all our lives, so many questions can come up.  We've been taught to be sin-conscious, taught that God is sin-conscious, and we've been taught to be fearful of punishment, taught that God is only half loving and the other half judging/wrath/punishing.  So when we hear He is all loving and zero wrath, that is a shock and brings questions, and then into my heart come the answers from Julian's book of revelations of God's love:

But doesn't the Bible talk about God's wrath? "I saw no anger, other than humanity's."

But isn't wrath part of God's nature? "God is the goodness that can't be angry."

But isn't He bringing wrath sometimes?  "Nothing He does ever lacks mercy or grace."

But isn't God judging us?  "All His judgments are sweet and comforting and bring our spirit to rest."

But what about my sin?  "God does not blame me for my sin."

But isn't God against me when I sin?   "He looks on us with pity, not with blame."

But isn't sin deserving blame, by His justice? "Sin shall not bring shame but honor."

But didn't Jesus need to die to pay for sin debt?  "Jesus asks me, are you 'apaid' that I suffered for you?"

But why did He die on the cross?  "He went and rescued Adam from hell and lifted him to heaven."

But didn't He see Adam as guilty? "He excused Adam from blame."

But how could that be? "Christ was oned with Adam, so He could no more blame Adam than His own Son."

But doesn't God punish sin?  "Sin alone blames and punishes; God only helps and aids."

But surely our sin change our relationship with God? "Rising or falling we are always the same in one love."

But doesn't sin separate us from God? "We are so one with Him that there can be nothing separating us."

But don't we need to get forgiveness? "There can be neither anger nor forgiveness between God and us."

But doesn't He get grieved or disappointed in us?  "He always looks upon the soul with gladness."

But God can't just forget sin? "In God's sight we do not fall."

But surely we are bad sinners? "We are not sinners and we are not to blame."

But surely we're not innocent? "He sees us as the children we are, guileless and innocent."

But how can we be innocent and guileless?  "God judges us according to our true essence."

But don't we have an evil, sinful nature?  "There is a godly will in us that never consents to sin."

But doesn't original sin taint us?  "The soul is oned to God and kept endlessly holy."

But is humanity actually good?  "The whole of creation is beautiful and good."

But what about all the evil sinners in the world? "All natures came from God and return to God."

Are you saying all go back to God? "Christ rescued Adam from hell..by Adam I mean all mankind."

But what about all the evil that is done? "I made well the greatest harm and will make well all lesser harms."

But doesn't God bring suffering on bad people?  "God meets evil with good. Love overcomes the spirit of evil."

But aren't many people doomed to hell? "All shall be well in every way."

But what about hell and purgatory?  "These were not shown to me...I saw no harder hell than sin."

But isn't there a possibility of being damned? "We are led and protected by God and never shall be lost."

You mean we can be sure we go to heaven?  "The soul has a life that shall live in heaven without end."

But what if we turn away from God?  "Even though I abandoned Him, our gracious God never let me go."

But what if we fail to meet His standards?  "This life does not require that you live without sin."

But if I fail don't I let Him down and displease Him? "It is impossible for Him to be displeased with us."

But won't my sin stop His blessings? "My sin shall not stop His goodness working."

But isn't there some terrible sin that can disqualify me?  "What a powerful love, that no trespass can break!"

But isn't it all up to us? "God does all that needs to be done."

Are you saying this about all people?  "He made all things to endure forever, and nothing will fall short of that end."

And the Last Judgment? "By an action on the last day..the Trinity will make everything wrong to be well."

And those who suffered injustice and pain?  "All of us will be enfolded by the vast consolation of God."

But won't some reject Him?  "What we really want is God...creatures have a natural love for their Creator."

Is God really so nice?  "He really is simple, friendly, and utterly gracious..He is most gentle and kind." 

But surely His kindness is only for good people? "Everything is suffused with the mothering love of God."

But are some better than others?  "He makes no distinction between Christ and the least soul."

But does that include even me? "He will personally manifest His friendship to each one of us."

But what if I feel so far from God?  "We are in God and God is in us, even when we cannot see this truth."

But what if I can't get over my problems?  "He will never allow anything to impede our ultimate joy."

But will He put something bad on me because I sinned or to teach me a lesson? "God cannot do bad things."

But is He against me or struggling with me? "In God there can be no struggle, only peace."

But is He there for me in trouble?  "He supports us equally in well and in woe."

But what if I am ashamed of my past? "He transforms all things, no matter how ugly or sorrowful, into blessing."

But what if I have suffered and been hurt? "The Holy Spirit rewards us for all our trouble in this life."

But what if I feel so depressed? "Everything will be reconciled in joy...we shall be filled to the brim with joy."

But what if I don't pray enough?  "Your whole life is a prayer in My eyes."

But what if I feel so alone?  "He is closer to us than heart can tell...My dear darling..I have always been with you."

But what if I feel very vulnerable? "He wraps Himself around us, enfolding us in His love."

But what if I feel so nervous and anxious? "He is our true rest...peace and love are always present within us."

But what if my life feels out of control? "He is the responsible caretaker of our lives...I will take care of everything."

But will He ever leave me? "Our Beloved dwells within us in His tender love, and will never, ever leave us."

But can evil get to me? "I will always protect you...I will keep you safe...I hold you very securely."

But how does He see me? "We are completely lovable in His sight and stand fully at the center of His love."

But what is He really like? "He is Endless Love that is without beginning, always is, and evermore shall be."

But what does He want?  "He is loving us unconditionally, wanting only to bring us joy."

What is the meaning in this life?  "Love was His meaning."

What will the end be like?  "All things will have a good outcome."

Can we be sure of that?  "God is Love and will do everything."

What will heaven be like for us? "We shall be enfolded in God forever."

What is God's eternal theme?  "You will never know anything but love, without end."

(Direct quotes and paraphrases are from The Showings of Julian of Norwich, translated by Mirabai Starr.)

This Ends My Journey with Julian of Norwich

I have now finished writing this daily devotional going through the book, Revelations of Divine Love, by Julian of Norwich. 

Even though she lived long ago, the message God gave her of being All Love is a message that is timeless. 

It has made me see how simple it all is when it comes right down to it: God is Love and that is all we will ever experience with God. And because God is Love, all shall be well.

God has used the message in Julian's book to encourage me and uplift me each time I have read it. Sometimes I felt like a child gazing in awe and wonder into the face of Christ, so amazed by the beauty of perfect love and friendliness there. Through this book I really got a revelation of God being all love and nothing but love, with not a hint of darkness or judgment or wrath. It gives me such  peace and relief to know this! 

God is love, all love. This love is more wonderful than we could ever imagine. This love:

• made and keeps all so that nothing is lost
• is enough for us
• is a bond between us and God that cannot be broken
• suffers and sorrows with us and promises us ultimate joy
• endlessly affirms us and uplifts us
• sees us as pure and innocent children
• is always delighted with us and says we are His highest bliss
• is always friendly with us, always merry and sweet
• is the goodness that cannot be angry or disappointed with us
• is endless compassion, not blame
• says there is nothing to forgive
• took on flesh to rescue us and oned our humanity to Himself
• is Father and Mother to us
• does all that needs to be done
• never lets us be overcome and keeps us securely
• is Who we came from and the home we return to
• sees us perfect and says we never fall in His eyes
• brings joy and peace and is life everlasting 
• will make all things well for us all!

I have loved going through Julian's book, thinking and writing about God's love for us. 

If there is anyone who has read these posts, I hope you have enjoyed them, too. 

May we all experience more and more of God's wonderful love and know that we will never know anything else but love from Him without end!

"I fall down on my knees and pray to the Father of all the great family of God—some of them already in heaven and some down here on earth— that out of his glorious, unlimited resources he will give you the mighty inner strengthening of his Holy Spirit. And I pray that Christ will be more and more at home in your hearts, living within you as you trust in him. May your roots go down deep into the soil of God’s marvelous love; and may you be able to feel and understand, as all God’s children should, how long, how wide, how deep, and how high his love really is; and to experience this love for yourselves, though it is so great that you will never see the end of it or fully know or understand it. And ...you will be filled up with God himself."

Ephesians 3:14-19 (TLB)

Love Without Beginning or End

"In our making we had beginning; but the love wherein He made us was in Him from without beginning: in which love we have our beginning. And all this shall we see in God, without end."

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 86)

God loves us with a love that has no beginning or end. We have always been safe in the heart of God. He had us in mind before He ever created anything, was already loving us and planning out a beautiful future for us, sharing life together with Him. He always meant to make His home in our hearts so we could be together in every way. His love has held us up through all we've been through, through all the troubles and mistakes, sufferings and sorrows, joys and triumphs. We have been held in His hands since forever and we will be held in His hands for forever. There has never been any doubt about whose family we belonged to or where we would end up. We have always been safe in His arms of love. Love was our beginning, our origin. We came forth from Love and are Love by nature. And Love is our destination, our home. Love is where we will always be. Love is what we will always experience in God. Love is the meaning. Love is the best thing there is. Our God is All-Love, and we are wrapped in God, in Eternal Love, now and for always! Let's think about it, talk about it, sing about it, tell others about it, live in it and share it with everyone - we are from God, who is Love, and we are going to always be in God, who is Love! Love has never failed us, and Love will never fail us. All will be Love forever and All shall be well!

"I'll never quit telling the story of your love - how you built the cosmos and guaranteed everything in it. Your love has always been our lives' foundation, your fidelity has been the roof over our world."

Psalm 89:2 (MSG)

"His love.... is so great that you will never see the end of it."

Ephesians 3:19 (TLB)

A Prayer: I praise You, God, for all You have shown me of Your love, even though I know I will spend all of eternity experiencing the depths of You love and yet never come to the end of it!  May all people know and experience Your love for them - I know You will bring that to pass. Thank You for loving us all and bringing us all home to You. Thank You for the peace of knowing that all shall be love in the end, and all shall be well! You are a beautiful God. You are truly All-Love and I love knowing and loving You!

In This Love

 "And in this love He hath done all His works; and in this love He hath made all things profitable to us; and in this love our life is everlasting."

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 86)

Everything God says and purposes and does, all His relations with us, are marked by love and done in love. He just has no other way to be, for He IS love. So if it is not love, it is not God! Every interaction He ever has with us is in love. Every action He ever takes is in love. And this is not the kind of "love" that we sometimes think of Him having, where we imagine Him crushing, punishing or hurting us "for our own good." This is real love that does no harm, that only heals and helps and supports us. In this real love God makes all things work out for good for us, brings all things to be for our advantage and turns every sour note into a beautiful song of blessing for us. He even made the worst thing we ever did, killing His own Son, into the greatest blessing we could ever have, our eternal salvation in victory over sin and death, and our eternal life with God! This love just keeps bringing out everything to good. It just keeps winning over darkness and evil. It just keeps reigning in life and dissolving death. It keeps healing hearts and reconciling people to each other. It keeps building people up and cancelling their shame. It keeps on loving, for it lasts forever! God is this love, and He will always be who He is, our Father, Lover and Friend. What a wonderful life we have in Him who is pure love. It is better than we could ever hope for, and it will keep getting better, expanding into more beauty and joy, forever and ever! For in this love, in this God, our life is everlasting. We will live forever enjoying the love of our God!

"God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him."

1 John 4:9 (NLT)

"Let everyone thank God, for he is good....His tender love for us continues on forever!"

Psalm 136:1 (TPT)

A Prayer: Your love means everything to us! Thank You that all that You do is saturated with love!

His Love Never Slackens

"And I saw full surely that ere God made us He loved us; which love was never slacked, nor ever shall be. "

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 86)

Before we were ever created, we already existed in God's mind, in God's heart, in God's love. Before we were even made, we were already loved. This love has wrapped around us like a blanket every day of our lives. This love is always at the maximum amount, so we could not be loved any more than we already are loved by God, or any less. Nothing we have ever done, are doing or ever will do could ever keep God from loving us or lessen His love. His love accepts us as we are, values us as precious, delights in everything about us, hurts with us, has compassion on us, sticks with us when others don't, and supports us in every moment. We just can't be unloved. We just can't be unlovable. This love won't stop coming to us, it won't let us go. So we might as well agree with God that we are loved, and that we are lovable, to the maximum amount, always and forever. God loves us, and it is the most true and real and important fact of our lives.

"Nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Romans 8:39 (NLT)

"In your generous love I am really living at last!"

Psalm 63:3 (MSG)

A Prayer: Thank You for wrapping me in Your love no matter what. I love You!

Love Was His Meaning

"Wouldst thou learn thy Lord's meaning in this thing? Learn it well: Love was His meaning. Who shewed it thee? Love. What shewed He thee? Love. Wherefore shewed it He? For Love. Hold thee therein and thou shalt learn and know more in the same. But thou shalt never know nor learn therein other thing without end. Thus was I learned that Love was our Lord's meaning." 

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 86)

Julian wanted to know what was the meaning of all Christ showed her. The answer she was given was that Love was His meaning. The meaning of it all is Love. Love is who God is. Love is all God does. Love is the meaning behind it all. Let's stay with Love and learn more of Love, and He will show us more and more Love without end! That is what it is all about. God is Love, nothing but Love. The meaning and purpose of our existence is Love, nothing but Love. The goal and fulfillment of all things is Love, nothing but Love. And that is all we will know without end!

"The most important of these things is love."

1 Corinthians 13;13 (EASY)

A Prayer: Thank You for Your Love!

His Heavenly Treasure

"For He beholdeth His heavenly treasure with so great love on earth that He willeth to give us more light and solace in heavenly joy, in drawing to Him of our hearts.."

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 86)

We are a treasure to God. We are valuable, lovely, wanted, precious and amazing. And we are His heavenly treasure. We are born from above, born of the Spirit, new creations full of Christ's resurrection life. We are citizens of heaven. We are not from around here. We belong in heaven. God wants to give us more light and rest by giving us more and more heavenly joy, drawing us away from looking at the sorrow and trouble here on earth to the beauty of heavenly glory found in Him. He draws us to see, think and know as He knows, with heaven's perspective. We are not trying to get to heaven, for we are already there in Christ, since we were raised with Christ and co-seated with Him in the heavenly places. We are living from heaven. We are bringing heaven to earth at every moment that we live here on earth. And Christ is living and reigning through us, love is living and reigning through us, bringing the light and healing of God's love to everyone we meet. We are manifesting the life of Christ so that everyone can see that they are heavenly treasures that have Christ within them, too. Thus more and more grace will spread to all, with more and more love, for more and more joy and more and more peace! And heaven will keep coming to earth till love and life fully win out over all darkness and death!

"All things work for your enrichment so that more of God’s marvelous grace will spread to more and more people, resulting in an even greater increase of praise to God, bringing him even more glory!"

2 Corinthians 4:15 (TPT)

A Prayer: Thank You that Your love is spreading to more and more people and that all will be well!

All Brought Up Above

"When....we be all brought up above, then shall we clearly see in God the secret things which be now hid to us. Then ....we shall say all with one voice: Lord, blessed mayst thou be, for it is thus: it is well; and now see we verily that all-thing is done as it was then ordained before that anything was made."

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 85)

We will all be brought up above to heaven. Not a single soul will be missing, not a single person forgotten. And all the things we could not understand on earth will be clear to us. We will be overwhelmed with the love of God and the beautiful plan He had and fully accomplished, notwithstanding all the wrong turns we may have made in our human history. God knew all about those things in advance and none of them were anywhere near strong enough to prevent His love plan from being carried out. He wanted a whole vast family of children, fully experiencing His love and living in union with Him, and He wanted to fully enter into the human experience through Christ and be one with us in every way, sharing life with us for always, full of peace, joy and love. Nothing will stop this plan. All wrongs will be made right. All hurts will be healed. All strife will be reconciled. All will be well. Love is stronger than anything, love overcomes any obstacle, love forgives any fault, love heals any wound, love never fails. Love wins! Through Christ's finished work the healing through love has already started and will surely be seen by every single person. Nothing will be lacking and noone will be missing. All will be new, all will be innocent, all will be restored. And all will be well, and we will shout and laugh and sing and praise God, saying, "Truly, all is well!"

"By the blood of his cross, everything in heaven and earth is brought back to himself—back to its original intent, restored to innocence again!" 

Colossians 1:20 (TPT)

"Because of God’s unfailing purpose, [his] detailed plan will reign supreme through every period of time until the fulfillment of all the ages finally reaches its climax—when God makes all things new  in all of heaven and earth through Jesus Christ."

Ephesians 1:10 (TPT)

"How blessed is God! And what a blessing he is! He’s the Father of our Master, Jesus Christ, and takes us to the high places of blessing in him. Long before he laid down earth’s foundations, he had us in mind, had settled on us as the focus of his love, to be made whole and holy by his love. Long, long ago he decided to adopt us into his family through Jesus Christ. (What pleasure he took in planning this!) He wanted us to enter into the celebration of his lavish gift-giving by the hand of his beloved Son."

Ephesians 1:3-6 (MSG)

A Prayer: Thank You for Your love that never fails to bring every last person home to You!

As We Have Been, We Will Always Be

"For as verily as we shall be in the bliss of God without end, Him praising and thanking, so verily we have been in the foresight of God, loved and known in His endless purpose from without beginning."

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 85)

Just as we shall always be in God's presence and bliss for always, so we have always been in God's sight. As we have always been, so we shall always be: known and loved and delighted in. This was His whole purpose, to create children that would always be dearly beloved, beautiful and lovable, and enfolded in the family circle of the Trinity at all times. We will always be loved, and known, and delighted in, just as we have always been loved, and known, and delighted in, from forever to forever. Life on earth, the human experience, is just waking up to what is true, what has always been true, and what will always be true: we are the beloved children of God, living in His tender care. We are simply waking up to our authentic selves, waking up to who our Father is, waking up to the love that has always held us and always will. There has never been any doubt we would end up with God, for in His sight we have never left His presence. We have never been anything else but His good and lovely children, and we have never been anywhere else but His arms. We have always been home!

"I have loved you with an everlasting love."

Jeremiah 31:3 (NIV)

"In love he chose us before he laid the foundation of the universe!"

Ephesians 1:4 (TPT)

"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you."

Jeremiah 1:5 (NIV)

"Before we were even born, he gave us our destiny." 

Ephesians 1:11 (TPT)

A Prayer: Thank You for knowing me and cherishing me for always!

He Looks at Us and Rejoices

"And in this sight I marvelled highly. For notwithstanding our simple living and our blindness here, yet endlessly our courteous Lord beholdeth us in this working, rejoicing; and of all things, we may please Him best wisely and truly to believe, and to enjoy with Him and in Him."

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 85)

God knew when He created us that we would make mistakes, forget Him, get confused, wander off sometimes, and have faults. He understood that we would be weak, blind and simple-minded. He knew every path we would take and every wrong turn we would make, all the messes and crashes we would experience, and yet He still made us, without hesitation! He wanted us, warts and all. What does this show us? It shows us that we don't have to be perfect. We don't have to be perfect to have a good attitude about ourselves. We don't have to be perfect to be loved. We don't have to be perfect to be accepted.  We don't have to be perfect to have a good relationship with God. God takes us as we are, right now, with our imperfections, and He rejoices in us! He doesn't just tolerate us or only bear with us in hopes that we will change. No, he delights in us. He totally embraces us and is proud of us and loves us just as we are, right now. For just as we are is beautiful to Him. Just as we are is fine. We never were required to be perfect and we never will be perfect in this life. So what? We are loved right here in the midst of this messy, crazy life, because this messy, crazy, imperfect life is really perfect and our imperfect selves are really perfect to Him just the way we are. He truly looks at us and rejoices; just being with us makes Him burst into a happy love song! The best thing we can do is believe it and enjoy our friendship with Him, enjoy being loved, and enjoy being ourselves!

He will rejoice over you with great gladness; he will love you and not accuse you. Is that a joyous choir I hear? No, it is the Lord himself exulting over you in happy song.

Zephaniah 3:17 (TLB)

"He delights in me."

Psalm 18:19 (TLB)

A Prayer: You are okay with me, so I can be okay with me!

Three Ways to Understand Love

"The light is Charity....I had three manners of understanding of this light, Charity. The first is Charity unmade; the second is Charity made; the third is Charity given. Charity unmade is God; Charity made is our soul in God; Charity given is virtue. And that is a precious gift of working in which we love God, for Himself; and ourselves, in God; and that which God loveth, for God."

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 84)

The light that gives us life is sourced in God, our endless light. In fact, since God is love, this light is Charity, or Love. There are three kinds of love: love that is uncreated, love that is created, and love that is given. Another way to think about this is that God is uncreated Love, humans are created Love, and the giving of ourselves to others (which is God in us giving of Himself) is Love that is given. God is Love, never created but always there. He has always been and always will be love. He has always been and always will be loving us! We are created by God and from God, made of Love Himself. So we are Love in created form. We had a beginning. Our origin is God, is Love. It is our nature to love and we thrive and really live when we live in love. God is all about community. God is a community, Three in One, each one always pouring out in love to the others. And God created us to be part of this community, this circle of love. The Trinity created us within this loving community, within this family, and we are always being loved by the Trinity. The more we awaken to this love, this more the love within us flows out. We love God, we love ourselves as people in God, and we love others as people in God. It is really God loving in and through us, yet it is us, too. We are all together in this wonderful family of love, and love keeps pouring out to and from and amongst us all!

"In the same way I loved you, you love one another."

John 13;34 (MSG)

A Prayer: Thank You for creating us, Your children, to live in Your family of love!

Our Faith Is A Light

"Our faith is a light by nature coming of our endless Day, that is our Father, God....The light is cause of our life; the night is cause of our pain and of all our woe....We, with mercy and grace, steadfastly know and believe our light, going therein wisely and mightily. And at the end of woe, suddenly our eyes shall be opened, and in clearness of light our sight shall be full: which light is God....Thus I saw and understood that our faith is our light in our night: which light is God, our endless Day."

How does faith occur? Faith happens when God persuades us of something that we can't see with our natural eyes. He gives us His sight, spiritual sight, to know eternal, unseen reality. Sin is to "not see" spiritual reality, to be blind or in the dark to it. What spiritual reality are we often in the dark about? We don't know God is with us and God loves us. We look around at the natural world and the way things work down here and we think God must work in the same way. We think He must stay distant until we have proved ourselves to Him or earned the right to be in His favor or presence. The world works by "there's no free lunch." Everything has to be earned, which is operating by law or performance. But spiritual reality is totally different, for God works by love and grace. We need to be en-light-ened or to have light in our understanding to see spiritual reality. The light we need is God's light. He is the source of our spiritual sight, or faith. For faith is simply being convinced of something you cannot see with your natural eyes. It is spiritually seeing, seeing unseen reality or God's reality with our inner eyes of the heart or spirit. God gives us this inner light. He doesn't want His beloved human family to be in the dark in their understanding. He shines the light of His love and grace into our lives and persuades us of true reality, spiritual reality: God is with us and even in us at all times, and we are His children, loved and accepted unconditionally apart from any performance on our part. 

Being in the dark about God's love and presence in our lives, about our identity with Him, brings so much sorrow, struggle, loneliness, confusion and pain to our lives. When people feel unloved, they have such a big void inside and can seek to fill it and stop the pain of feeling unlovable with all kinds of hurtful things. But when we find out God loves and holds us and we are actually His dear children who belong and are accepted always, it makes us come alive, heals our heart, and lets us become aware of and enjoy that love that has always been there for us, that God and Father who has always been there for us! God is in the enlightening and persuading business. He won't stop showing us His love till He has convinced us it is true: we really are loved no matter what, just as we are, by our heavenly Dad. 

The biggest persuasion God ever brought us was to become flesh and appear before us as God in a human body, to show us exactly what God is like and who we are to Him! In Christ we see that we have a Father who loves us so much He can't bear to have us estranged from Him or in the dark about His love and presence. Christ clears up the confusion about who God is, showing us He is not an angry judge but a loving Dad. We start to see our value and worth to God and how special we are to Him, and how He loves us no matter what, even if we lash out in anger and hurt towards Him. Christ is here even now in His Spirit, persuading us of God's love for us and our preciousness to Him. This is the light by which we see, the light of true reality that dissolves the darkness and melts away our sorrow and hurt. Isn't God good? He doesn't even expect us to "work up" faith on our own, but instead gives us His own spiritual sight to see what He sees when He looks at us. The light turns out to be Christ, to be God Himself smiling at us through Jesus' human face. For we see in Christ's eyes only love and compassion, forgiveness and understanding, tenderness and acceptance. We see in Christ the Father's unconditional love for us all! And things keep getting brighter and brighter, and we keep seeing more and more of His love and kindness towards us, till one day our faith will be sight. And then we will know even as we are known, and all will be love and all will be well!

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 83)

"For with You is the fountain of life; In Your light we see light."

Psam 36:9 (NKJV)

"God said, 'Light up the darkness!' and our lives filled up with light as we saw and understood God in the face of Christ, all bright and beautiful."

2 Corinthians 4:6 (MSG)

"I pray that your thoughts will be flooded with light and inspired insight; that you will clearly picture his intent in identifying you in him so that you may know how precious you are to him."

Ephesians 1:18 (MIRROR)

"And they shall see his face; and his name shall be written on their foreheads. And there will be no night there—no need for lamps or sun—for the Lord God will be their light; and they shall reign forever and ever."

Revelation 22:4 (TLB)

A Prayer: You are the light that gives me spiritual sight. You are the one who persuades me of truth. Thank You for opening my eyes to Your love, and to Your reality of grace!

God Is Light

"In light is endless Nature-hood."

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 83)

The third property of God's being that Julian sees is that God is light. As light is pure and has no darkness, so God's nature or character is pure and has no darkness. His nature is only one way. He is not partly good and partly bad; He is all good. He is not partly love and partly hatred; He is all love. He is not partly kind and partly unkind; He is all kind. He is not partly patient and partly impatient; He is all patient. He is not party loyal and partly disloyal; He is all loyal. He is all light, all goodness, all love, all grace, all the way through, with no speck of darkness. This is such a relief and lets us know we can truly depend on God. For He is not going to change in the way He treats us. He is not erratic or unpredictable. He is not two-faced or having a double personality, sometimes kind and sometimes wrathful. He is light. There is no darkness in Him. He is full to the brim of only goodness and love. That is His nature, and it's a pure nature. It is pure love, pure goodness, pure kindness. We sometimes think of holiness when we think of light or purity, and we may think God is so holy that sometimes He is angry, punishing or rejecting of us, as if His holiness means that He rejects those who don't act holy. But God's holiness is the purity of love. His holiness simply means He is wholly love, the perfection of love with no impurities, that is, no anger, hatred, rejection, judgment or punishment in it! This can also be said of God's power; His power or might is the power of love. It is not that He is so powerful He may destroy us. It is that His love is so powerful He will protect us, keep us, hold us, and make us safe forever. God is light. He is purely one way, wholly one way, and it is the way of love. This is His endless nature, the nature we came forth from, and the nature we can rest in forever!

"This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all."

1 John 1:5 (KJV)

"But whatever is good and perfect comes to us from God, the Creator of all light, and he shines forever without change or shadow."

James 1:17 (TLB)

A Prayer: Thank You for being light, all one way, all one love!

God Is Love

"In love is gentle courtesy.."

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 83)

Another of the three properties of God's being is that God is love. What a simple theology it is to know that God is love and base all our thoughts about God, ourselves and others on this all-embracing truth. God is love, so He is never un-love. If the most loving person you know would not act in a certain way, then surely God, who is far more loving and is even Love itself, would not act that way. God is love. He can't be any other way. He can't be anger, or hatred, or meanness, or hurtfulness, or rejection or condemnation. He is love. He is only kindness, and sweetness, and gentleness, and friendship, and tenderness, and understanding.

God is love. That means even though He is strong, and wise, and glorious, and regal, He shows us courtesy and is very attentive to all our needs, coming to us in other-centered kindness, care, vulnerability and humble support. He is so great and yet He gently and tenderly holds us and listens to us and encourages us. His first thought is for us and our welfare, not for Himself and His "glory." He is generous, always pouring Himself out in love, to the point of self-sacrifice. He is a humble caretaker, a gentle shepherd, a loyal friend, a doting spouse, a tender-hearted mother, a caring father. He would do anything to help us, He always meets all our needs, He never leaves us alone, He is always supportive, and He would truly rather die than be without us. He is the definition of real love. He is everything we need Him to be and so we have come to know and trust the love God has for us. He is the love that is "much more" than we can comprehend. He is beyond our greatest imaginings, a love we have only ever dreamed of and yet have needed all our lives. We mean the world to Him and He means the world to us. Being in union with Him is what life is all about and gives us the greatest satisfaction, joy, peace, strength and companionship we could ever want. How wonderful to know that God is love!

"So we have come to know and trust the love God has for us. God is love."

1 John 4:16 (PHP)

"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

John 3:16 (KJV)

A Prayer: I want to know and trust Your love more and more. Show me over and over again how much You love me!

God Is Life

"In life is marvellous homeliness."

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 83)

Julian saw three properties in God, Life, Love, and Light. In scripture we see statements describing God's being as these three things. It is all one goodness, seen in three ways, the goodness of life, the goodness of love, and the goodness of light.

God is Life. God cannot be or have anything to do with corruption, lack, sickness, or death. All those relate to or are going toward non-life, and God is life. This means that God does not bring any of those things about in our lives. God does not bring death, He raises from death. God does not bring sickness, He heals from sickness. God does not cause lack, He provides so every lack is filled. God does not bring corruption, He brings fullness. He is always bringing life, life and more life. He brings the places in us that have withered or died back to life, gently nourishing us and invigorating us with His strength. Christ has even raised us up into His own resurrection life in the heavens, and we are with Him in life always. This life is a life of union and closeness, a life of homeliness or feeling at home with each other, a life of coziness and embrace. This life is a life of safety and security, free from all sickness, pain, sorrow and dying. For this life of Christ is our true home, where we come from and where we belong. We are in life and we are never going out! All that waits for us in the future is life and life more abundantly. For His life has already conquered death for us and we will live with Him forever, enjoying and knowing Him. For to know Him is truly eternal life!

"Jesus said to her, 'I am the resurrection and the life.'"

John 11:25  (NKJV)

"I give them eternal life and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand."

John 10:28 (NIV)

A Prayer: You are life to me. I am alive in Your indestructible, overcoming, abundant life!

We Never Fall

"For in the Beholding of God we fall not, and in the beholding of self we stand not....But the Beholding of our Lord God is the highest soothness (truth)."

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 82)

We can look at our lives and see many mistakes and faults, many times that we fall. We can certainly say that according to us, in truth we often fall. Yet according to God we do not fall! This seems counter to what we experience in our visible lives. Yet God's perspective is obviously to be taken as superior and yielded to as the highest truth, the "truly true" truth. 

There are many ways to look at this truth of God, that we do not fall. We can hear God saying to us, "You are always My innocent little children who don't know what you're doing, so to Me you never fall. I see all the hurts and delusions that lead you to act out, so I say you never fall. I see how you can get enslaved in behaviors and end up doing things you really don't want to do, and therefore you never fall. I can see that you are weak and frail and need help and that Christ fills up every area of weakness or lack so you are full and complete, so you never fall. I can see that you sometimes forget who you are and act as who you are not so much so that it is a false persona doing those wrong things, so I say you never fall. I can see the real person you are in spirit that is always one with Me and aligned with Me, and I see you never fall. I can see that you have felt so ashamed of any mistakes and so Jesus came and took all that sin and guilt away and made you continually sin-free, and so you never fall. And I can see you feel unclean, but you are the temple and dwelling of Christ which is always holy, so I say you never fall. I can see you often feel unworthy, bad or not enough, and Christ is in union with you filling you with His righteousness and perfection, so you never fall. And no matter what you do it doesn't change My love or closeness to you and you never can fall out of My favor, so you never fall!" 

In whatever way we look at it, God says we never fall. What does this mean? It means we never fall! We are upheld in innocence, in understanding, in righteousness, in grace, in peace, in union, in favor, in completeness, in love. We simply cannot fall from this secure place of being in His arms, one with Christ and hidden with Christ in God. We cannot fall from this relationship of love, of acceptance, of unity, of peace, of belonging, of completeness. We cannot fall from union with Christ and all He is, cannot fall from His perfection, His holiness, His righteousness, His sufficiency. We cannot fall out of our new birth or new creation, cannot fall out of His life, His victory, His overcoming, His strength. We cannot fall from our place in Him, seated with Christ in heaven, blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places and reigning with Him over all struggle and darkness. No matter what we see with our eyes or what our behavior may look like, the truth from God is this: We never fall out of His reality, His presence, His truth, His keeping, His love.  We are in God's hand and nothing can snatch us out. We never fall!

"Now to him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glory without fault and with unspeakable joy, to the only God, our saviour, be glory and majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before time was, now, and in all ages to come, amen."

Jude 1:24 (PHP)

"He shall stand and be upheld, for the Master (the Lord) is mighty to support him and make him stand."

Romans 14:4 (AMPC)

"He made us perfectly holy and complete for all time!"

Hebrews 10:14 (TPT)

"With God on our side like this, how can we lose?"

Romans 8:31 (MSG)

A Prayer: According to You, I do not fall. Help me believe it!

Kept in His Love

"If any such lover be in earth which is continually kept from falling, I know it not: for it was not shewed me. But this was shewed: that in falling and in rising we are ever preciously kept in one Love."

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 82) 

Children sometimes do well and sometimes fail. They sometimes show love and sometimes fall into negativity towards others. But they are always loved by their parents. They are always part of the family They always belong. They are always special and valued and cared for. Their identity as children of those parents never changes, no matter what they do. They are held in their parents' love always. That love is a constant. 

So it is with us in God's kingdom of love. We are the family of God, children that are beloved and precious. We belong. We are always part of the family. Sometimes we succeed and sometimes we fail, but our identity as God's beloved children never changes. We are always special and valued and cared for. God our Father has a love for us that is permanent, and we are held and kept in that steadfast love. We can relax and feel safe, because we truly are safe. We are safe in the love of God.

"Family fondness remains the essence of this kingdom."

Hebrews 13:1 (MIRROR)

"Our triumph remains beyond dispute. His love has placed us beyond the reach of any onslaught."

Romans 8:37 (MIRROR)

A Prayer: Thank You for holding me up in Your love, no matter what!

Loved in the Midst of Our Imperfections

"'Be not greatly aggrieved with sin that falleth to thee against thy will'. And here I understood that....the Lord beholdeth the servant with pity and not with blame. For this passing life asketh not to live all without...sin."

Julian of Norwich (Ch. 82)

We don't need to be upset or demoralized when we fail and do the things we don't want to do. And that is one important thing: we don't want to sin. We can certainly be tempted and fall into sin, and we can certainly choose hurtful ways perhaps due to being hurt ourselves or not understanding how much God loves us, but deep down we don't want to sin. We want to do right and be a good person in our lifestyle. Sin comes to us, then, against our will, that inner good and godly will that our Creator put in us when He made us, that image of God in us, that wonderful Christ in us as the ground of our whole being. So we can see that we can fall and stumble in this life, but we don't let it get us down, we don't let any condemnation or shame stick to us. God doesn't condemn us, so we won't condemn ourselves either! God doesn't look on us with blame or criticism, so we won't blame and criticize ourselves either. God treats us with love and compassion, so we will treat ourselves with love and compassion. And we can pass that compassion on to those around us, who are also perfectly loved by God in the midst of their sometimes failing behavior. This is the successful and full Christian life - not to always behave perfectly, but to be able to receive God's love in the midst of our sometimes failing behavior, and to be able to extend that same love to ourselves and to others. 

What a relief to find that we are not required to behave perfectly in our lives! We are not expected to meet some impossible standard of perfection and have all our thoughts, words and deeds be absolutely without mistake. No human could live up to that standard. Only Christ Jesus the One who is both human and divine was able to live up to the perfect standard! He was perfectly obedient to God in all He did and fulfilled the perfect standard, then He set it aside as obsolete and showed us a new way to live, the way God always intended: a love-based way rather than a rule-based way. We can enjoy a wonderful love-based relationship with God even in the midst of our mistakes and flaws. The pressure is off. We are completely accepted and loved just as we are. We are loved whether we behave well or badly, loved whether we improve in our various areas of weakness and loved even if those areas never see improvement. We are taken off the performance scale for good. We are simply enjoying God's love for free, with no strings attached and no requirements or stipulations added. In the midst of such acceptance and unconditional love, we find ourselves relaxing. We find ourselves feeling happy and light and free. We find ourselves feeling strong and confident. We find ourselves being more understanding and kind to ourselves and others. Without even trying, we find that love fills us and flows from us. We are actually being our true self, who we have always been deep down - a human living in union with God! How does it happen? Not by trying to keep the rules or change in our own strength. We know the end of that story, and it isn't pretty. This new way is all love. We are able to be the true, kind, good and loving people we always were simply by being loved with no conditions! 

Isn't the love way of God so wonderful! We will be transformed by love. It's inevitable. There will always be times where we slip up and fail, and that's ok. Something is different now. Now we don't have to take on shame and condemnation for those things. Now we can leave them with God. Our behavior is His responsibility and He will take care of it, whether in the short term or the long term. But the main issue is not change at all. It is simply love. If we never were transformed, we would still be loved. We would still be fine with God. We would still be God's beloved and valued children. It really is all about love!

"For you who welcome him, in whom he dwells - even though you still experience all the limitations of sin - you yourself experience life on God's terms."

Romans 8:10 (MSG)

"In your generous love I am really living at last!"

Psalm 63:3 (MSG)

A Prayer: Your love is the best thing in the world!