Are there days when you feel unloved and unlovely? Are there times when you sense that the smallest of creatures is more important than you are? Are there moments when the word “invisible” seems to best describe you? If you’ve everfelt like that, then there is good news coming your way! GOD LOVES YOU! He knows your hurts. He’s been there too. But His love is real and unconditional and He wants you to experience that love! Adam and Eve did every day! His Word tells us that Adam and Eve’s whole day was spent tending the Garden of Eden and visiting with God.
You see, God created us for relationship with Him, but, since Adam and Eve made a choice that would change not only their lives, but ours, God had to do something to re-establish that close connection with humanity, the best of His creation. But He didn’t just want a general relationship, he wanted a personal relationship… one like He had with Adam and Eve.
Early on, God was able to establish a close relationship with several faith-filled men, however, He wasn’t satisfied with only a few. He wanted that same closeness with each of those He created. Through one of those men, Moses, He gave mankind the Ten Commandments to show us the error of our ways so that we would stay away from the wrong things and turn back to Him. Unfortunately, we seem to have a habit of listening to the wrong voice and making the wrong decisions. Instead of following after and developing a relationship with our Maker, we decided that what we wanted was more important and perfected selfishness instead of love. After centuries of desiring to restore the close, personal relationship that had been broken with His first human creation, God decided He’d have to restore the connection Himself.
This Creator of the Universe entered a cramped space called a womb and walked through life surrounded by family and friends who didn’t understand Him. He struggled with all the same human feelings and faced all the same temptations that we experience every day. Sometimes He felt unloved. Sometimes He felt small. Sometimes He felt “invisible” because His creation refused to notice Him. Even Jesus’ brothers and sisters had a hard time believing He was telling the truth about His identity. Then, one day, He shared His heart with those who were within shouting distance.
He told the religious leaders of His creation that they had chosen the wrong path… that they had taken the laws meant to point them back to the true God and purposely made those laws their NEW god. He announced to these leaders that they had chosen to dismiss a relationship with Him, their Creator, and instead embraced a bunch of rules that had no life, no personality, no love to give. Jesus told them that they loved the rules instead of the Ruler. He called them “fools.” He called them “blind.” He called them “hypocrites.” He called them “whitewashed tombs.” He called them a “brood of vipers.”
Jesus… God in human form… was upset. Rightly so. He wanted His creation to love Him! He came to the Earth in the form of a human to restore that loving relationship! Instead, His creation had chosen to love what He hated… selfishness, greed, deceit, injustice, purposeful misunderstanding and all that was opposed to His nature and character. He loudly proclaimed that the leaders among them had led His people astray. He berated and rebuked them and reminded them that there were writers and prophets among them who would be persecuted, beaten and even crucified because these ungodly leaders would refuse to accept that they, themselves, were wrong!
Few of them cared about what Jesus thought or what He wanted. Few ever thought about Him at all! But the judgement came when He stated that all the “righteous blood” that had been shed on the Earth from the beginning of time would be on their heads. What a destiny of destruction for those leaders!
But then He cried out, “O, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her. How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!”
OUCH!!! Does this statement hit home with anyone else out there? Here is the God of the Universe, the King of all Kings, sharing that He wanted to care for and love and protect His frail and wayward creation, but they refused! OUCH!!!
I hear myself thinking, “How dumb was that!” and then His still, small voice whispers, “You have refused….” And the times and the ways and the memories flood me with shame and sadness. My pride gives way to remorse as the weight of those words brings me to my knees. Truth settles on me and I cannot move. God, the Creator and Sustainer of the universe loves me and wants me to love Him back… but… I have refused….
“How?” “By being to busy,” He whispers. “When?” “Too many times to count…” He says, sadly. “Where?” “No place has been excluded from My presence… but you ignored Me,” He gently reminds. “Why?” “Because you respond to the wrong voice,” He states. “You are so important to Me and I love you very much, but I will not force Myself on any of My creation. You must want to spend time with Me. You must want to be that little chick under My wing of protection. If you refuse Me, I cannot help you. You must be willing for Me to help you. You must want to love Me, to run to Me, to spend time with Me and to do as I ask because of that shared love. Without these things, you would be a puppet and I would still be alone.” Silence. ” Are you willing…?”
Tears flood my cheeks as I run into His arms and am comforted. Each time is the same. Not once have I been refused. He first loved me. He made the great sacrifice.He restored all things. He waits for each of us.
So, Loved Ones… are you willing?
Scriptural references were taken from Matthew 23 in the NKJ version of the Bible