Learning to Receive God's Love

What I want to know is the God that sustains us through every season in our lives. I cherish the times I feel strong in Him. When He feels close, it’s as though I can accomplish anything. The confidence He gives is like nothing else. His love is stronger than what situations scream at us and when He speaks, fear and worry disappear. What about the days when we feel nothing? The moments when doubts seem to settle in and we can’t grasp the hope that He is near. When my heart grows weary and I feel empty, what will He say to me then? When I don’t feel strong and the desire towards God has decreased, what is His heart towards me in such a moment? This is what I want to know. What is God’s heart for us when we are weak? And I think we would all agree that we are just that. Weak. Some of us may not know it yet, but we are. When I say weak, I mean there is nothing in and of ourselves to accomplish anything in God without God. There is no desire in our hearts for Him without His hand placing that inside of us. The smallest little place that is towards Him inside of us is all His doing. It is His work of grace that causes our hearts to even want to say yes to Him in the first place. Knowing this stops us from striving and helps us to understand that, though we do have a responsibility before Him, it is mainly God who works in us to achieve His purposes and plans. Something I want to grow towards is being before God as a child. Since it is inside of God’s heart to want to take care of us, cover us, protect us, and love us, it is necessary that we don’t buck His ever increasing desire to be a Father towards us. Imagine a child that refuses to eat what his/her mother or father prepares for dinner. The child decides that he/she can make their own meal. After deciding on macaroni and cheese, the child heads towards the kitchen and gets the box out of the cabinet. To make this example even more fitting, this kid can’t read. He mixes together all the ingredients that is pictured on the box and pours it into a pan. After placing it on a burner, he is clueless as to how to turn on the oven or what temp to put it on. You get my point without me having to continue this story. We so often place ourselves in spiritual neglect by not allowing God to care for us when we feel weary and worn out by life. So many people are looking for something somewhere to fill the emptiness that is inside of them. I’m getting better about leaning into God when I sense this boredom and emptiness in my life. I’ve tried to “cook my own meal” before and I’m finally learning it’s better to just sit at the table my Father has prepared for me. It’s not easy to trust until He has allowed a few storms to come our way and we realize in the end that He does walk with people that don’t feel strong. We realize His heart is towards us and He is for us when all of life seems to be crumbling underneath what we thought would bring happiness from our own making. He is pleasantly able and willing to come and build something better for us, something lasting and of greater quality than anything we could come up with ourselves. It’s eternal. It’s rewarding. It’s life-giving. It’s having a Father that cares about us and loves us. His goal is that we would allow Him to love us more through life's difficulties.