RECOGNIZED BY GOD

Many passionately pursue the approval of others but always seem to be disappointed with the results of their efforts. But there is one whose approval you need and whose recognition significantly impacts your life – take a look.

1Cor 8:2-3 Anyone who claims to know all the answers doesn’t really know very much. But the person who loves God is the one whom God recognizes.

Have you ever, like me, prayed for God to help you love him more? I knew that I was supposed to love him but didn’t inherently feel or experience much desire or passion in my heart for him. I continued to pray like this often until I received the revelation that my love for him was predicated upon my reception of his love for me. The Scriptures that gave me this revelation were the following.

1 John 4:7  Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes FROM God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.

1 John 4:19 We love because he first loved us.

From meditating upon these truths, my eyes were opened to the fact that the ability to love God does not come from self-effort but rather from our reception of God’s love for us. I have often said, “You will never work it up; you must soak it up.” This is why Scripture says, “And without faith, it is impossible to please God, for those who come to him must believe that he is and that he is a rewarder of those who diligently seek him.” Hebrews 11:6

There is nothing that pleases God more than our reception of his love and grace for us. I believe that God’s greatest heartache is his children’s unbelief, and his greatest joy is our wholehearted trust in him.

My prayer for you today is that you would genuinely know how much God loves you! May you receive His love so deeply and thoroughly that your natural response to God is to love him back! As God has loved you with all of his heart, soul, mind, and strength, so may you love him back with all that you are! Receiving the love of God has been, and always will be, the key to loving God!

Are you growing in the revelation of his love for you? Do you know how precious you are to him? I can assure you of this; the more you humbly accept his extraordinary love for you, the more you will love him, and that is how you prepare to be…

RECOGNIZED BY GOD