God loves me. I know because He’s told me so.
No, that’s not from some song that children learn to sing in church. I’ve literally heard the voice of my Father tell me that He loves me.
Side note: If you’ve never heard God speak actual words to your heart, please know that this is available to you. Better, He is available to you. He wants to speak to you.
His voice is a wonderful, beautiful sound.
It seems like lately when I ask God what He would like to say to me, the first words I hear are “I love you.” It’s almost like He wants to establish that fact before we go any further. Anything else (okay, everything else) is secondary to His love for me.
I’m not a particularly driven individual, but I do like to have a plan and an agenda. I like to make lists and then check things off of them. I’m not highly relational as a default.
But God is. He is very relational. So when I’m praying I’m mostly praying things like “here is my list of things that I want to cover today.” God is so very gracious with me. When I’ve finally gone through my list of things, and I remember to ask Him what He would say to me, He seems to almost always start with “I love you.”
I’m not totally sure why, but it throws me every time. I want to hear His thoughts on all the things I’ve just gone through and He’s more interested in what my heart needs than what I want to accomplish. In essence, He’s saying “Whoa. Slow down there bro. I know you have all these things, and I’m glad you know that you can bring them to me. But, before we cover those things, let’s take a second and acknowledge this relationship. Sit for a second and know that I care for you and your heart WAY MORE than I care about all the things that you want to accomplish. You are more important to me that what you do or don’t do.”
He thwarts my plans for efficiency in the most glorious, caring way possible. I’m always taken aback. It throws off my groove. But that’s EXACTLY what God’s love does. There is nothing like it in this world and it is meant to completely throw off everything. God’s love is meant to be disruptive. It is meant to completely change your life.