Keep yourselves in the Love of God

Flashing lights greeted the kids and me as we headed towards the intersection of Highways of 95 and 53 last Monday. The familiar road was not even properly blocked off yet, but emergency vehicles were arriving from every direction. We immediately knew that someone had just experienced a tremendous shock, and perhaps was facing a tragedy. We began to pray for safety for the victims and asked God to work in their hearts even through this terrible circumstance. Heavy hearted and a little shaken, we drove on home only to receive an email asking for prayer for the local Christian mother who had just been in a car crash. The next day, when I realized that the family mentioned was one that we had met through homeschool soccer, I just put my head in my hands and wept. Another Christian family in our community facing a major crisis, the fourth in a string of tragedies over the last weeks left me stunned and grieving.

It was a little over three years ago that we faced a similar series of crises within our own extended family. After about 6 months of "mysterious" symptoms, Tim's 45 year old brother was diagnosed with liver and colon cancer. As the aggressive cancer quickly spread throughout his body it was clear that unless God intervened, he would only have a few months to live. We traveled east to be with him and his family, spending three precious weeks with them before we had to return home. While still reeling from this tragic situation, we received word that my mother had a spot on her lungs that the doctors believed might be cancer. Further tests would reveal that it was. Six short weeks later we headed back to Illinois for the funeral of Tim's brother. Surprised by the suddenness of the situations; we moved through those days struggling to show love and support our families in spite of our own shock and grief.

However, amidst the sorrow and unanswered questions, God provided comfort for us through the ministry of a godly Presbyterian pastor at the church we were attending at that time. Sunday after Sunday as he faithfully proclaimed the love and providence of God, our hearts were refreshed and revived. His messages seemed to echo the words Corrie ten Boom, "There is no pit so deep that God's love is not deeper still." How desperately we needed to be reminded of the amazing vastness of God's love and power. It would have been so easy to allow emotional fatigue and the heartbreaking circumstances to determine our outlook. However, we recognized that God was calling to us to keep ourselves in His love. "Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life." (Jude 21)

On the surface, this seems like a strange command for God to make. How can we help but be in the love of God? The Bible tells us that at His very essence, God is love. If God is love and God is omnipresent, how can we be anywhere but in the love of God? And yet, Scripture in other passages explains that it is possible for us to harden our hearts and pull away from the wellsprings of His love. It is a temptation that we all face. Unexplainable suffering or difficulties often cause us to resist the love of God and this can lead us to a place of fear or unbelief— a place where we cannot help but feel "away from" or "outside of" the love of God. An honest appraisal reveals that at the core of turning away from the love of God is always our own sin.

So what are we to do if in the midst of the greatest trials of our lives we find ourselves faltering? We must go to the One knows all about our struggles with doubt and believe He loves us anyway. But we have to go honestly . . . . broken, weary, weeping. We need to turn to Him and ask him to do in us what we cannot do in our own strength …to teach us to abide in Him. Perhaps that is why many early Puritan pioneers often answered each other's enquiries as to how they were doing with the simple phrase . . . "Being kept."

• "Being kept" in the love of God, to know His peace and even joy in the middle of life's painful twists and turns.
• "Being kept" from doubts, fears or unbelief.
• "Being kept" from sinful responses to our painful circumstances whether it be anger, jealousy, or pettiness.
• "Being kept" from relentless pleasure seeking in an effort to numb the pain of life
• "Being kept" from gossip and slander, when we want to lash out in frustration at our circumstances.
• "Being kept" from sin, so that we might experience the fellowship and comfort of God.

And in the end, when we stand facing God and eternity, we will look back at our feeble attempts to "keep ourselves in the love of God", knowing that it was God, Himself, the Author and Finisher of our faith who ultimately did the keeping.

"Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy, to the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen." Jude 1:24