No matter what

"The Lord's love does not fail however much we fail him. Peter had built his whole relationship with Jesus Christ on his assumed capacity to be adequate. That's why he took his denial of the Lord so hard. His strength, loyalty, and faithfulness were his self-generated assets of discipleship. The fallacy in Peter's mind was this: he believed his relationship was dependent on his consistency in producing the qualities he thought had earned him the Lord's approval.  

"Many of us face the same problem. We project onto the Lord our own measured standard of acceptance. Our whole understanding of him is based in a quid pro quo of bartered love. He will love us as if we are good, moral, and diligent. But we have turned the tables; we try to live so that he will love us, rather than living because he has already loved us." 

--Lloyd Ogilvie,  Ask Him Anything

Yes. This is it. 

Admit it. There are days when you get it all right. You love well and work well. You smile all day and say all the right things, and you think, I've got it. And you can imagine God smiling down upon you in Fatherly approval. 

Those are good days. But then there are the days when it all goes wrong right from the start. The days you wish you could take back, the words you regret the moment they leave your lips. And if you are like me, you go to bed heavy-hearted, promising, I'll do better tomorrow. 

Do we really believe that God loves us as much on the bad days as the good ones? Or do we try to live so that He will love us?

I want to live, really live, because He has already loved me. Because His love surrounds and fills me always. No matter what. 

I think if we really believed that, we would live so much larger, so much greater, with so much more joy. Because we are already securely loved, valued, wanted, redeemed. 

No matter what.

Day 27 of Abide: 31 Days of Resting in Him

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