Strength From Setbacks // Flipping Your FailuresSample

You’re Magnetic

God loves us—just as we are, right now. Wow. That’s kind of difficult to accept, isn’t it? I mean, it’s hard to feel worthy of that love, with all our mistakes, our imperfections. Don’t we need to be perfect and holy too, just as he is, before he can love us? No, brother, he loves us—just as we are, right now. If we’re ever going to understand God, if we’re ever going to understand ourselves, in relation to God, we’re going to have to bend our minds toward that truth.

He is perfect and holy; we are not. True. What’s not true is that, because of his perfection, he’s drawn only to more perfection. What’s not true is that, because of his holiness, he demands our holiness before he’ll love us, accept us, want anything to do with us.

God knows our mistakes, every imperfection. Nothing is hidden from him (Hebrews 4:13). And, actually, precisely because he knows, he executed the ultimate act of love: he sent his son, Jesus Christ, to be our King and to save us from our mistakes and imperfections (Romans 5:8). So, the truth is—like a doctor to the sick—he’s actually drawn to imperfection and sin (Mark 2:17). Our relationships with God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, begin to work when we accept and welcome that love.

Okay, so what do we do?

Throughout this week, take these words as God’s promise, just to you. Meditate upon them. Let them sink in deep.

“. . . neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate [me] from the love of God in Christ Jesus . . .” (Romans 8:38-39)