Life's Big Questions: Devotions From Time Of GraceSample

Does God really love me?

If you are a believer in God, I can assume that you believe in God’s power, control, ambitious plans, sovereignty, holiness, eternity, and command of 10,000 times 10,000 angels. You know that He made the universe, holds the hounds of hell at bay, protects His children, and will ultimately crush all evil.

But here’s the thing: does He love me? Am I just a microscopic chess piece on His insanely large chessboard, or is He really my Father? Am I just a thing He has made, a tiny, tiny cog in an immense machine, or do I matter? Does He care how I’m doing? How I feel? What I have to deal with each day? Does my success or failure matter to Him?

St. Paul ached to know these things too, and the Spirit of the Lord gave him this confidence: “I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38,39).

Christmas, Good Friday, and Easter clinched it for Paul. If God’s Son, divine and holy from all eternity, would take on human flesh for me, obey the commandments for me, suffer and die for me, and rise again to guarantee my forgiveness and resurrection, there can be no doubt.

He loves me.