“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love.10 If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.” (John 15:9-12)
Have you ever asked yourself these questions. What does it look like to you to “remain” in Jesus’ love? Have you ever considered that you are a part of the same love that the Father and Son have for one another? What are the implications of that for your life? Take some time and prayerfully reflect on this passage one phrase at a time.
There is something that love can heal that nothing else can. We all know what parts of ourselves are broken, don’t we? These places inside of us that are frayed and fragile and fallen often get that way because of a lack of love. This lack can express itself in an inability to feel love, an experience of being unloved, or an inability to love. We all instinctively know that bullies are mean because often they’ve had meanness done to them. Hurt people hurt people. We know that a longing for love can drive people into the arms of strangers, cause others to numb feelings with substances or keep people isolated and alone so they don’t have to be exposed to hurt again. We’ve all been fractured in one way or another by a lack of love. And like a broken bone that was never properly reset, these wounds can malform us and mark us in ways that lead to disfigurement of some sort.
In steps Jesus. If it is true that a lack of love can break us, then it’s also true that only love can fully heal us. The way out must retrace the steps of the way in. It is into our sorrow, into our sense of abandonment, into the broken pieces and most hurtful places of our story that Jesus enters and takes up residence. And when he meets us in these places what does he do? He brings into that darkness His light. And what is the light that he shines in these places? Shame? Guilt? Judgement? No. The light he shines is LOVE - love that meets us in our deepest need and love that helps us heal our past, reframe our identity and shape our future. This love so very often addresses our point of fracture. Sometimes the bone needs rebreaking and resetting. But this break is done by loving hands and with the purpose of healing. CS Lewis says that “A sum can be put right: but only by going back till you find the error and working it afresh from that point, never by simply going on.” So, our loving Jesus walks with us to the point of break, and we are invited to walk with him to the place of our greatest healing.
Prayer : Lord Jesus, I come before you this day acknowledging my need for your love. Let your love for me ground me do its healing work in my life. Let your love for me help define for me who I really am. Let my love for you and for others be an outflow of the healing your love is doing in me. Amen
Song of the day: How Deep the Father’s Love for us - Austin Stone
