God’s Unrequited Love by Lara

A recent Bible study of Amos brought these questions to mind, Does the Lord know about unrequited love? Is the Lord’s love blind?

In life, we often experience a separation from a loved one from whom we crave love and understanding. Or we want a friend or family member to know the Lord and experience His grace, mercy, and restoration like we’ve experienced.

So yes, I think if in our lives we have these examples, imagine the Lord’s longing for so many people’s attention and love. I know I’ve been slow to respond and still have more growing to do to fully understand His desire for me.

Based upon my reading of Amos 5, I don’t think the Lord’s love for us is blind as the adage goes for humans. In Amos 5 and 6, God points out the Israelites’ wrongs and He is angry with them and warns them of what is coming if they do not “return to Him” (Amos 4 ). Yet He still loves them and He still loves us through what we have done, are doing, or will do.

What love is this? It transcends modern day thinking and it surpasses human comprehension.

In my little world, there are people I love yet still get bothered at times by the things they say or do. There is a certain amount of time I know I can reasonably spend with them without becoming outwardly annoyed. My acceptance of them is conditional and it’s never 100%. But God’s love is 100% all the time!

Last night stuck at home during the ice storm, the Holy Spirit led me to visit Lisa Buffaloe’s LivingJoyfullyfree.com site where I immediately saw an acquaintance, Kristin George, being interviewed about breaking free from addiction. Kristin and I were roommates at a recent women’s retreat led by Lisa Burkhardt Worley and team. Kristin is young and on fire for God’s love and spoke about how God has changed her and loved her through some wild times.

Love is something I’ve had to learn about. The Lord uses hands-on examples with me like a Montessori teacher as I’m a visual learner. One example of this is how raising my two dogs Luna and Grace have taught me about His training, discipline, forgiveness, and unimaginable love. With dogs, hair goes everywhere, their muddy paws make spotless floors impossible, they get sick inside, and if bored, take out their frustrations on an occasionally left out item. But I wouldn’t change them and I love them even when they are stinky with dog breath blowing on me.

This example shows me how we make messes and leave our “hair” – signs of our humanness – all over the place. And what happens? God comes along, Swiffers up the mess and teaches us in the process.

This fatherly love makes me think of the lyrics of a song by Chris Tomlin that speaks about how we will never know how much it costs to see our sins on the cross.  I’m so grateful for God’s great show of 20/20 love. It certainly is not blind.

And yes, the Lord does know a thing or a million about unrequited love. So to all those out there who haven’t turned to Him, who haven’t let Him love you in all your mess, I pray you will “humble yourself to Him” as Ms. George said in her interview and love Him in return.