God's love

I had a conversation with a friend two nights ago who said that he believed he had 'gone too far for God'. We chatted and I shared that that's actually impossible - we can NEVER go to far for God.  Look at Romans 8:38-39 - For 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.

We can't be separated from God's love.  It's a simple as that.  No matter what we've done, how many times we've done it, and how bad 'it' is, God will take us back.  In fact, one of my favourite things about God is that HE'S waiting for US to come back. Look at the prodigal son.

Whether it was before you accepted Christ or after, I think we've all been there.  Before we come to know Christ, we can think that we've done too many bad things.  We can think that God would never take us because we're too 'bad'.  "God could never love me, I've done awful things."

After we accept Christ, it can be the same type of denial, but in a different way.  It's often in the form of a sin we struggle with.  We know we shouldn't do it, and yet we keep falling back into it.  And when this becomes a pattern over days, weeks, months, years, we think that God can't still love us and forgive us because "I know better and yet I'm still sinning."  Yes, it's not good, and yet He knows us better than we know ourselves - He knows we are human and that we will fall.  That's why there's grace.  (*This is not an excuse to sin or fall into grace-abuse.  It's simply a reminder that we can't out-sin God's forgiveness.  We can incur His discipline, but we can't get away from His love.)

I realize this is a generalized statement, but if you're to take one thing away from this blog, it's this - that if you're feeling far from God, it's not because He won't take you back, it's because He's waiting for you to return to Him.

It's a love-hate thing...

I can't wear white.  My favourite t-shirts are blank white shirts,  but I inevitably get something on them - every time.  Today I decided to be adventurous - white golf shirt with tan khakis.  Bad idea.  I'd been wearing these for less than an hour before all this happened.

 

 

 

 

 

The pictures don't do it justice, it's much worse in person.  And there are a few more spots that you can't see in the pictures.  To be fair, I'm not usually this bad.  My wife made a cake over the weekend and I didn't realize there was still some purple icing on the counter...but admittedly, I realize that this is still an exceptionally large number of stains...

 

Eating in the winter is the worst because my sleeves always get stuff on them.  My wife always has to warn me about my sleeves, but it's usually too late by then.  And that last bite...the last bite always has my name on it...

 

The best part of my day has been a surprise visit at work from my sister-in-law.  She brought me:

 

 

However, with lots of jelly-filled and chocolate timbits, my situation today is only set to get worse...

 

 

Miserable

This is going to be quite a vulnerable post.

I have had a miserable week.  I have been in a miserable mood, and have had no motivation to do anything.  The reason is quite simple - my wife and son have been away all week, visiting her mother.  I'm so glad she could do that, but when we planned this a couple of months ago, I never thought I would be in such rough shape.

This is the first time we`ve been apart for an extended period of time.  A few people said to me, "Ah, nice!  You'll enjoy your week as a bachelor!"  Far from it.  It has been the total opposite.  This week has felt like one of the longest weeks of my life.  I've counted every second (It's only Monday??  It's only Tuesday???).  The house has been a mess, not because I can't clean it, but because I've had no motivation to.  I have missed or mis-scheduled three appointments, all of which were written in my day planner, and yet I somehow still missed.  I've slept terribly all week.  My brain has been completely muddled, I've been depressed and lonely, I've been bored, and no matter how hard I try, I haven't been able to concentrate or think straight.  I`ve fallen behind on a bunch of things I need to do.  It's affected my personal life, my work life, my spiritual life, everything.

It was a slope, I've noticed.  It started after coming off the high of being on vacation last week and having a fantastic time.  Coming back to reality is hard.  Coming back to reality alone is harder.  Coming back to 1,000 things on your plate that have to get done is not encouraging.  And while the slope began gradually, it quickly became slippery and steep.

And the worst part is, Satan knows when to attack.  A friend of mine once told me about a message he heard  from Charles Stanley about temptation - HALT.  Watch out when your Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired.  I`ve noticed those to be very true in my life, that Satan attacks in your weakest moments, when you are most vulnerable.  This week was no different, and the attacks were intensified.  I`d like to say I had a great week with the Lord, but that`s just not true.  I had good moments of reading my bible and praying.  But I also had bad moments of depression and overall...blah.

If there`s a couple of encouragements I can take from this week, it`s that 1) I know that I truly love my wife and son, and 2) I know I need God`s help more and more, always.  I also know that we all have these weeks from time to time - it`s part of life - and I take refuge in the fact that it will get better.

My wife and son come home today.  I can`t wait to get some traction on this slope.