I think being in love looks good on me...

I think being in love looks good on me. No, let me rephrase that. I think being loved looks good on me. Welcome to a piece of my writing that is entirely about me (It’s my blog) and has nothing to do with you. I know you’re going to read on because let’s face it, you like things but forewarned is forearmed this post is unapologetically about me and me alone (for the most part).

Have you ever felt happy and at peace to the extent that when someone asks how are you the honest answer is “I am fine?” We all know that “I’m fine” is as much of a reflex as removing your hand from a hot stove plate. So many times we just say we’re fine because we don’t want to talk about it or we don’t think the other person will get it or we just want to fake it until we actually become fine. Now back to my question, have you ever been so fine that your “I’m fine” is the truth? That is where I am. I am fine. I’m in that little perfect place in life where I am happy, whole, and…. Yes, you guessed it, FINE.

Obviously, because I’m making such a fuss of how fine I am you would want to know my secret. My secret is not much of a secret actually it’s common knowledge. It’s not some tall, dark (chocolate and caramel ooouuuweee), handsome and God-fearing man of God nor is it a remote job that pays in USD. It’s God. My not-so-secret secret to being fine is God. For any of you that do not know I am 26 years old. Born and bred in a loving wholesome Christian home in Zimbabwe and so naturally I have always known about God. In one way or the other God has been involved in my life from the very beginning. I have always been surrounded by people that love God loudly and talk about him all the time. Prayer has always been around me (I wouldn't always take part) but it was always there. God's love has been spoken of around me my whole life over and over again. If you think with such a background I have always been grounded and rooted firmly in my understanding of God's love you are sorely wrong.

I have always spoken about God's love and I thought I understood it. Songs about the love of God have always gotten me to tears or close to tears because they sounded so beautiful and I just could not believe unworthy as I am I get to be a recipient of said love. This is why I always thought I really got how much God loves me. I was wrong. If I had known  "...what is the width and length and depth and height.." (Ephesians 3:18) of God's love I would have lived a more liberated life. It's one thing to say amen when a preacher says God loves you. It's another thing to cry at the altar as you try and imagine how deep God's love is for you. It's a totally different ball game actually understanding God's love for you.

Ephesians 3:17-19 says this, "17 that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height— 19 to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God (NKJV)." I'll tell you right now that before enrolling for Bible School my faith was at an all-time low and so comprehending God's love was not something I was trying to do. I knew of it, that is a fact but I did not comprehend it. If you did English language in school you know there were those passages that had questions that were dubbed comprehension. If you did not comprehend the passage, you could not answer the question. While I don't think I will be addressing any questions on God's love (Definitely not today but if you have questions shoot. I don't promise to have an answer but we can try and find an answer together) I needed to comprehend his love so I could experience it in its fullness. The logic is if you don't understand his love you can't experience it because well, you don't understand it.

I absolutely love that verse 19 of the above-quoted scripture says, "...the love of Christ which passes knowledge..." because that's so real. The love of God passes all knowledge for real because to understand it you have to let go of all your preconceived notions of love. If you are trying to liken the love of God to the love of a person then you cannot comprehend it. In simpler terms, the love of God in it making so much sense does not make sense at all. You can't make sense of why God loves you like you can make sense of your boyfriend loving you because you are a kind person. God's love cannot be rationalised. In his essence he is love. Love is who God is just as it says in 1 John 4:16, "And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him." My human mind did not understand the love of God because I was constantly trying to rationalise it and equate it to human love. I did understand to an extent that God's love went a little deeper than human love because there is nobody who could ever send their son to die for random strangers that were busy living in sin but I wanted to make sense of it so much it stood in the way of my fully comprehending it and understanding it.

How then did I get to "I'm fine" because of God you ask? Well, it is a journey. I would have loved to say one day I woke up and I just knew but I don't want to lie to you. On some days I feel unloved. Yes, you read that right. Even after the realisation and comprehension of God's love, there are days where I feel like the love is not there. There are days when I look at myself and think if I was Jesus would I love this mess? The thing is I'm not Jesus and Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so. I must constantly remind myself that I am loved by the creator of the universe, the King of kings, the Lord of lords. I have to continually go back to the word to remind myself that he loves me. Sometimes I have to do a stocktake of where he has taken me from and where he has brought me and my oh my is that evidence of how much he loves me.

Dear reader it takes more than a song and a sermon to understand God's love for us. We need to open our Bibles and read them. That book is a love letter from God to all of us. Go on Google, search for scriptures that speak of God's love, and meditate on them. Comprehend God's love so you may be, "...filled with all the fullness of God." I am happy, I am loved and I am fine. When I say it I mean it because just remembering how much I am loved fills me with so much joy and peace.