**Today’s post is one of the most important I could share. Please read until the end. Share it with someone who needs the truth it contains.
I’m pretty sure I know the single biggest issue Christians grapple with.
How could I possibly know our biggest struggle? Because I’ve heard the same universal thread whispered by pastors’ wives, and prodigal daughters, and everyone in between. Here’s a hint:
It’s not a behavior, it’s a belief.
Want to know what it is?
“I just can’t believe God loves me.”
Why is it we can readily believe God loves the world, or God loves our friend, but we hesitate to believe He loves me?
Is it because we know our performance doesn’t live up to His perfection? Or because we’ve distanced ourselves from God and assume God has distanced himself from us? Or because life is hard, and hurts weigh heavy, and we wonder if God even hears our prayers?
Is it because we think God doesn’t see us, much less love us?
Why do we listen to the voices of lies when we could listen to the voice of love?
Whatever the reason, the belief that God doesn’t love me simply isn’t true.
Yesterday I prayed through one of Jesus’ last prayers, recorded in John 17. Jesus prays for himself, his disciples, and–get this–YOU.
20 “I am praying not only for these disciples but also for all who will ever believe in me through their message…23 I am in them and you are in me. May they experience such perfect unity that the world will know that you sent me and that you love them as much as you love me. (John 17:20,23 NLT)
Pause and let this truth sink in: The night before His crucifixion, Jesus Christ prayed for you. Jesus prayed that you would know God loves you just like the Father loves Him.
Whaaattt??? Could this be true? Could God the Father actually love you and me like He loves the Son?
According to Jesus, the answer is “yes”.
Of all the things Jesus could have prayed the night before his death, He took time to pray that you would know God loves you.
But what if you’re thinking, I know I should believe God loves me, but I don’t know how to believe God loves me. Candidly, I’m still learning to know God loves me, too.
Here’s What I’ve Learned About How to Grasp God’s Love:
1. Ask God to Help You Accept His Love
Jesus prayed you would know God loves you. Why not ask the Father the same thing Jesus asked the Father: that you would know He loves you?
Jesus isn’t the only one who prayed that believers would understand the depth of God’s love. The apostle Paul prayed for it, too.
“And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.” (Ephesians 3:17b-19)
2. Hold On to What God Says
It’s one thing to hear God loves me, it’s another thing to grasp God loves me. Paul prayed we would “grasp” God’s love (Ephesians 3:18). When we grasp something we wrap all five fingers around it tightly so it doesn’t slip through our hands.
Too many of us let God’s love slip right through our fingers.