Everlasting love.

Jeremiah 31:3 says, “The Lord appeared to me (Israel) from ages past, saying, “I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you and continue My faithfulness to you.”

There is something poetic about those words. King Jesus, dropping bars since before the beginning of time. We are going to pull apart that verse and look at it line upon line. The verse starts with, “The Lord appeared to me (Israel) from ages past, saying…” Did you know that God still appears to us today and speaks to us? He has not stopped making house calls and making Himself readily available to us.

You may not hear an audible voice, but if you look around God can use even trees, leaves, sunrises, sunsets, wind and waves to talk to you. He uses people around you. Your friends, pastors, books or that still small voice within you. If we listen and pay attention, we will hear God speak. 

Then the next words are important, because sometimes we are afraid to listen and hear God speak because we are afraid of what He might say to us. I can assure you that if you hear words that tell you how bad you are, how useless, messed up, hopeless, any words that don’t bring life- they are not coming from God. God has a tendency to speak to us with words filled with tenderness. God does not condemn us into becoming better people. In fact the opposite is true. It is His kindness that brings us to repentance (see Romans 2:4). God will not kick you when you are down. He reaches for you and picks you up. When you are at your lowest, God comes to meet with you where you are and He helps you to see the way out, Jesus. 

So in our verse when God speaks, He goes into these beautiful words, “I have loved you with an everlasting love.” God’s love for you knows no beginning and no end. It is an eternal, agape, unconditional kinda love. God loves you completely. Right now, wherever you are, God loves you completely. 

The next words are, “Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you…” God does not trick us into falling in love with Him. Loving God is our response to His lovingkindness towards us. He woos us with His lovingkindness. He just shows us who He is and once our eyes begin to open and we start to really see God for who He is, we cannot help but fall in love with Him. Now, you may be new to the Christian journey. Don’t worry, loving God is not a pre-requisite to God loving you. He loves you whether you love Him or not. He loves you whether you know Him or not. He loves you whether you acknowledge Him or not. God loves people. All people. All ages, races, ethnicities and backgrounds. No matter your past, God looks at you where you are and says, “Take My hand, We can go on a wonderful adventure together. Where your latter days will be brighter than your past”. God loves you. 

The last few words of our verse are, “and continue My faithfulness to you”. Do you see God doesn’t say that He draws us then starts being faithful to us? But He draws us then continues His faithfulness to us. God is faithful. He is looking after us even when we are not looking after ourselves. He is making a way for us even when we think we are just lucky or we are smart and got it covered. Everything that exists cannot exist outside of Him. Likewise, we would not have anything if it wasn’t for God. 

Thank God that He doesn’t wait for us to get our lives right before He takes us on a journey of discovering who He is. God loves us where we are. BUT, He also loves us too much to leave us there. He slowly pulls us out of the mess we have made of our lives and plants us into His house (local church) and He begins to a do a work in us that only He can do and only because He loves us. 

God has loved you with an everlasting love. Let Him draw you with his lovingkindness and continue His faithfulness towards you. 

Love and blessings,

Melissa Tsingano.