After many years, I feel that I’ve finally reached a point where I truly love God. Just whispering “Father” brings me to tears and makes my heart flutter. I feel that it wouldn’t be exaggeration at all if all the beautiful words in the world in their most superlative forms were applied to God.
I am amazed at my own feelings. I’m cautious by nature and have rarely trusted anyone with abandon like this. I’m also a passive person and it’s unnatural for me to love someone as passionately as this.
But I am happy.
My trust and love for God did not grow overnight. It was a long process.
It began when I truly came to believe that I was justified through faith. Of course, I had long believed that my sins were forgiven through faith in Jesus Christ. But I had felt that I was just a forgiven sinner, and could not believe that God truly considered me righteous. As time went by and I grew in faith, I became convinced that I was really justified by faith in Jesus Christ and that God truly sees me righteous.
With this realization I started thinking, isn’t it then true that God really likes me? If God sees me a righteous person, who keeps all the commandments in the Bible just like Jesus, how could He not like me? Thinking that God likes me makes me like God in return.
As my confidence in my relationship with God grew, I became more confident about prayer as well. When God doesn’t seem to answer my prayer, it doesn’t discourage me, because I feel that God – who loves and likes me – does not deny me my prayer request unless He has something better in store for me. I’ve come to rejoice in adversity because I feel that God, who loves and likes me, does not allow it unless there is something good in it. I now look for blessings after difficult times because I have confidence in God’s goodness.
My understanding of the Bible also became clearer. Portions of the Apostle Paul’s letters that had been theologically difficult to understand are now clearer. The Scriptures were written by people who loved God. It can be truly understood only by people who fully love God. It’s the same as with a love story, which can be only be truly understood by people who have actually been in love themselves.
I came to know the love of God and to truly love Him in my sixties. I hope that our church members come to the same place at an earlier age.
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