"Free To Love" -2

(Prelude: This being our 29th anniversary, I hereby dedicate this blog to my wife; because by her side, I have had the chance to express love, and to feel love at so many different levels. I love you Marianne...) Having spent much of my life from the age of 11 till I was 23 in and out of jail, I can recall what it was that made me not want to be behind bars; one thing that it was not, was the fact that I was there, because I could pretty much adapt to any condition. But the thing that made me not want to be there was the hurt I felt inside from not being able to be with the ones that I loved. In a strange kind of way, that is what I am talking about when it comes to loving God; because, how can you love a God that you cannot approach? This is what sin has done to us: it has created a gulf between us and God; a gulf that makes approaching God impossible. Which, in case you did not know, is what Jesus died on the cross to correct; for He became the bridge to get us across that gulf so that we could be free to access the Father; and thus, we are free to love God. So, right now you might be asking yourself, Why can't we love God even though we are far from Him? Well, maybe we could try, but to be perfectly honest, I think that would be what is called being lovesick. At least that is how I remember it from the times that I was locked up behind bars; because I still loved those that I had missed being with, I was just lovesick because I could not be with them. However, what we are talking about here has one very big difference, which is, that I already knew those people that I missed; but with God: we can not know Him until we are set free to love Him... "Herein is Love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." (1 John 4:10)