Jesus Loves Me...but Why?

Dear Diary, May 1, 2012

Jesus loves me, this I know...but why?

I’ve always wondered this but never given myself a plausible answer. This past weekend, my youth group did the 30 Hour Famine…a thirty-hour fast to raise money for World Vision. Guest speakers, including our pastor, came before our small youth group to lead discussions. One was the importance of life, and how we must have consideration for other people since God deems all mankind special. That’s when it came up: Why? Why does God think we’re special? Why does He give a flip about us?

Why do I have to give to God? I promise Him my heart, but then I go and defile it, giving it away to other people after I’ve sword to devote myself fully to Him. He forgives me when I turn back to Him, but then I go off again eventually. Why does God love me? I’m broken. I’m imperfect. I screw up all the time. Sometimes, I hate myself for messing up, for being flawed when I know the right way to live. “But I trust in Your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in Your salvation.” Psalm 13:5. There are moments, though, when I feel empty. What about me does God look down and say “that’s why I take care of her.”

One of the dad’s helping out during the Famine gave us the answer after he presented the ominous question, “But why does God love us,” followed by a silent room of teens glancing around at one another for the answer. “Because we are made in His image.” “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, in our likeness…’ So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him Genesis 1:26,27.

At first, that brings a deluge of clarity. “Oh, I see! In His image, so He looks at us and sees a piece of Himself. That endears us to Him.” Makes sense. But wait…so, my face? God looks at my body, my image, and loves that? What about all the stuff underneath my skin, in my heart and in my mind, where all the real action takes place? Isn’t there some redeeming quality about my personality, about my ambitions, my likes, my dislikes, my talents, that God loves?

Actually, I battled this question last night. I felt very depressed, thinking that there was nothing really about me that God loved. Nothing that was different from anyone else.

This morning, He put a hand on my shoulder and said, “Really?” I didn’t expect to think about this topic or even to write about this, but the Lord works in mysterious ways. It’s not a physical image that God looks at. “But the Lord said to Samuel, ‘Do not look at his appearance or at His physical stature, because I have refused him. For the Lord does not see as man sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.’” 1 Samuel 16:7.

My heart. The part of me pulsing through my entire body, keeping me alive. My heart. Filled with all the things I keep inside, the thoughts no one else hears. God looks at that part of me, and He still loves me.

He looks at my heart, and He sees His image. “We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.” 1 John 4:16.

This isn’t something I can shed off, like the fleeting emotions of infatuation. This love is deep and entrenched in my soul forever. “For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, not any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 8:38-39. “’Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be removed,’ says the Lord, who has compassion on you.” Isaiah 54:10.

It’s something special in every person. God delights in His chosen, but He also feels deeply for those who do not choose to ask Jesus into their hearts. “’As surely as I live, declares the sovereign Lord, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live. Turn! Turn from your evil ways! Why will you die, O house of Israel?’” Ezekiel 33:11. (Just a side note, “house of Israel” represents the people He has created – people with a purpose, people created for a reason. That’s everyone!)

God loves me! “This is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent Hi s Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” 1 John 4:10. If this doesn’t convince me that God loves me, then I don’t know what will. He shed His blood, he experienced excruciating pain for me. For you. He looks at your heart, and He sees a reflection of Himself. He remembers when He formed you, carefully, specially. He made you to look like Him, inside and out, and He gave you a future. He said, “I love you so, my dear. I will always be there for you, even when you forget that I’m always watching, always making sure that you will be alright. Nothing will ever diminish my love for you.”

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