Two weeks after Ian was born, BJ and I led worship for a retreat downtown (what that really means is, BJ led worship for a retreat….I sang with him for one set and then broke down because I was still full of raging postpartum hormones and wasn’t ready to be away from my new baby). Anyhow, I sang a few songs at a retreat…and the first song was “How He Loves”. It was the first time I had sung anything since before Ian was born. Hearing those verses about how deep and passionate our Father’s love for us is, with the new perspective of being a mom for just 2 weeks, nearly took my breath away. I had a hard time finishing the song.
It’s been 9 months now. This morning BJ was singing “How He Loves” while Ian and I were standing in the back of the room. I was holding him, swaying and singing…and then our very wiggly and active son was still. He put his head on my shoulder (which NEVER happens) and rested. After a few minutes he was sleeping. I looked down at him and heard BJ’s voice singing “He loves us, oh how He loves us!”. I stopped singing and just marveled at this picture I was getting a glimpse of.
The fierce love I have for this sweet, sleeping baby is only a small measure of the love my Father has for me. The tenderness that I feel towards Ian is just a reflection of the tenderness God feels towards me, and all of us. I am His baby. It also struck me how intensely painful it must be for Him when we choose things that move us away from Him.
I’ve heard it said many times that if only we could really understand and know how much the Father loves us, it would change everything about the way we live (our pastor, David Dwight, gave a great sermon on this from a couple weeks ago - http://hopecentral.com/one-love/). I thought about this in those moments this morning. If I really understood and believed that God sees me the way the way that I see Ian, it would change the way I see other people, the way that I see myself, the things I give priority to and the way I view God. It would quite literally change everything.
In The Art of Being, Sara Groves wrote about bringing her first born home from the hospital. She thought about how incredible her love was for that baby, and he hadn’t done anything yet. She loved him because he existed, not because he did anything to earn it. She goes on to compare this love to the love God has for us…”He says that when we were on our worst possible behavior, He loved us. He does not say He loves us because we are successful, because we are good people, or because we are okay dressers. It is not our doing He loves; it is our being.”
In that moment this morning, I saw a brief glimpse of God’s deep love for me and for all of us. We didn’t do anything to earn this fierce affection. He loves us because we are his babies, just as much as Ian is my baby. My prayer will be that I can live in this perspective, because if I can, it really will change everything.
