The Love Boat

I awoke way before sunrise yesterday and found myself rehearsing all the love scriptures that I had been studying the previous week.  It had been one of those restless nights where I just seemed to have had hundreds of thoughts racing through my mind without stop.  As I set my attention on His love, a calming peace FINALLY began to come over me.  While in that state, my thoughts drifted over to my wife who was sleeping contently next to me. I began to envision the love of God as a light flowing through her body like a lighted torch would illuminate one’s way in a dark cave.

Then the reality that God is love and that His written word is His will for our lives joined in and I began to see the light of His love bringing healing to all the caverns of darkness that the enemy had placed in my wife’s body.  (Acts 10:30 – Ephesians 5:11)  It is interesting to me that the Apostle John begins his whole dissertation on the love of God by saying in I John 1:5 “that God is light and in him is no darkness at all.” (KJV)  As I have mentioned many times before, light always dissipates darkness.  And in the vision that I had, it was the burning light of God’s love that was illuminating the dark and lifeless areas within my wife, leaving behind areas that were “fresher than a child’s” and had “returned as to the days of his (or her in this instance!) youth” (Job 33:25 KJV)

You know, He just won’t let me move away from His favorite subject… His love toward us!  After I had gotten up and reviewed our Children’s Church lesson for the day, I packed up everything I needed for the class, and then started to get out of my chair so I could go and get my wife up. But it was like I still had one more thing to do.  I swung my chair back toward my computer and suddenly had the urge to look at 1 John one more time.  Since I was too lazy to dig through my briefcase to get out my Good News translation, I instead leaned over and grabbed my NIV Study Bible from my new bookcase.  (Would you believe it?  After almost 3 years I got all my study books off the floor and organized into a wonderful new bookcase!)

This particular Bible is like a good old friend to me as it was the main Bible that I used throughout my Bible School days.  It is well worn, underlined, highlighted and written in!  I flipped it open toward 1 John and I John 4:16 (which I had previously circled, underlined and noted thoughts in the margin) caught my attention!  It says: “And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.”  The word “rely” hit me like being smacked with a board right between the eyes!  (Not that it hurt, but it definitely got my full attention!)  It all became perfectly clear.  We are to rely on His love in every situation in our lives.  Webster says that rely means “to rest on something, as the mind when satisfied of the veracity (or habitual observance of truth), integrity or ability of persons, or of the certainty of facts or evidence.”

That reliance on His love is what causes our faith to work. (Galatians 5:6)  It is what casts out ALL fear in the midst of situations where the opposite of God’s will is yelling out to you in adverse symptoms, or people’s well meaning but faith destroying counsel.  The word “know” indicates an intimate relationship with God like as a relationship known only between a loving husband and wife.  That reliance on His love for us is what brings us that peace “which surpasses all understanding” (Philippians 4:7 MKJV), as it did to me during the darkest time of the night just before the sun began to make its appearance in the eastern sky.

How strong is your ability to rely on His love?  How intimate is your knowledge of His light that instantly dissipates the darkness that attempts to encroach upon you? Might I suggest some time spent in the book of I John?  I mean, who better than to learn from than the Apostle of Love?  It reminds me of the little green character named Mike in the movie "Monsters, Inc.", when he is head over heals in love, pretends that he is blowing a ships horn and says, “Honk! Honk! The Love Boat rides again!” 

Find some alone time this week, pack a notebook and pen and then set sail for the most enriching adventure of your life as you come to intimately know His love as defined in John’s letter to the believers in the Biblical book of I John.  Stay tuned and keep asking yourself… “What am I expecting today?”