I meant prolonged…

 

So, for anybody who has chosen to keep up with this blog at all, about a month ago I said I would take a brief break from posting for dissertation and coursework. This I have done, however, sadly this must continue for just a while longer. I love writing and posting here, but A) it takes time that I should be using to do revision and B) my mind has barely anything but anatomy and physiology in it at the moment. That’s how it should be, indeed ‘There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens’ (Ecclesiastes 3:1), currently it is time for exams. So on to a further cessation, I shall return properly after may 6th, in the mean time here’s a wee thought from the psalms; God bless St. Peters for teaching me them!

 

Psalm 103:12-14 – Sing psalms (to the tune of ‘before the throne’)

As far as east is from the west,

So far his love bas borne away

Our many sins and trespasses

And all the guilt that on us lay.

Just as a father loves his child,

So God loves those who fear his name.

For he remembers we are dust,

And well he knows our feeble frame.

 

I have come to really love and hold dear the psalms we sing at St. Peters. It is an incredible gift to be able to remember bible passages at the best of times, but some of the words of the psalms that we sing stick in my head better than most others. Psalm 103 is a joy to sing and is powerful in its message to us, I often find myself singing those verses above to myself as the promise they give is incredible. I think that this passage is best understood in reverse, follow me if you will.

God created us, ‘he remembers we are dust‘, he knows how he created us, down to each atom of our being, he knows us intimately, better than any human could ever know us. He knows our entire biology, every atom, cell, tissue and organ. He also know our souls, he knows our troubles, our temptations our hopes, fears, joys and failings. He knows our ‘feeble frame‘, he is in full understanding of our weakness, how easily broken we are, physically and spiritually. So what? He knows we are weak, where does that get us? Surely if we are weak he doesn’t care, if he cared he would make us strong?

God has made us what we are, he knows us completely, in every sense of knowing, I’m sure this extends to many ways we ourselves don’t understand. And with this knowledge, he still loves us. An incredible truth, that God can love us, even though we are broken, indeed no matter how broken we are. ‘Just as a father loves his child, so God loves those who fear his name‘, A child is weak, a father knows that, but that doesn’t make a single bit of difference to his love for that child, the father teaches the child to live, teaches it and disciplines it to make it grow, because he loves the child. And we are told that God loves us like this, he wants us to grow, to learn and to live our best lives to honour him. We need to acknowledge God in all we do, if we have some understanding of who God is then of course we will fear his name, the one who loves us completely and is our father also created the whole universe, and even with knowledge of the whole universe he still knows you intimately enough to know the number of hairs on your head, that is a God we should know, that is a god we should honour, not a god of limited power but a god of unlimited love.

How does he love us? what form has this love taken that we sould know it? That he chose to create us at all, out of his love and power came all creation. He made things good for us even though we would use them badly. And when we mess up? Make mistakes? Sin? He takes all these away from us, taking the punishemnt as well. When we fear his name, enough to want rid of our sin and give it up to him asking for forgiveness he takes our sin, trespasses and guilt ‘as far as east is from the west’. ‘So far his love has borne away’; his love is the reason these things are taken from us, the reason we can live a life free of guilt, free from our mistakes, free from punishment that we deserve for our actions. And that, is mercy and grace that we can never fully comprehend, taking our actions against him, the punishment for those actions and taking it from us. We offer our stained and broken lives and he makes us new, all through the sacrifice of his own son Jesus Christ. What an incredible position we have, being called children of god, this should fuel every action, every day of our lives. It is our assured and incredible hope. What a love, what a cost, we stand forgiven at the cross.

 

No person, animal, flower, or even pebble, has ever been loved too much—i.e. more than every one of God’s works deserves. – C.S. Lewis