April 04, 2022: God's Great Love, Compassion, and Forgiveness Can Remove the Deep Scars of Our Life.

In the Book of Lamentation chapter 3, the author writes about God's great love and compassion in spite of Israel's continued disobedience to Him. This book was written in the days following Judah’s tragic defeat and exile to Babylon (586 B.C.)

In painful detail, the author attributes horrific national suffering not just to the cruelty of the Babylonian military but to divine wrath that doesn’t sound compassionate or merciful. Yet the prophet’s tears mirrored the heart of God who didn’t enjoy allowing His people to suffer.

For many years, however, His people had been following other gods while exploiting poor and defenseless neighbors. God had been patient. But because His people had grown stubbornly cold-hearted in the way they ignored Him and hurt one another, He followed through on His many warnings to them. Yet there was still hope. There would be restoration

Lamentations: 3:19-24 (NIV)

I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall. 20 I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me. 21 Yet this I call to mind and therefore, I have hope:

22 Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. 23 They are new every morning, great is your faithfulness. 24 I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion therefore, I will wait for him.”

God calls us to restoration to Himself as well, in spite of our continued disobedience to Him. But our sins and scars can be so deep even after we accept His forgiveness through His Son's death on the cross, that we still feel helpless and hopeless as His children.

We yearn for God's love and compassion daily in our lives, but those deep scars of painful hurt can keep us from knowing and experiencing God peace in our lives. I too experienced this emptiness as a Christian for many years until I came to my complete and absolute surrender to my Lord.

You see, God's forgiveness, love, and compassion, is not conditional. If we have accepted Jesus Christ into our hearts and acknowledge Him as Lord of our lives, then we can rest assured that we have God's promises of forgiveness and love for eternity. It is we, ourselves that keeps us from experiencing God's daily love, forgiveness, and compassion in our lives.

We have come to falsely believe that our sins toward God and others were so sinful that we think, "How can God truly forgive me?"...God promises of forgiveness and love are not based on our feelings, but are based on God's Son, Jesus Christ, dying on the cross for us.

PERSONNAL COMMENT:

Let us not continually waste time feeling unworthy of God's love when we already have it based on His act of love for us. Let us fully and absolutely surrender ourselves to Him and rid ourselves of our deep-rooted scars that hinder our relationship and peace with our God. May God move us closer to Himself so that we may also share His grace and love to others.