Look What LOVE Has Done

Love.  

What comes to mind when you say "love".  I mean, in our house, we love pizza, cookie dough and the Packers but I also love God, my husband and my kids. The word "love" has a broad spectrum in the ways it is used.  But there is a great Love that out measures them all.

I've said before that our adoption of Endale changed our family.  For me personally, it changed me in so many different ways.  The one thing that stands out far above all the blessings and growth from bringing Endale home is my view of love.  Not just any love, but God's love for me.  I grew up as a Pastor's Kid.  My parents tell the story of me being born on a Wednesday and in church the very next Sunday.  So I have known of God's love for me and have loved God from a very early age.  I never really knew any different.  I may never truly understand God's love for me this side of Heaven, but after experiencing adoption I grasp God's love for me better than I ever have before.

It wasn't until our adoption process and then homecoming of Endale that I "got it".  God's love for me.  You see, earthly relationships can skew our perception of what love is supposed to be.   The earthly relationships that we have are imperfect.  Do you have a relationship with someone who has conditions or boundaries?  Do you have a relationship with someone who doesn't show grace and mercy?  Is there a relationship where there is no forgiveness?  Do you have a person in your life that says they love you, but they don't pursue a true relationship with you?

If you're like me, you fall into all or at least one of those in your relationships.  The struggle of trying so hard to have a relationship with someone who doesn't want it.  In the end, you wind up hurt and confused. We spend so much time and energy trying to earn or even keep love.  God's love isn't like that.

Adoption is the perfect earthly picture of God's love for us.  Our adoption story went something like this.  When we started the process of adopting (all three), we studied everything we could find out about them, their birth country, their pictures.  We wanted to know them.  We knew everything we could about Endale before he knew us.  

We started the adoption process.  There were heaps of paperwork and hoops to jump through to get to Endale.  It cost a lot of money that we didn't have.  We pursued him.  We did whatever it took to get to him.  

We wanted Endale.  Our agency told us that another family from Spain had committed to adopt him.  When they found out he had Down Syndrome, they decided not to adopt him.  The agency also went down their waiting family list to if anyone wanted to adopt him.  He had this "label" of Down Syndrome.  That didn't matter to us.  We wanted this child.  He was chosen.

 God's adoption story of us is so similar!

God knows us.  He knows everything about me...my quirks, my personality, the things I really don't like about myself, my struggles, my fears....and HE LOVES ME.

God pursues me.  He wants me.  He is there.  I don't have to go anywhere.  He had to sacrifice for me.  He did whatever it took to get ME.   HE GAVE HIS ONLY SON FOR ME.

God wants me.  I am really good at thinking of all the reasons someone wouldn't want to get to know me or want to spend time with me.  I can feel completely unworthy of love.  Or I think to myself, there is no way someone could love me.  God wanted me.  He wanted me with all my "issues", with all my failures and imperfections, He wanted me.  HE CHOSE ME.

His love is relentless.  His love doesn't give up.  His love doesn't keep records of my faults.  His love doesn't have boundaries.  His love won't give up on me.  His love is unstoppable. His love is for me.  His love can rescue me.  When I feel completely unlovable, His LOVE sets me free.

"There's no limit, no condition,

There's no boundary for His love

Nothing greater, nothing stronger

Nothing like the LOVE of God"

-Love Can-Central Live-

For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. 

Romans 8:38-39 

NOTHING can separate us from His Love.

*If you don't know the love God has for you, please message me.  I would love to share with you the greatest love you will ever know.*