Why does Sarah cling to that stuffed lamb she was given as a toddler? Why does Eric guard that ratty T-shirt he earned way back in his little league days? And why does my wife stick with me? It’s been almost 49 years, and my bones creak, and my bladder leaks, and my face looks like my great Grandpa’s.
My answer is this, once you have deeply loved someone, or even something, you just don’t want to let go.
Sarah cuddled with her lambie pie every night. She wore the fleece off the poor beast. Eric’s team were the champs that year. He proudly wore his T-shirt until his biceps burst the seams.
I purchased a classical guitar when I was a teen. I strummed it in bars and coffee houses before I came to know Jesus. When I got redeemed, so did my guitar. I went right back to those bars and coffee houses and sang about Jesus – ‘til they bounced me.
The guitar was used to influence several hundred souls to come to Christ. I used it to sing my wedding vows to my wife.
But the day came when it was so old and cracked and brittle that it was impractical to use – so I sold it to a friend and bought another one.
Oh my! I was quickly overcome with sellers’ remorse. I loved that guitar and it sorta loved me back. I called my friend, and he graciously understood and sold it back to me.
I then hung the guitar on the wall of my home. Over time all three of my children picked it up and taught themselves how to play it. Now all three want that guitar bequeathed to them when I die. To date I have owned that guitar for 57 years and I ain’t gonna let it go again.
So why should you be interested in all this?
Well, only because you have been loved, deeply, thoroughly, loved by the Lord Jesus. God says so.
He spoke through the prophet Jeremiah saying ‘I have loved you with an everlasting love – Jeremiah 31:3.An everlasting love – that’s the best kind.
And then there is Galatians 2:20 where Paul made God’s love for him very personal. He wrote, “I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So the life I now live in the body, I live because of the faithfulness of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself up for me.” The Son of God loved me and gave himself up for me.
Now because He has loved us, He refuses to lose us!
Jesus said, “My sheep listen to my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish; no one will snatch them from my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one can snatch them from my Father’s hand – John 10:28-29.
Even when we are at our worst, He holds on. The Psalmist confessed, “My spirit was bitter, and my insides felt sharp pain. I was ignorant and lacked insight; I was as senseless as an animal before you. But I am continually with you; you hold my right hand” – Psalm 73:21-23.
because He has loved us, He refuses to lose us! Our fleece may be wearing thin, but His love persists and sees us in the best light. Our seams may be bursting but His love covers us.
Matt Redman put it this way, “Oh no, You never let go, through the calm and through the storm. Oh no, You never let go, in every high and every low;
Oh no, You never let go – Lord, You never let go of me.”
How sweet it is to know that God’s love for us will never ever let us go.
A PRAYER: A Lord, thank you for your relentless love for us.
This has been Jim Johnson and pickleheavenpress.com
May the grace of our Lord Jesus be with you.
Scripture passages are from the NETBible ®
Pickle Heaven Press-James R. Johnson 