I am so loved by the creator of the universe that He gave up everything for me and came to my rescue. He gave up everything to become nothing for me. He gave it all for me. His deep passionate love for me compelled him to rescue me.
How undeserving I am. For, how broken am I!
To receive love that is uncomprehending, to accept a gift I do not understand, to hold in my hands a value in which numbers cannot calculate.... Its not fair. Its not fair, its not just... but it is justified by grace. A grace I cannot speak of without breaking down in tears.
Grace, unmerited favor. Grace, a gift given before I even knew the word. Grace, before I could even understand why I needed it or if I wanted it.
How do I respond? How do I respond to a love I do not know, a grace I do not comprehend. How do I live with myself in taking a gift for granted? For taking this gift and trashing it, violating it, molesting grace and perfect love and then... hiding for shame. Hiding for guilt, hiding for a comfort knowing that I can *finally* get what I deserve.
I deserve pain. I deserve punishment. I deserve....
but to open my sun dried eyes, to search over the parched, barren vast of desert that has become my life and see open arms. To see a loving, graceful embrace reaching out for me. To find the oasis of life searching for me in the desert.
To see my lover pursue me into the dry darkness. To hide for shame and hear his voice always calling in the night. To run and hear the pursuit of a chase, I'm not getting far for he is searching after me.
I know but if I turn, his arms will clasp around me. If I lift up my head, his eyes will capture me. If I but whisper his name he will rush to my call. For his love pursues me. His grace follows after me.
While the son was still a long way off,
his father saw him coming.
The father felt sorry for his son.
So the father ran to him.
He hugged and kissed his son.
his father saw him coming.
The father felt sorry for his son.
So the father ran to him.
He hugged and kissed his son.
