To Make You Feel My Love
It was almost 10 years ago when I first heard this song. I don't even remember exactly how I first heard it, but it takes me back to driving country roads in Tennessee, thinking, praying, dreaming. Most of my dreams didn't come true--but better ones did. My world was about to expand, but in the living, it often felt more like exploding.
In the middle of all the changes and losses and recalibrating came this song, like an arrow to my heart. I listened to it over and over, and it often brought tears. There was something about it that made it easy to picture God singing it to me. I somehow knew it was Him, and I knew it was true--He loved me like that. And even though I didn't understand the sudden turns my life was taking, I was submerged in His love, and I knew it would all be ok.
I guess that's the way it works with His calling. He calls us to Himself first--to be loved, truly loved. Not just as a number in the 144,000, but as His unique, image-bearing child, with a love so deep and incomprehensible for each of us that He would choose the worst suffering rather than lose us. Just to make us feel His love. First, He calls us to that love. And then--to His great adventure.
I rediscovered this song again today, thanks to a Providential encounter with an All Things Considered interview with Karen Gibson, who directs The Kingdom Choir. It's one of the songs on their album, and Karen said that song always made her think about God's love for her. So I listened to it again--The Kingdom Choir's version (which is seriously amazing, by the way), and then the version I listened to almost 10 years ago.
Both sunk deep into my chest, but the second brought the tears again. I was back on those reflective, back-road drives, except with the perspective of seeing all that God's love has opened up for me since then. His love hasn't taken me down an easy road--but it has been a beautiful, world-opening one.
I think God knew I need this song again. I feel like I'm on the edge of another great chapter in the story He's telling in my life, and although I can't see ahead, and at times I'm scared and desperately clinging to the clear, the comfortable, and the conquered, I somehow sense Him calling me deeper once again. Deeper into His love, and deeper into the unknown, beautiful adventure that is sure to follow.
Thank you again, Jesus. I love You, too.
In the middle of all the changes and losses and recalibrating came this song, like an arrow to my heart. I listened to it over and over, and it often brought tears. There was something about it that made it easy to picture God singing it to me. I somehow knew it was Him, and I knew it was true--He loved me like that. And even though I didn't understand the sudden turns my life was taking, I was submerged in His love, and I knew it would all be ok.
I guess that's the way it works with His calling. He calls us to Himself first--to be loved, truly loved. Not just as a number in the 144,000, but as His unique, image-bearing child, with a love so deep and incomprehensible for each of us that He would choose the worst suffering rather than lose us. Just to make us feel His love. First, He calls us to that love. And then--to His great adventure.
I rediscovered this song again today, thanks to a Providential encounter with an All Things Considered interview with Karen Gibson, who directs The Kingdom Choir. It's one of the songs on their album, and Karen said that song always made her think about God's love for her. So I listened to it again--The Kingdom Choir's version (which is seriously amazing, by the way), and then the version I listened to almost 10 years ago.
Both sunk deep into my chest, but the second brought the tears again. I was back on those reflective, back-road drives, except with the perspective of seeing all that God's love has opened up for me since then. His love hasn't taken me down an easy road--but it has been a beautiful, world-opening one.
I think God knew I need this song again. I feel like I'm on the edge of another great chapter in the story He's telling in my life, and although I can't see ahead, and at times I'm scared and desperately clinging to the clear, the comfortable, and the conquered, I somehow sense Him calling me deeper once again. Deeper into His love, and deeper into the unknown, beautiful adventure that is sure to follow.
Thank you again, Jesus. I love You, too.
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