God is...Love
As her soft motherly voice coaxed me closer, all I could focus on was the pair of glistening tweezers in her right hand. The exposed light bulb in our ceiling turned my innocent little bathroom into some type of horror film operating room. I was the unwilling patient, and she was the crazed doctor, convinced she was doing the right thing. The frenzy with which I fought to escape her was only matched by the force with which she secured me in her motherly grasp, right on the back of my arm, that fatty part, the part that all mothers seem to know how to locate in a split second. “It’s what has to be done,” she assured me. I worked to reconcile what she was saying and doing with the picture of what I thought motherly love should look like. “This is for your good,” she said. “If we don’t take care of this now, it could lead to something terribly worse.” I was certain that wasn’t true. With my eight years of experience on the earth, I was sure that leaving that splinter in my festering puss filled finger would be just fine.
I can’t help but think of how many times this same scenario plays out in our lives as it relates to our relationship with God. Many times we live this life thinking we have a clear understanding of what we need to do in terms of our relationships, attitudes, and overall view of the world around us. The reality, however, is that we only see a portion of the whole picture, and because of this, many times we make life changing decisions with limited information.
The apostle Paul addresses this very issue when he tells us “[w]e don't yet see things clearly. We're squinting in a fog, peering through a mist” (1 Cor. 13:12 Message). What Paul is telling us here is that there is a vast amount of information pertaining to our lives and the world around us that we cannot see with our natural eyes. Proverbs 3:5 makes this clear, stating that we are to “[t]rust in the LORD with all [our] heart, and lean not on [our] own understanding.” Our "understanding" is based only on what we can see, and remember, as Paul tells us, “we don’t…see things clearly.”
One might wonder what in the world this has to do with the love of God. The fact is that this has everything to do with the love of God. The writer of Hebrews gives us some great insight into this when he states,
“My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord, nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by Him; for whom the Lord loves He chastens, and scourges every son whom He receives.”
If you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom a father does not chasten? But if you are without chastening, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate and not sons. Furthermore, we have had human fathers who corrected us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much more readily be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live? For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed best to them, but He for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness. Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it (Hebrews 12:3-11 NKJV).
As I stood in that bathroom as an eight-year-old boy, tweezers shining, my mother gripping my arm, and my world about to be turned upside down, it was my understanding of my mother's love for me that eventually led me to submit to her desires and TRUST what she was doing was for my benefit. Her love for me, which she showed day in and day out, allowed me to trust her even though I couldn’t "see" what she could see. Even though what she was about to do seemed crazy, and all the information I had on the situation had bad idea written all over it, it was my knowledge of her love for me that assured me that the removal of that splinter was the right thing to do. If she said it needed to be done, it must be for my benefit.
In Matthew 7:11 Jesus makes the statement that, “If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!” Just like my mother cornering me in that bathroom, God wants to remove the things that are causing pain in your life. There is no doubt that we all have splinters in our lives, and many of us have let them fester for years fearing the pain that is associated with addressing them; however, one thing is for sure, unless we trust the love of God and let Him work in our lives, we will live in pain for the rest of our lives. The One who gave His only Son has not come to harm us but to heal us, and a moment of discomfort in the arms of a loving God is far better than a lifetime of pain and suffering alone.
