If I had one wish for my family it would be this:  That they would understand completely and fully how deeply God loves them, how powerfully Jesus loves them.  As children we sang the Sunday school song "Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so."

    But do we know?  Do we really have any idea how very very much we are loved by our Savior, our God?

   I'm not so sure we really do.  I think we can spend too much time at an invisible mirror.  We know ourselves well.  We see ourselves pretty clearly.  We know well all our battles, our past bad choices.  We know the words that have stormed out of our mouth at unguarded times.  We know the thoughts that slither and flit thru our minds that aren't always kind.

   This is where the struggle to really embrace God's love for us will come from.  Our own selves.  Looking in instead of up.  He knows the battles we face, our frustrations, our anger, our humanity.  And still He chooses to love us.

   Looking around instead of up can also hinder us from knowing Jesus loves us.  Sometimes people grow up in homes that are scarce in the love department and it is easy to fall into the trap of assuming that God loves in the same manner as mankind.  This is especially true when is comes to love from our earthly fathers.

   So many children are growing up in homes with no father, some with emotionally absent fathers, some even with abusive fathers.

   Our heavenly Father loves us like no one else ever could.  There is no comparison.  Don't look in at your failures, and don't look around at the failures of others. Look up. Jesus never fails.

   Everything about our Lord, every action, every word spoken, and everything within Him says, "I LOVE YOU!"  His love is a gift that we can accept or reject.

   He didn't just say it.  He proved it when He allowed Himself to be crucified on a cruel cross taking with Him the sins of all.  Our sins are paid for through this act of love. Our part is simply to accept it. Accept the love of our Savior.  We do that by believing that He died for us, repenting of our sin, and inviting Him into our life to be our Lord.

   Jesus loves me this I know....and no one can take that away.