Agape Love

Recently, I was searching for some of my Christian books that had been packed away in boxes. In the process, I found some of my old prayer journals. I began journaling in September of 2004, so in my hands I had 14 years of prayers and letters to God. When I began the practice of journaling, I was in a very painful time in my life. I was still healing from a divorce and passed experiences that I had never dealt with. Needless to say, there were some painful memories tucked away in these notebooks. It took me several days to muster up the courage to begin to read them and look back on where I was at that time. There were journals in there regarding all aspects of my life; the good, the bad and the ugly! There were some of gratitude, praise and thanksgiving for God’s goodness. Others, I was pressing into God and crying out to Him for help because life’s challenges were weighing heavy on me. One common factor I found in many of my writings is that I wanted to be loved. Through much soul searching and reflecting, I’ve decided it was time to pull down some walls and lift the curtain on some very secretive aspects of my life that have only been shared with those closest to me and my counselor. I have chosen to reveal these secrets because it will give you a deeper understanding of the goodness of God and what He has done in my life.

         

I grew up in a single parent home with a wonderful mother who loved me more than she could express in words but always revealed through her actions. I knew who my father was and did have somewhat of a relationship with him as a small child, but when he married, I did not see him or hear from him again until I was 20 years old. The REJECTION I felt on multiple occasions when attempting to maintain a relationship with him throughout my childhood became unbearable, so I gave up.  At the very tender age of six or seven years old, I was sexually abused. I know for myself, I cannot speak for every survivor, a little bit of my spirit died. I felt SHAME and dirty. I felt UNWORTHY and never felt good enough or pretty enough. I always felt like something was WRONG with me. This had a huge impact on my adult life because every relationship was affected by it from the relationship with my husband at the time, to my children and any person I encountered. I never let people in completely, and I did not TRUST easily. Despite the walls I had built around myself, I LONGED for one thing the most, to be LOVED. I yearned for love so deeply. I thought the only way a person could be truly loved was by the love of a man. My thoughts about what love really was were so distorted and completely wrong. I would pray to God in my letters to Him to send me a man who would love me. I would ask Him to send me someone because I did not want to be ALONE. To be quite honest I was a hot mess emotionally!

After reading several of my entries and thinking to myself “this is a girl who just wanted to be loved,” God whispered to me, “I have loved you the way you’ve longed to be loved since the beginning of time.” My heart was so full and I was reminded of my completeness in Christ Jesus. I was also reminded of just how much HE LOVED me in John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only son, that WHOEVER believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.” God loved me so much He sacrificed His son so that I would have eternal life! He also told me in Jeremiah 31:3 “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving kindness.” An everlasting love, He says! He promised me in Isaiah 54:10 “Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be removed yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be removed.” God found me bound by satan’s lies that I was unworthy to be loved and in a desert land He found me, in a barren and howling waste. He shielded me and cared for me, He guarded me as the apple of his eye (Deuteronomy 32:10). I am so thankful for answered prayer! God heard my cries and longing to be loved and answered them by revealing to me that HIS LOVE is the ultimate love! Oh my goodness, how could I have been so blind all these years? Though it took me years to see it and understand it, God’s love is the ONLY love I need. I no longer have to search for love in empty places or settle for the remnants of what this world has to offer me. I have the AGAPE love of God! My brethren, my hope in writing this message to you is that you too will be filled with HIS agape love. That He will reveal Himself to you and give you an awareness of how completely and immeasurably He loves YOU!

~A Loved Diva~

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