Enduring

This week has been a very slow one. 
Is it over yet?

Not much doing, because I have been laying low. 
Not exactly my style, but I have been enduring.

Tonight I should be at my friend's home meeting her precious new grandson, whose mommy was in my Sunday school class, but here I sit with my box of tissues.

If I had been well and had been off to her house I would have missed my son's call. 
He needed to talk.
It was a good talk.
Papa knew.

What a comfort to have such a wise God as my Papa!
So loving!

This morning during my quiet time with the LORD the emphasis was on His enduring love.

To endure is to bear, suffer or persist.

His love bears the weight of the world.
His love suffered the weight of our sin.
And His love outweighs everything else for all time.

The First verse of the Fifty-Second Psalm reads,

"The loving kindness of God endures all day long."

I went to my concordance to see what the original text says.  The words all day long really mean always.
His love endures always!

Endures what?
Whatever is thrown at it!

This is the message I will share with my friends at the rehab tomorrow, if I am well enough to go.
Please, Papa?

I would like to tell them of His exquisite love.

The Message puts Psalm Thirty-six, verses Seven and Eight this way;

"How exquisite is Your love, O God! How eager we are to run under your wings."

When we encounter the love of God, we encounter a thing of beauty; something that lasts.
How easy it is to run to the One that we are convinced loves us unconditionally.

There's the rub.
We need to be certain of this love.

If the Cross isn't enough evidence of that love then nothing else will be.

While we wrestle with this He waits patiently, His love persists.

First John Four, Nineteen doesn't read,

He loves us because we first loved Him.

No it reads,

"We love Him because He first loved us."

He waits with open arms in total, pure love.

Our loving God tells us in Jeremiah.

"I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have drawn you with loving kindness." 

His very essence is love.  Earlier in that fourth chapter of First John it says,

"...God is love."

In exploring what love is we cannot forget the Thirteenth chapter of First Corinthians.

These words  and they fit my God too:

Patient
Kind
Bears all things
Endures all things
Never fails.

I hope I have drawn a small, but clear picture of the LORD God.
For thirty three years I have been getting to know my God and He is definitely love!
His enduring love has inspired me to endure too.
I hope my rehab friends can get the picture.  They need endurance.

In His loving arms we can all endure!