“Yet Jerusalem says, “The Lord has deserted us; the Lord has forgotten us.”
Never! Can a mother forget her nursing child? Can she feel no love for the child she has borne? But even if that were possible,
I would not forget you! 16 See, I have written your name on the palms of my hands. Always in my mind is a picture of Jerusalem’s walls in ruins.”
Isaiah 49:14-16, NLT
Some of us need to be persuaded of God’s love. We are unconvinced. But Isaiah understands. We grasp the theology, but not the meaning. Our own native ideas keep us in disbelief. Perhaps the greatest liability we have as believers is this doubt that God really feels this way about us. But, He does.
Isaiah claims the impossible, yet grounds himself in what is real. The Father loves us and we’re His very own. Even if we don’t seem as holy as we ought to be. In His out reached hands, we discover scars. This is the price He has purchased us with. We once were blind, and very lost— but now we are His own children and can see.
God may love me. But does He like me?
We are given the impression that He more than ‘loves’ us; He ‘likes’ us. That dear ones, is not a point I’m prepared to support it with scripture, but that isn’t the truth, it doesn’t exist except in my own thinking. I know that He theologically loves me. But to be really honest I sometimes think that God is irritable with me, and He just gets tired of having me around.
But I also must believe God also likes me as well. Surely, there is such a fine line here, between ‘like’ and love. The more I walk with the Lord, and it’s been over 50 years now, the more I love/like Him. I have learned to like Him as much as I love Him. And if God doesn’t like me, I think it actually diminishes His love.
Isaiah speaks for the Lord using tender metaphors. Among the people some had the mindset that God had somehow forgotten them. They thought that they were ‘the lost ones.’
God then uses the analogy of a mother. A nurturing mother. This metaphor is strong and sure. No, God hasn’t forgotten His people. Look at His hands, your name is ‘tattooed’ on them. You’re His, forever. (I hope you like that truth.)
“In math, if you divide an infinite number by any number, no matter how large, you still have an infinite quotient. So Jesus’ love, being infinite, even though it is divided up for every person on earth, is still infinitely poured out on each one of us!”
Charles Spurgeon
Broken Believers 