The Hound of Heaven

In the recent post, A Much Safer Subject, I quoted C.S. Lewis who said that the love of God for us is a much safer subject to meditate on than our love for God. This is because our love for Him flounders and is weak, but His love for us is strong and unrelenting and unending.

The Scriptures are full of different ways of encouraging God's people to depend and trust in His unfailing love for us. Ultimately this is the only place of peace and rest for the human soul. When all looks hopeless and impossible in the natural, we find rest in knowing that God is love and that He will not relent nor quit in His pursuit of us and in His pursuit of all humans.

He is an all-consuming Fire of desire for weak humans, and He is filled with divine energy to tirelessly seek and chase us down! In this desire of God is where I find my confidence in prayer for myself and for others - not in my zeal nor my intercession nor my efforts nor my love, but in His unrelenting zeal, His unceasing intercession, His divinely initiated works, and His selfless love.

The cross of Jesus is the highest expression of this reality in God, and this is the solid ground on which I plant my feet when my zeal falters and I'm surrounded with impossible situations. If my focus and trust is in the strength of my love for God, I will be discouraged; if I meditate and trust in the strength and endurance of His love for me and for those I pray for, my heart will be strengthened to believe and to remain steady even while trembling.