“By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us.” [1 JOHN 3:16 NKJV]
My own glimpse of Jesus moved from obscurity to increasing clarity on a winter’s night in the Zaragoza desert in Spain. The world was asleep, but my heart was awake to God. During prayer I heard Jesus say, “For love of you I left my Father’s side. I came to you who ran from me, who fled me, who did not want to hear my name. For love of you I was covered with spit, punched and beaten, and fixed to the wood of the cross.”
Although it was many years ago, this morning in an hour of quiet time, I realized that those words still burned on my life. Whether I am in a state of grace or disgrace, the words impose themselves with the stark realism of objective truth. That night in the cave I stared at a crucifix for hours, figuratively seeing the blood streaming from every wound and pore in Christ’s body. The longer I looked, the more I realized that no man has ever loved me and no woman could ever love me as he does. I cried out in the darkness, “Jesus, are you crazy—are you out of your mind to have loved me so much?” I learned that night what a wise old Franciscan told me: “Once you come to know the love of Jesus Christ, nothing else in the world will seem beautiful or desirable.”
Is any love more attractive than Jesus’?
Lord, thank you for letting love move you to save me. Amen. [Faith That Matters]
