Forever His

3-6 “How blessed is God! And what a blessing he is! He’s the Father of our Master, Jesus Christ, and takes us to the high places of blessing in him. Long before he laid down earth’s foundations, he had us in mind, had settled on us as the focus of his love, to be made whole and holy by his love. Long, long ago he decided to adopt us into his family through Jesus Christ. (What pleasure he took in planning this!) He wanted us to enter into the celebration of his lavish gift-giving by the hand of his beloved Son.” Ephesians 1:3-6

I grew up without my biological dad around, although God blessed me with a wonderful, loving and god-fearing step dad, there was always something missing in my heart, a void for belonging to a Father. Sounds crazy right? I started attending church when I was 10 years old, I knew everything about God, heard possibly every sermon in the book, and prayed daily (for my food and before bed without fail, I’m so holy, I know haha), and yet still found myself not belonging. My teenage years were rocky and lukewarm, I loved God yet didn’t know just how to have a genuine relationship with him, I always thought I had to be a certain way, or behave a certain way to have a real relationship with God. I thought every time I sinned I checked off another box on “God’s reasons to punish me” book, I imagined God annoyed by me, thinking when I’d change or stop sinning. Of course, it was all a lie. As my twenty’s were approaching I found myself still having this type of relationship with God, I knew him, yet had no real clue of who he was, so I continued life with these excuses keeping me from relationship with The Father.

I thought everything in my life would come together when I had a relationship with my biological dad, but I was wrong. As wonderful as it was to have my dad around after 15 years without contact, the void inside my heart was still empty, I was still looking for identity in all of the wrong and temporary places. A wonderful friend of mine gave me a book called “A Purpose Driven Life” by Rick Warren as a graduation gift when I graduated High school, if you haven’t read this book, I totally recommend it, it is fantastic. The book starts off with this scripture:

“Everything got started in him and finds its purpose in him.”
Colossians 1:16

And continues with this,

“You didn’t create yourself, so there is no way you can tell yourself what you were created for! If I handed you an invention you had never seen before, you wouldn’t know its purpose, and the invention itself wouldn’t be able to tell you either. Only the creator or the owner’s manual could reveal its purpose.”

Colossians 1:16 was everything I ever needed to know. Life will never make sense until you look to the one who created your life, God. I can tell you, I’ve looked in temporary things from relationships to material possessions, and it all at one point was great, but faded. Until I made the decision to make God my solid rock, it took a while for me to realize, but I am thankful for God’s sovereign hand that kept me, even in my unfaithfulness. For years I behaved like an orphan, when I was adopted. I walked around knowing I had a Father but not actually belonging to him, obeying him, or letting him love me and that is why I was empty. I don’t have anything special or great going for me for God to love me, but yet despite that, he loves me without boundaries or conditions. I still constantly struggle understanding why a God so perfect, could love me, such an imperfect person, but He does, without reason or question, without expectation or excuse. And because he loves me, he calls me to a Holy life, he calls me to obedience, and he calls me to righteousness. He desires to see me grow in His love, he desires for me to live a holy life unto him. And because he is a loving father he also disciplines me when needed, He redirects me when I am falling into my own way. He asks me to obey Him because his plans are to protect and not harm me. He is the author of our lives and desires to see us be successful in everything that we put our hands to do and he also desires for us to find fulfillment in life. Our identity comes from God, not from this world. We belong to Him and without him life will never be complete. He had our lives in mind before we even took one breath of life. Whatever it is that you’re not finding peace in, whether it is a relationship, friendships, a job, finances, etc. know this: The God who planned your life, knew this very moment you’re facing, He’s with you through every season. You belong to Him, he created you with purpose and more than anything, he loves you! But we must choose Him, God is a gentleman, he patiently waits until we choose Him, he waits to have our hearts. And whatever void is in your life, He will fill to overflow.