The Beloved
The goal in Loving Freely is to be so embraced by the unconditional love of God as the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit that we are able to develop an Island of Peace within our souls and be able to love others freely, because we are freely loved by God. What this means is unpacked below.
Jesus begins his earthly ministry in Mark 1 by hearing the Heavenly Father declare over these amazing words;
“This is my beloved child, whom I love, with you I am well pleased.”
Think about this statement for a moment. Before Jesus entered into any form of service to anyone, he is declared the beloved child, whom is loved, and the Father is well pleased with! It was this deep inner peace that Jesus held throughout his ministry, knowing that he was unconditionally loved by the Father. There was a place or reality that Jesus lived in all through his life here on earth.
This place is what the pastor and mentor to Martin Luther King Jr., Howard Thurman describes as an “Island of Peace” within our soul. In his book, Meditations of the Heart, Thurman says; “A beautiful and significant phrase, “Island of Peace within one’s own soul.” The individual lives his life in the midst of a wide variety of stresses and strains. Each one has to deal with the evil aspects of life, with injustices inflicted upon him and injustices which he wittinly or unwittingly inflicts upon others. We are all of us deeply involved in the throes of our own weaknesses and strengths, expressed often in the profoundest conflicts within our own souls. The only hope for surcease, the only possibility of stability for the person, is to establish and Island of Peace within one’s own soul. Well within the island is the Temple where God dwells—not the God of the creed, the church, the family, but the God of one’s heart.”
An Island of Peace. What a beautiful description of the inner peace that only Christ can offer to us who have repented our sins and have been given the Holy Spirit. In the gospel of Mark, Christ knew this Island of Peace in his soul, and thus was able to love others freely because of it. He knew that He was sent on a mission from God and that God’s voice in his life was all that mattered. Dr. Todd Hunter in Deep Peace says it like this, “Peace within is the overflow of being so loved by God that contentment is the natural state of our souls. From that place of provision, we are then free to love, forgive, and serve our neighbor.”
This is why we love others because we’re the beloved child of God, not to become the beloved child of God. This awareness changes everything! We can only love others freely when we freely receive the fact that we are God’s beloved child, whom He delights in!
The words in I John 4 captures this beautifully in v. 11, “Dear friends, since God so loves us, we also ought to love one another.” And in v. 19, “We love because he first loved us.” We love others as the beloved of God, because we have received the fact that we are God’s beloved. We cannot give away what we have not received ourselves.
The reality is that because of the fall, we all have voices rattling around in the back of our heads saying things like, “You’re a failure.” “You’re worthless.” “You’re in trouble.” “You’re no good.” These are the voices of my false self, and yours may be similar.
But these are not the voices of God! If we are in Christ, he no longer sees as enemies, but as the beloved. A friend said to me once; “If you hear a voice over your shoulder talking about your biggest failure and it isn’t calling you ‘beloved,’ it isn’t Jesus talking.”
A big problem in the church in this country is that we’ve been embracing the wrong belovedness. We’ve been trying to embrace the belovedness of the world through the love of culture, rather than of what the Heavenly Father says and speaks over us. Abba Father speaks the same words over us that He spoke over his son as the Spirit descended upon him in Mark 1 saying, “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”
The false sense of belovedness that the world sells us will leave you constantly empty, never fully satisfying you, and giving you an allusion that you are in control. But the belovedness of the Father is everlasting, never empty, fully satisfying, and releases our need for control. The Heavenly Father looks at His beloved children with delight in his eyes and that is enough.
This is why I love Rembrandt’s panting of the return of the prodigal son from Luke 15. In the picture we can see the gentle hands of the Father resting on the shoulders of the weary and beleaguered son.
There are many things from this text and picture we can meditate on, but two are what I want to highlight here. If you look closely at the hands resting on the younger son’s shoulders, the hand on the left is more feminine and the one on the right is more masculine. It is my belief that God Father rests his hand on our shoulder, and also that through the work of the Holy Spirit, God acts like a mother comforting us when we return home and receive our belatedness.
Henri Nouwen in his book, “The Return of the Prodigal Son” says it like this about being the beloved child; “It is the place within me where God has chosen to dwell. It is the place where I am held safe in the embrace of an all-loving Father who calls me by name and says, “You are my beloved son, on you my favor rests.” It is the place where I can taste the joy and the peace that are not of this world.”
Robert Mulholland says it like this in The Deeper Journey, “The source of a loving union with God lies in God’s unfathomable love for us. Think of it—Jesus says that God love you in the exactly the same way that God loves him! To respond to such love with the love of your total being draw you into that loving union with God for which Jesus prays.”
We can only love freely when we freely receive the love God as his beloved!
This is the deep awareness that Jesus lived with, that he was a part of the triune God and was deeply loved by the Father and filled with the Spirit. And God invites us into that same triune relationship of love.
The Triune God exists three in one, as God the Father, God the Christ, and God the Holy Spirit.
It’s within the Triune God that we get all of our emotional needs met, thus allowing us to love others freely. Our triggers are rooted in the false self’s desire for affirmation and approval, the need to control others, our longing for safety and security, and our need to be separate (be our own god).
When we have all of our emotional needs met by the Triune God, this is what it looks like;
God the Father alone fills our need for affirmation and approval.
God in Christ alone frees us from the need to control others and circumstances.
God the Holy Spirit alone fills our longing for safety and security.
It’s because we get all of our emotional needs met in the triune God that when we love others, God alone gets the glory, not us.
Pastor Paul Tripp says it like this; “Here’s what happens to us all – we seek horizontally for the personal rest that we are to find vertically, and it never works. Looking to others for your inner sense of well-being is pointless. First, you will never be good enough, consistently enough, to get the regular praise of others that you are seeking. You’re going to mess up. You’re bound to disappoint. You will have a bad day. You’ll lose your way. At some point, you’ll say or do things that you shouldn’t. Add to this the fact that the people around you aren’t typically interested in taking on the burden of being your personal messiah. They don’t want to live with the responsibility of having your identity in their hands. Looking to people for your inner self-worth never works.”
I have found that all of these core needs are all met when I live deeply in the awareness and presence of God. As Lisa Fields states,“The safe space you are looking for is in the presence of God.”
I regularly hear the voice of Abba Father saying, “Why are you looking externally for everything I’ve put in you internally?” It’s in those places where the Spirit leads me back to what Paul does in Ephesians 1 and the thirteen descriptions reminding me of who I am in Christ;
Blessed in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.
Chosen in him before the creation of the world.
To be made holy and blameless in his sight.
Predestined in love for adoption to son-ship through Jesus Christ.
Freely given us his glorious grace through Christ Jesus.
Redeemed through his blood.
Forgiven of our sins.
Been lavished with God’s grace.
Has made known to us the mystery of his will through Christ.
Also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything.
Included in Christ.
Marked with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit,
Guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s procession.
Because of all of these things that Christ says we are, the Triune God meets all of our core needs for affirmation and approval, control, safety and security, and our need to be our own god.
No one can affirm you like the Heavenly Father does!
We realize that we control nothing in life and thus give it over to Christ and allow him to change people and circumstances.
The Holy Spirit alone makes us feel safe and secure through His indwelling presence.
And we then give all honor and glory to God for what He does to restore and renew all things.
The beautiful aspect of this triune God is that whatever emotional needs I have at any given moment, the triune God is there, ready and waiting to meet them. Whatever my heart longs for, the triune God fills!
And this is why learning to be obedient to the Holy Spirit’s work in our lives is so important. The same power that God resurrected Jesus from the grave is living in us resurrecting us from the grave of our false selves that are longing for all of these triggers of approval/affirmation, to be in control, safety/security and to be our own god. Paul says it like this in Romans 8; “And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who lives in you.”
We can’t know the Heavenly Father’s affirmation and approval and experience his pure delight over us without the Holy Spirit opening the eyes of our hearts. This was the relationship that Jesus modeled in the gospel of John as the Holy Spirit constantly brought him into fellowship with the Father. Jesus was not looking for the affirmation and approval from the world, because he knew who he was as God’s son and what was in people. The Heavenly Father’s approval is all he needed. John says it like this in his gospel in 2:24-25; But Jesus would not entrust himself to them, for he knew all people. He did not need human testimony about them, for he knew what was in them.” Looking for the affirmation and approval of others will constantly leave us empty, for I know what is in me as one!
We can understand that we control nothing as Jesus is King unless the Holy Spirit illuminates this. We can't experience the safety and security from the Holy Spirit until we experience his abiding presence in us and around us. And we will never understand that we are not the center of the universe until the Holy Spirit shows and reminds us that we not at the center, Jesus is.
I pray regularly a modification of what the Desert Father’s call, “Breath Prayers”;
“Holy Spirit, may I know the Father’s affirmation and approval over me and experience the delight in his eyes over me.”
“Holy Spirit, remind me that I control nothing and that Christ is my brother and is present with me in all things.”
“Holy Spirit, may I know that I am safe with you and that you will not leave me as an orphan.”
“Holy Spirit, remind me that my life is not about me, but about the Father’s glory and honor.”
All of the deep longings for approval and affirmation, to be in control, to feel safe and secure and to be our own god is all met by the triune God and this is why we love others freely, because we need nothing from anyone! It’s when we allow Christ to love us freely, that we can then love others freely. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. says it like this in Strength to Love; “Only through an inner spiritual transformation do we gain the strength to fight vigorously the evils of the world in a humble and loving spirit.”
It’s when Christ reconciles our divided lives, that we can then and only then move outwards towards the world to love others freely.
If God is enough, then God is enough!