TAKE FIVE | Mini-Retreat - A World Filled with Love
Dear Partner,
"He's got the whole world in His hands", but does it always seem filled with love? If you, like me, at times get discouraged by what we see in the news read on.
I encourage you to Take 5 | Mini Retreat. Take a few moments to rest your soul and grow in your intimacy with Jesus. May you experience the deep restoration God describes in Psalm 23:1 “…he restores my soul.”
Believing,
Sean McFeely
The Oasis Ministry Ventures Team
Blog by Alan Fadling
Psalm 119 has a potent way of describing our world. I wonder if it will resonate with you. I wonder if it sounds like the world you live in today.
The earth is filled with your love, Lord;
teach me your decrees.
-- Psalm 119:64 NIV
If you were asked, without having read those two lines, “What is our world full of today?,” how would you answer? Conflict? Selfishness? Hatred? While certainly there is plenty of each in our world today, the psalm writer sees the world around him filled even fuller with the love of God.
One morning during a season of great challenge and hardship, I offered this prayer after reading those two lines from Psalm 119:
“I live in a world full of your love, Father. I am surrounded by your boundless care. There is no place I can look where I would fail to find your care present. Even when I look around me and see so much that does not resemble love, enable me to recognize your love wherever I am and wherever I look today. Help me see Jesus today. In seeing him, may I see in him all that I need. May I then reflect his life and love in everything I do and with everyone I meet.”And when I come to see the truth of God’s ever-present, surrounding love, I’ll want to learn from him how I can best live. I’ll want to be taught God’s ways. I’ll want to be guided by God’s counsel. The degree to which we welcome God’s guidance is the degree to which we believe it is the best counsel possible for our lives.
In a world so full of God’s loving care, obeying divine direction is the most sensible thing I can possibly do. As I come to God, whatever lying offers may tempt me will be exposed as empty and destructive.
May our lives, like the earth, be filled with God’s love today.
For Reflection:
How do you react to these lines from Psalm 119?
How do they contrast with your thoughts, feelings, and experiences?
How might you invite God’s Spirit to grow your confidence in their truth?
