Sufferer, Meet Love

It's about time His Word be lifted higher in my life.

He'd been whispering it to me all this time:
in the inkling that maybe one morning quiet time just is not enough to nourish,
in the cravings to crack open the sweetest filling Word when I'd just sat down to study,
in the desire for a lullaby laying there a blink away from sleeping, the desire for that God-breathed melody,
in the mealtimes where I settle for a Pinterest escape on the cell phone, while my antsy soul is being pinned when it longs to escape into Him.

Finally, into His Word, and this is what a heart with a Savior-sized chasm drank in:

"The thought of my pain, my homelessness, is bitter poison.
I think of it constantly, and my spirit is depressed.
Yet hope returns when I remember this one thing:
The Lord's unfailing love and mercy still continue."
-Lamentations 3:19-22

Thoughts take us captive and we wonder. 
We wonder why this loving God would allow us to fall into the traps and schemes of the Enemy, the thoughts taken captive by the oppressor rather than the one who frees and loves and reigns forever. Wouldn't it just be easier to be guarded, shielded, taken away from these thoughts that still come, even after we are His for eternity?

The answer?
Did you not read? He asks breathing peace through the pages.
My unfailing love and mercy still continue.

Even in the struggle, the pain, the suffering that beats and bashes the heart into a disfigured question mark as to where our God has gone, 

His love does not fail.

Oh, quite the contrary.

"He is patient with you,
because He does not want anyone to be destroyed,
but wants all to turn away from their sins."
-2 Peter 3:9

He is patient. 

Patient though He cried out on a cross under the furious anguish and unimaginable pain that should have been ours,

Patient though He did all this and we still roll around like helpless swine in our own mess of sin, helpless and bathing in the vile as if there were not something better freely offered.

With outstretched arms He made purity, clean, and perfect possible for us,
and with those same outstretched arms the loving Father eagerly calls to us stumbling like toddlers, trying to walk in freedom, imagining that the full-fledged walking we strive for is an eternity away, even though Daddy calls to us: "My child, eternity is here!"

What patience!

What patience, and what love! Because, "He may bring us sorrow, but His love for us is sure and strong." -Lamentations 3:32

That's right.
His love is strong in the suffering.
 In the sorrow.
 It's the treasure that gleams so bright because in the failure of the struggle, unfailing love always wins.

Every time.

Without fail.

 The love that was on the cross and overcame the sorrow in death and the pain in sin.

Because He is love and He is glorious and He is worthy and He is the biggest and that's all His love is!

"Because He was humble and devoted, God heard Him. But even though He was God's Son, He learned through suffering to be obedient." -Hebrews 5:7-8

Let us learn from a Savior faced with the greatest suffering yet was humble and devoted and reaped obedience, to believe with suffering smiles that God's unfailing love does not fail to help us now, to teach us now, nor will it ever.

No, not even close.

Because in the suffering the love shows it's unfailing-- it is expanded, brought to life, set aflame, proven invincible, defined in a masterpiece from my mess, never faltering, never failing.
Even in the struggle to walk in the freedom we're called to.
Even when we question.
Even when we think it's too much.

Love, He never fails.