He Loves Me; He Loves Me Not
Remember picking off dandelion petals on the playground? “He loves me. He loves me not. He loves me. He loves me not.” The last petal determined whether that sandy-haired boy who sat in front of you in Mrs. Owens’ 4th grade class loved you with an undying passion or didn’t know you existed. We knew it wasn’t an accurate measure of love. But secretly, you and I still pick petals when it comes to God’s love for us.
Remember picking off dandelion petals on the playground? “He loves me. He loves me not. He loves me. He loves me not.” The last petal determined whether that sandy-haired boy who sat in front of you in Mrs. Owens’ 4th grade class loved you with an undying passion or didn’t know you existed. We knew it wasn’t an accurate measure of love. But secretly, you and I still pick petals when it comes to God’s love for us.
Okay, maybe not petals anymore. We’ve graduated to adult indicators: Whether we get that blessing we wanted. Whether we have what our friends have around us. Whether our prayers get answered. Whether our ministry is successful. Whether our needs are met when and how we want. We have a whole bouquet for assessing how God truly feels about us. We pick up the “career” flower: A good job (He loves me); A bad review (He loves me not); An aced presentation (He loves me); Layoffs (He loves me not). We pick petals from our “marriage”, “children”, “ministry”, “dreams” flowers, always judging God’s love by the current petal on the bloom. And–thank God–it’s just as unreliable as it was in the 4th grade.
The trouble with our petal method is that we have the rules wrong. In God’s garden, there’s only one meaning any petal has for his children: “He loves me”. A good job (He loves me); A bad review (He loves me); An aced presentation (He loves me); Layoffs (He loves me).
While our insecurity whispers or nags or even yells differently, God loves us 100%, and 100% of the time. Even when we don’t get what we want. Even when He’s not bending to our will. Even when everyone else gets the blessings we were praying for. Good or bad, wanted or unwanted, the petal you’re currently on tells you one thing: He loves you, and always will.
Laura Singleton
Laura Singleton’s passion is the transformation that happens when women get access to God’s Word and God’s Word gets access to women. She was twenty-five when her life was turned upside down by an encounter with Jesus Christ. With an insatiable thirst for scripture and theology, she soon headed to Dallas Theological Seminary to learn more about Jesus, and left with a Th.M. with an emphasis in Media Arts. She, along with two friends from DTS, travel the nation filming the independent documentary Looking for God in America. She loves speaking and teaching and is the author of Insight for Living Ministry’s Meeting God in Familiar Places and hundreds of ads, which pay the bills. Her big strong hubby Paul is a former combat medic, which is handy since Laura’s almost died twice already. She loves photography, travel and her two pugs.
