And Beyond

 I'm feeling led to share something I wrote a dozen years ago. I think it will speak to you. I know it still speaks to me.

I wrote a few weeks ago about my mother's approaching end of life. Earlier this week, just a little over an hour past midnight on Tuesday morning, the Lord took her home. My mother came to Christ late in her life, and though she loved Him, she always struggled to receive and live in the fullness of His life, healing, and love. As a result, she grappled with fear, depression, and feelings of abandonment, particularly over the course of this last year as her health steadily declined. She even wondered if perhaps it was all due to her having angered the Father, or that it was all the result of her past sins. She believed she was His, but she could never enter into His peace and joy, and the glory of His life. Then, in her final days, His love broke through. 

On this past Sunday morning, with her kidney's beginning to fail completely, my sister and brother-in-law came to her home to help the full-time aide we'd retained get her into her bed. As my brother-in-law helped place her on her bed, she said to him, with a joy that came from eternity, "Can you feel all His love?" She then slipped into a semi-conscious state and those were the last words she spoke. Her Father's love had laid hold of her. The reality of Romans 8 burst forth. Not even death as it approached may separate us from the love which is in Christ our Lord. My mother had always believed He loved her but had never been able to really experience His love. Now, in her final hours, she did. Death has no sting, and for those who are His, it never will.

As I meditated on this, the Spirit brought Jesus' words in John 13:1 to mind. He was preparing to leave this life and return to His Father. "Jesus, knowing that His hour had come, and that He should depart out of this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end." To the end...and beyond the end. In that living room where she lay, she saw the One who had loved her from the womb and through all the hurts, wounds, failures, and regrets. The One who loved her through all her struggles, doubts, and lies of the enemy. The One that all the power of darkness and death could not keep from her. The One who cannot be kept from you and me. His love broke through it all. It will always break through it all. He loved her to the very end of her life here, and as she stepped from the confines of her failing earthly body into the wonder of eternity, He loved her through the open door to the fullness of that eternity. To the end and beyond....forever.

To some degree, I think we all share my mother's struggles. Whether from a sense of unworthiness, or an inability to believe we're forgiven, loved, treasured, we stumble through life hoping to somehow endure until the end, and then we can enter into that love. Jesus calls us to enter in right now. To the fullest extent possible.....right....now.  What my mother experienced in her last hours can be experienced by His people in these hours. No matter how strong the barrier, His love can shatter it. Has it shattered all the barriers between you and His love? As the old hymn says, His is a love that will not let you go. His love will hold you to the very end....and beyond.

Blessings,
Pastor O