(By Pastor Derrick D’souza)
As a child I always used to love hearing my Mom tell me how much she loved me (I was the youngest sibling among five). I used to ask her the same question over and over again until I was confident she was not just saying it to make me happy. My simple question was Mom do you love me? And I normally asked it just after I messed up!
My Mom’s constant response was, “Son, I love you but I do not love the things you do!”
Almost always that response left me dejected and guilt ridden as I hated myself for not living up to the standard of my loving parents. I really do love my parents and oh how I wished I could have obeyed them fully. My sense of anger towards self was more because I did not want my parents to misunderstand my actions and use it as measurement of my love for them. This was primarily because the rest of my siblings were sober and nearly always made Mom and Dad proud. Hence just to make sure, I kept asking the question to see if there was a change in my Mom and Dad’s attitude towards me when I did wrong.
When I became a born again Christian, I began to feel the exact same emotions when I did wrong. The only difference here was that the negative feelings were compounded exponentially considering it was not Mom and Dad I was letting down, but God himself!!
I sought the Holy Spirit on this and He opened my eyes to some of the most beautiful verses in the Bible that has forever put to rest, every feeling of unrest and assured me that God’s love for me is not only more but much much more that I could ever imagine.
I call these “The How Much More Love Verses” . When God says ‘How much more’ you have got to use your imagination to understand what He is trying to say…. Please Meditate very closely on the below scriptures and you will be set free of every feeling of condemnation, guilt and sorrow in your walk with Jesus. I pray you will understand the full extent, God the Father, God the Son and the God the Holy Spirit went through to make sure you never feel unloved, lonely or condemned for a single second of your existence.
