Genesis 23-24:1-51; Matthew 8:1-17; Psalms 9:13-20; Proverbs 3:1-6

“Let love and faithfulness never leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart. (Proverbs 3:3 NIV)

Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.” (Proverbs 3:5-6 NIV)

As the Millennials would say, an oldie, but a goodie. I’ve been repeating Proverbs 3:5-6 since I was a little girl and believe I would be hard pressed to find a long-time Christian who didn’t know these verses by heart, or even any Christian who has not been exposed to them through a sermon, bible study, or just in casual reading through the Bible. It’s a promise; it’s an instruction, and it’s a study of what we are called to do. The Lord is highlighting a few key words in Proverbs 3 to me tonight:

Love; faithfulness; bind them; write them; trust; understanding; submit.

Love: the greatest commandment

Faithfulness: fruit of the spirit, reliable, steadfast, unwavering

Bind them: unite

Write them: commit them to memory, put them out for others to see

Trust: confidence in, reliance on

Understanding: deep knowledge

Submit: turn over control

When we unite the fruit of the spirit and the greatest commandment, we are met with unwavering (Perfect) love. We put this perfect love into action, and are rewarded with confidence in and reliance on our Heavenly Father. The deeper our reliance grows, the more we turn over control, recognizing that it is only through our Heavenly Father that we have access to the true knowledge that sustains us.

I take this to mean that the first thing we are called to do is to love others and love God as unwaveringly as we can (understanding that we are human, and we will fail). When we tap into the steadfast love that the Lord has–for his people, his creation–we find ourselves loving not only ourselves and those around us in new ways, but we understand the love God has for us, and learn to love him in the way He first loved us.

As we learn to love like Him, our reliance on Him will naturally grow since we understand the deep wells of care and devotion he has for us. And when you truly understand how deeply you are loved, you cannot help but put your full confidence and trust in Jesus hands. He desperately loves you! Why would he not have the best plan in store for your life? That truth sustains us in the hard moments when we don’t understand, but allows us to constantly give control back up and move from uncertainty back into love.

If I want to learn to fully rely on the Lord and his sovereign plan for my life, then I first need to be taught how to love and how to accept His love. Once I have accepted this gift, it’s a natural progression to trust and understanding.

Tonight, ask the Lord what it would mean to accept His love, and show his love, both to yourself and others. Listen to what he has to say. I can imagine there are people who know they have a hard time loving themselves or others–and yet, the Lord calls us into perfect love for true understanding. Father God, thank you for loving us in this way.