“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28, NIV)
“Does God care about me?”
Seems like an easy question. Of course he does, we respond, hardly thinking. He’s God.
And then the unexpected comes. The difficult lands heavily, with its rotors stirring up every little thing not tied down. The grueling makes threadbare the fabric of our character. The nasty sinks its teeth into our faith and rips off a bite.
Sure, those are word pictures now. But tomorrow they may be far too real for you. And you may find yourself in that worst of places, asking, “Does God care? Does he care about me? Does he care about my spouse? my child? my friend?”
Sadly, what you find in today’s tell-all arena of living is that while we dare to ask the question, we aren’t asking it of God himself. We are like those who take one golf lesson from a noted professional—then after trying his recommendations with only limited success, they go to a friend and wonder aloud, “Is this teacher doing what’s best for me?” The best course is for that golf student to return to the professional and ask straight up: “Are you sure this is what’s best for me? Am I missing something still that you want me to see?”
When life goes wrong, when we doubt the love of God, we don’t do our best to grumble to the bartender, post it on our social network, bark at our dog. When we want to know if God cares, we do our best to ask him!
One of his answers lies in today’s passage. Don’t miss one key word found there: you. Jesus could have spoken generally, with a disconnect to anyone in particular. He could have said, “All who are weary…” But look at that you: “Come to me, all you who are weary…” He knew that there were those in his audience who weren’t singing praises just then. He knew that there would be those down through the centuries whose hearts were crying out, “God, do you care?”
Maybe that’s you. Maybe you need to hear it: “God cares.” But you don’t need to hear from me; you need to hear it from God. Take your troubles to him. See if he gives you the rest he promises.
—
Jeff Hopper
January 24, 2013
Copyright 2013 Links Players International
The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.