And we know that in all things God works for the good of
those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
Be
assured that there is much about my life in this world that I would consider to
be anything but good. At the top of that
list is losing my first wife to one of my best friends at the time.
No, I do
not mean to besmirch her character. For
if I had of lived up to even a fairly small percentage of the potential I had exhibited
during our courtship, I have no doubt that we would have been celebrating our
35th wedding anniversary a couple of weeks ago.
If you
have read [The Crackerhead Chronicles], you know that I almost lost my mind
over losing her. In fact, some would
argue that I really did lose it, and I would be hard pressed to offer a
rebuttal.
On the
other hand, I now know that losing her was giving me firsthand experience with
what our Heavenly Father has been dealing with since the Garden of Eden. For the love that He has for us is more
passionate than what would be considered to be the most torrid of love affairs
in the eyes of this world, and it tears His guts out when one of us rejects His
advances.
Yes, it
is naturally inconceivable that the Creator of all that exists (apart from
Himself, of course) would subject Himself to such anguish. After all, if He truly is all-powerful and
all-knowing, couldn’t He have made us to where we had no choice but to love Him
with all of our hearts, minds and souls?
Be
assured that I would not have given Sam any choice but to love me forever if I
was the potter of her clay, but just how valuable would that love have really
been? Moreover, could it have been
honestly considered a love at all?
No, I don’t
think it could have been, but being the pathetic loser that I naturally am, I
wouldn’t have cared. Our Heavenly Father
does, however.
Hence, one
of the main reasons for our existence in this world as we naturally are. For in order for our Heavenly Father to
receive the very special kind of love He desires, He had to give us a choice of
whether or not we wanted to love Him back.
Yes,
there are other factors to consider. For
by keeping His glory hidden from our physical sight, our Heavenly Father made
it much harder for us to want to love Him, which makes the love that He
receives from those who are willing to give Him the full benefit of their
considerable doubts all the more satisfying.
Nonetheless, it all comes back to Him wanting to be truly loved by us,
which is a love that has to be freely given.
Speaking
of a more satisfying kind of love, I have been given some firsthand experience
with that, as well. For with me
exhibiting very few signs of great potential these days on account of suffering
from very poor health for a number of years, there is no naturally-recognizable
reason for why my beloved Arlynda should love me as much as she does. It is, of course, a love for me that He has
placed in her heart, but she still has some choice in the matter.
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