Love that Will Not Let Us Go

Today’s message was written by my friend Roger Kunkel.

I love the month of November. It is the month of Thanksgiving. It is a month filled with unlimited possibilities. When is the last time your possibilities gave you goose pimples?

Today I want you to focus on this verse from 1 Corinthians 13:8, “Love never fails.”

The seeking love of God often comes in unexpected places and in unlikely ways. When one is young, it is easy to fall in love and easy to fall out of love. Young love is tender and fragile. The first love may be followed by another as one grows tired of the first romance or finds another face that is prettier. How different is the love of God! God never grows tired, never leaves one for another, never forsakes because he has been forsaken. Hosea discovered this unrelenting love of God. This is the story the Bible tells and retells – the story of a love that will not let God’s people go. Francis Thompson speaks of him as “The Hound of Heaven” that pursues and continues to pursue. George Matheson wrote of it, and we sing of it as, “O Love that Wilt Not Let Me Go.”

Which one of us does not know something personally of this love? Which of us has done enough to deserve such a love? Yet we feel the warm love of our Lord breaking anew into our lives in some unexpected moment. More clearly still we see the love of God when we look at the cross. In the agony of death – isn’t that an unexpected place to find God’s love? This is love that never fails, the seeking love of God.

Let us pray: Loving God, your message is not sent in secret code, but in the plainest and simplest of words. It is a love letter to us. Help us to treasure it always, to live in love, and always to expect further messages. In Jesus’ name. Amen.