I Receive Your Love

I Receive Your Love

“I receive Your love, I receive Your love for me, I receive Your love, I know I am accepted” – Israel Houghton 

I got to thinking about giving, I love giving, I have a real obsession and passion for giving. I will give the clothes off my back, literally if someone asks, or even if they don’t ask; I give, its who I am. I live to give, I love to give. 

But I once received a gift and I didn’t know how to act. I didn’t know where to look or what to think, how to feel or what to say. I have given so much of me, my time and gifts that I didn’t even know how to receive this gift, it was foreign to me. Do I return it? Do I lie and say I’ve already got one exactly like it? Ask for the receipt so I can return or exchange it? I had no clue, I took it home and literally didn’t touch it, look at it or use it. I wasn’t gifted in the area of receiving.

Which lead me to that song “I receive Your love”
Can I sing the lyrics of that songs honestly? I mean I can’t even receive a gift from a man that I can see; how do I receive a gift, the most perfect, flawless gift from a Man I can’t see?

I struggled.

How exactly was I supposed to accept a love that died for me? And every second I spend not accepting what was done on Calvary is another second I keep my Saviour nailed there, bleeding, paying a price over and over again because I could receive His love that would take Him down.

I find it hard to receive love, I found it hard to believe that God could love me. (My definition of love is when a person knows everything that you are, what you did and who you are and still accepts you and still accepts you; that is love) I found it hard to accept that God would know my past, my thoughts, feelings, ideas and desires and still, STILL accepts me and all my flaws, I found it hard to believe much less accept. 

On top of that, there was man’s idea and my perception of love. It was warped because the people who said they loved me didn’t mean unconditionally, they meant they loved me when it was convenient for them to “love” me. 

I found it hard to take my Lord off the cross, I found it hard to receive His love but I got there in the end.

I got to a place where I found out that His love has no strings attached, no demands and most of all, there was nothing i could ‘do’ for Him to love me. That was the hardest part of accepting God’s love is knowing that there’s nothing you can do or did in the past to make Him love you; He just does. 

God loves you, before you were created, before you were thought of by your parents; God loves you. It may be hard to receive His love but it’s there, it’s not going away and there’s nothing you can do to make Him stop loving you.
God, who is love, loves you! 

Receive it! Give it! 

Love hard. Receive freely!