Some years ago one of my dearest friends and my spiritual mentor, Ney Bailey, asked me a question, “Imagine that a movie was made of your life. Nothing was left out. Everything that you have ever thought or said or done was displayed on the big screen for anyone to see. How would you feel?”
My initial response was that I would be horrified and take the first slow boat to Bratislava! It is one thing to take refuge in the absence of what I considered the really “big” sins, but to have everything I’d ever thought or felt displayed was quite another. Yet the truth remained, deep down I longed to be fully known and fully loved. My fear was that fully known and fully loved might not be willing to share a room, they seemed incompatible.
Then Ney said to me, “Sheila, here is the truth of the gospel, God has seen your movie, and He loves you completely.”
God has seen your movie, and He loves you completely.
That understanding has been life-changing for me. The God of the universe, the one who holds the stars and the moon in place, knows everything about us and loves us with unprecedented abandon. He knows the good, the bad, and the ugly. He knows the things we are proud of and the things we hide. He knows it all, and he invites us to come just as we are and live the life he has for each of us. As my dear friend, Max Lucado says,
“You have never lived an unloved moment in your life!”
“And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Romas 8:38-39 (NLT)