Fear No Fear

“All who dwell on the earth will worship him, all whose names have not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb who was slain from the foundation of the world” (Revelation 13:8, MEV). Jesus spiritually died before He physically created the universe. He had decided to do it. Made up His mind. He was determined to do it, the Father trusted that He would, and they did not stop until Jesus had walked it out physically through the cross. Jesus did it because it would open the Way back to God for everyone, Jew and Gentile. In that sense He was happy to do it (Hebrews 12:2), even though the prospect of the pain, the suffering, and the separation from His Father tormented Him as a man (Matthew 26:38) – the separation from God was the thing He most dreaded. That’s all true. What that means is that before anything was created, God was thinking about YOU. Before ANYTHING was created. Before God created the stuff of the heavens (spiritual world) and the stuff of the earth (physical world). Before Holy Spirit was hovering over that chaos that had been impregnated with the possibilities that were in the mind of God. Before ANY of that, Jesus was thinking about YOU and about ME. We were on God’s mind. He knew how we would be formed. What we would look like when we grew up. How we would talk. The timbre of our laugh. The light in our eyes when we were joyful. He knew our tastes. The food we liked. The clothes we preferred. Our style. Our favourite vehicle, pastime, and entertainment. He considered us. He had LOVE for us. That was His motivation. He wanted to be in a relationship with you. All the time in between. All the suffering. All the separation. All the horror in our redemption. It was all worth it so that He could know you and you could know Him. Not for a brief moment. But for all moments ever. Eternal knowing, abiding, and being together. Eternal communication one to the other. THAT is what He wanted. THAT is how much He loves you. THAT is what made it worth it. YOU made it worth it. You ARE worth it. Our ‘proof’ of His love is that He endured all of it to make the Way open. He did it for me. He did it for you. He LOVES you SO MUCH.