Is a Relationship With God Even Possible?Muestra

Receiving Love. Being Loved. It’s the Beginning of Everything.

When asked about our primary function as human beings, Jesus responded, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind” (Matt. 22:37).

But here’s the thing—we can’t give what we haven’t yet received. We can’t love before we’ve been loved. We’ll never live the lives we’re meant to live without being fueled, first, by God’s outrageous love.

Receiving love. Being loved. It’s the beginning of everything. It’s the beginning of life. It’s the beginning of us. To belong, to be cherished, it’s what we need most—even the smartest, even the toughest of men. And only God can address the totality of our needs. Only he can fill us with enough love.

By getting in close, by allowing ourselves to be loved up close— that’s how we change, grow, mature. By getting to know God, enjoying his presence, trusting him, following him—that’s how we become the men we are meant to become. That’s how we break through these ceilings that are holding us back. That’s how we push the outer edges of the envelopes of our lives.

Here’s the truth: in his love we don’t stand a chance. His grace and power are simply too powerful. When we move in close, we can’t help but change and grow and mature. When we come into his presence, his grace and power permeate every part of our lives.

And then, finally, we’re able to begin to discover wholeness and confidence—fearlessness even. We learn how to stop hurting people so much—and hurting ourselves. We begin to discover the joy and peace and purpose and significance and connection we long for— and have tended to look for everywhere else.

When we accept God’s love, we get up in the mornings with more enthusiasm and energy and joy. We walk through our days with more confidence and well-being, with a sense of being cared for and provided for, with a sense of belonging and purpose. And we go to bed with more contentment and peace. We’re able to relax, finally. And finally, in his love, we’re able to begin feeling good about ourselves.

Knowing God and accepting his love strengthens us, lessens fear, gives us energy and focus. It makes us better equipped to deal with hardship and struggle and failure. It makes us more robust, more durable men—able to take on what we never could have in our fragile, depleted, didn’t-know-we-were-loved states.

And God’s love starts to pour out of us, just as it did from those earliest followers of Jesus. “They turned the world upside down because their hearts had been turned right side up,” wrote Billy Graham, that space-age megapastor.

We hope you enjoyed this reading plan. Click here to learn more about Justin Camp and get his new book, Odyssey.