The Tender Calling of the Father’s Love

I don’t know about you, but I don’t respond well to people that use pressure, threats, obligation, or other forms of manipulation.  This approach to relationships has me coming to a complete standstill or back peddling so quickly I break the sound barrier.  You can’t win me over by force, but I can be persuaded with loving kindness.

These are the thoughts that I have been mulling over the past few months.  The loving kindness of God.  As I watched my grandfather in his final days, as I face the last holiday with my oldest before he leaves for the Corps, my thoughts keep returning to the tenderness of our Father’s calling.

If you look for it, even in heartache, loss, and bittersweet times, you’ll see the scarlet thread of His grace, mercy, tenderness, and love reaching out to us.  Inviting us to partake.  His love is our invitation.

My earthly father first illustrated this love for me when he pursued me as a runaway teen.  I had left home because I didn’t want to face the fears, heartache, shame, and trauma of my sexual assault.  I wanted to sweep it under the rug, hide it away, and keep it there forever.  I was ruined.  What was the use in talking about it?

Running away didn’t stop my dad’s pursuit.  He would come to my work everyday and ask me to look him in the eyes.  I‘ll never forget the first time he did it.  

I was afraid to look up.  I knew that when I did, I would see disappointment, anger, and the like.  So, my eyes ever so slowly travelled up to my father’s until I partook of his loving gaze.  Before I could even process the undeserved tenderness I saw reflected back at me, my heart heard his words.  They went something like this: “You are my daughter.  There is nothing you can ever do to lose my love.  You are mine and I will always love you.”

My dad didn’t stay behind to see what those words did to me, my stony expression wouldn’t have betrayed much.  But those words called me home.  The culmination of his continuing pursuit and love eventually brought me back into a relationship with him.  

Our Heavenly Father pursues us the same way.  Even in the garden, He made a way for us to be with Him.  A way for us to be restored into a right relationship.  That way is Jesus.  The Word made flesh.  Emmanuel, God with us.  The one who sacrificed it all for us.

It’s there for everyone to see.  In history, in our very lives God has been seeking mankind all along.  He has been working behind the scenes lovingly calling us to Him.  Have you answered His call?  Have you accepted His invitation?  He’s waiting for you.