Refreshing Your Heart with God’s Love
Do you have days when you can’t feel God’s love?
It might feel like your heart is in the “off” position, and you aren’t sure how to turn it back on again.
Honestly, that happens to everybody, and one of the beautiful things about the Lord is that His love doesn’t change. Our emotions can go up and down, but no matter how we feel in the moment, God’s love remains a constant fire. We can trust His love even when we can’t feel it (see 1 John 4:16).
If you’re having trouble feeling God’s love today, here are two really good reminders that are true no matter what. They’re true on the good days, and they’re true on the days when you’re struggling with fear, self-hatred, doubt, despair, or any other negative emotion that’s trying to pull you away from the knowledge of His love.
1. The One who made the earth knows everything about you, and all your details are precious to Him.
O Lord, you have examined my heart
and know everything about me. (Ps. 139:1 NLT)
The Lord knows everything about you…and He absolutely loves you. It’s okay that you aren’t perfect yet. It’s okay that you’re still learning and growing.
Your heart is dear to Him. He has looked at it, and held it in His hands, and turned it over, and studied it from every angle, and this thing is dear to Him. All your details enthrall Him.
2. God is fully delighted with His creation. You are among the created ones, which means He’s fully delighted with you too.
The LORD is good to all;
he has compassion on all he has made. (Ps. 145:9 NIV)
God, everyone sees your goodness,
for your tender love is blended into everything you do. (TPT)
God is good to one and all;
everything he does is soaked through with grace. (MSG)
Everything He made is precious to Him. Including you. All the time. Constantly.
The knowledge of His love is bigger than you are. Even when you feel like you’re at the bottom of the bucket, His love is there to hold you and comfort you. And if your emotions try to tell you otherwise, you get to take them captive (2 Cor. 10:5). You get to say, “No! I know what the truth is about the love of God, and I choose to believe it.”
God’s Love and Faith
Faith doesn’t need emotion—though it can be emotional. Faith believes and keeps believing, even when the emotions aren’t there to support it. Faith can say things like this: “Father God, I know You love me. I can’t feel You right now, but I know You love me, so I’m going to act and think like it’s true.”
That, beloved child of God, is often what worship looks like: faith in dark places, words of praise even when you feel blind.
Faith is courageous. Faith is brave.
Declarations of Love
Think of these words as worship. Read them out loud, and let your heart soak them up:
You love me.
You love me on the days I can feel it and the days I can’t.
You love me when it seems 100 percent true to my heart, and You love me when it doesn’t seem true at all.
Your love for me isn’t wishy-washy.
It isn’t founded on something unstable; it is founded on You and Your divine stability.
Your love is more constant than air.
Your love is just as strong as You are.
Your love fills the earth. Nature constantly, without fail, tells me about who You are—and who You are is love (Rom. 1:20; 1 John 4:8).
Your love fills everything and every place.
Your love constantly surrounds me (Ps. 119:64).
Your heart delights in mine, and my heart delights in Yours.
This week, may your heart know the love of God in unexpected ways, with unexpected strength.
Does your heart need to remember who God is? Check out these other devotions:
For more information on sex, marriage, and finding the person who is right for you, get a copy of Becoming the One by Salomé Roat. Click here to learn more. The book is also available in Spanish.