Hey, I’m Cas, nice to meet you.
You may remember me from earlier this summer when I ghosted you due to the rampant, attention consuming omnipresence of my children à la summer break.
But school starts tomorrow.
Do you know why school starts tomorrow?
Because, as Benjamin Franklin once said, God loves us and wants us to be happy. Duh.
But tearful reintroductions aside, I want to christen this fledgling era of Cas having all this writing time on her hands (thanks, Ohio, for being kind enough to pay for Christian school tuition!) to send you a quick quote from my favorite ultra nerdy Greek Bible study book.
The quote has to do with one of the absolute best pro-faith, anti-anxiety verses in the Bible, Romans 8:28, which says (in case you forgot):
And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. (KJV)
Here’s what Wuest has to say about it:
The [Greek] text reads, “And we know with an absolute knowledge that all things are constantly working together, resulting in good for those who are loving God, for those who are called ones according to His purpose.” Alford comments, “In this further description, the apostle designates the believers as not merely loving God, but being beloved by God. The divine side of their security from harm is brought out, as combing with and ensuring the other [🤯]. They are sure that all things work for their good, not only because they love Him who worketh all things, but also because He who worketh all things hath loved and chosen them, and carried them through the successive steps of their spiritual life. The calling here and elsewhere spoken by the apostle is the working, in men, of the ‘everlasting purpose of god whereby before the foundations of the world were laid, He hath decreed by His counsel secret to us, to deliver from curse and damnation those whom He hath chosen in Christ out of mankind, and to bring them by Christ to everlasting salvation.’”
…Paul accepts fully human free agency, but behind it all and through it all runs God’s sovereignty as here and on its gracious side. (142-143, emphasis his, emoji mine)
Is this not a great quote?
So don’t forget today, my darlings, that you live your life on the “gracious side” of God’s sovereignty, and this has been your unshakeable fate since before the world was made.
Don’t forget that you can “know, with absolute knowledge, that all things are constantly working together, resulting in good for those who are loving God.”
Don’t forget that you are (notice the present, open ended tense here) “being beloved by God” at all points and at all times and in all ways, which pretty much makes you invincible if you think about it.
Being beloved.
Man, that’s good stuff.
It’s almost like God really does love us and wants us to be happy, happy being the inadequate word here. More like “supremely, sublimely, defiantly joyful.”
This is the birthright of the lovers of God, and we should not settle for anything less.
May we not only love Him with all “heart, mind, soul and strength,” but may we also welcome the quenching ocean of His great love into every weary fiber of
heart,
mind,
soul
and strength.
Beautifully said, as always! 💕
Love this! Needed it today!