From East and West, North and South
“Let the redeemed of the Lord say so, whom he has redeemed from trouble and gathered in from the lands, from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south.” — Psalm 107:2-3
We recently started a series of blog posts exploring and reflecting on Psalm 107. As I wrote last time, this psalm invites those who have experienced God’s goodness and love to explode with thankfulness to Him. This is the furthest thing from a nagged thankfulness, but one that springs up uncontrollably, yet naturally. The way the psalm works to this end is by drawing the reader into the story of God’s love with vivid imagery—including that of a compass. With this picture God wants us to see the reach of His love. He loves all kinds from all over. First, we must consider that God loves at all.
Love is at the center of who God is—his very essence and nature.
Exodus 34 records one of the most profound moments of God’s self-disclosure. God passes in front of Moses proclaiming, “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love…” Here, God is saying that love is at the core of who He is, was, and always will be. John says the same when he writes, “God is love,” in the fourth chapter of his first letter. Love is at the center of who God is—his very essence and nature. This is so because the one, true God is Trinity.
Imagine with me that God is a singular monad, and not triune or three-in-one. He could be a lot of things. He could be power and might, but never love. The one, true God on the other hand is triune. That is three persons in one, true and living God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. They are of one substance and essence, equal in power and glory, and worthy of worship. God is triune, and therefore love. Father loves Son and Spirit; Son loves Father and Spirit; and Spirit loves Father and Son. The persons of the one God love each other with a steadfast, immovable, unconditional, always and forever, never-giving-up love. The God of love extends His divine love to all kinds from all over. This takes us back to Psalm 107’s compass.
God’s love reaches into every land. Turn in every direction: go north, south, east, and west; go as far as humanly possible and you will find there people that God loves.
God’s love reaches into every land. Turn in every direction: go north, south, east, and west; go as far as humanly possible and you will find there people that God loves. Go to the desert, to prisons, to fancy restaurants, and to port cities. There you will find people that God loves. In our town, Hickory, North Carolina, nearly every address includes a NE, NW, SE, or SW. In all those places there are people that God loves. The scandal of God’s love is that no person regardless of geography, social status, or failures deserves God’s steadfast, immovable, unconditional, always and forever, never-giving-up love. Yet, God’s love came to us—to the deserts, the prisons, the finest restaurants, and the bustling seaside cities to draw us into His divine love.
God so loved the world that he sent his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, love in the flesh, so that we could experience the satisfaction, freedom, joy and safety of God’s love. Through Jesus’s life, death, and resurrection we can rest in God’s steadfast, immovable, unconditional, always and forever, never-giving-up love. Over the next four week we will focus with greater specificity the kind of people God loves. However, until then may God gives us and our neighbors the Spiritual strength to comprehend with the redeemed what is the breadth, and length and height and depth of Christ’s love being filled with all the fullness of God.
