Tinkerings

I have a YouTube account.  When I go there, the nice people at YouTube have provided a list of videos they think I will like based on the videos I’ve watched.  There is usually a video by Brian Regan or Taylor Mali mixed in the bunch.  Sometimes Tim Hawkins.  Maybe another Axe commercial.  And almost always a Gaither Homecoming song or two that I haven’t seen yet.

This morning it was the Gaither video that caught my eye.  I knew it would be good because it was David Phelps singing.  He has one of the most beautiful and articulate tenor voices of any genre.  His classical training shines through in everything he does.  But it was the title that got me first.

“Oh Love That Will Not Let Me Go.”

Something about that sentence clicked in my head today.  My mind went back to a talk I’ve had many times with others who seemed to need it in that moment.  A talk about I Peter and the totally unmerited favor of God.  Peter tells us two things in his opening epistle.  First, he tells us that there is a reward for us in heaven that cannot be taken away because it is being held by God.  Second, he tells us that we cannot fail to reach the reward because we are held by that same God.

Think about that for a moment.

When I was walking last week through one of the many beautiful parks surrounding Boston last week, my friends and I came upon a fundamentalist preacher standing in a crossroads of paths with his Bible held like a weapon and shouting, “If you don’t repent you will fall into the hands of an angry God and spend eternity in hell!” at the top of his lungs.  Some made fun of him as they walked by.  Others ignored him.  It just reminded me of all those times, week after week, Sunday night after Sunday night, I found myself in an altar at the end of a church service praying and crying and begging God to forgive for not wanting to go to church that day.  I had not yet matured enough to understand God’s Grace.

Reach in your pocket and take out a quarter.  No, go ahead.  I’ll wait.

Got it?  Good.  Place it in the palm of your right hand.  Now close your hand around it.  The quarter is you.  Your hand is the grace of God.  Do you think anyone or anything can rip you out of that hand?  Not even your own sin can remove you from that hand.  (We can discuss the whole issue of backsliding at a later date, ok?  For now, just follow this train of thought with me.)

I’ve lost a lot of confidence in things at times.  I’ve lost confidence in friends.  I’ve lost confidence in the church.  I’ve lost confidence in family.  I’ve even lost confidence in myself.  But there is a sentence that keeps me grounded.  Keeps me strong.  Keeps me at peace.

Oh Love That Will Not Let Me Go.

That is nothing less than the grace of God.  A love that won’t let go of me even when I struggle and wrestle and try to break free.  His love will not let me go.  And I am at peace in the midst of life’s strongest storms.