Marinated in God's Love
By Marilyn Kettering Badger
April 17, 2017
From The Best of Barbara Johnson, 3 books in one volume: Book 2 Splashes of Joy in the Cesspools of Life, page 398.
“But God’s love can happen ANYWHERE. Once it happened to me at the Department of Motor Vehicles office when I was selecting a personalized license plate for my husband Bill. As I looked through the giant book of license-plate names that had already been used, I realized that my own name is written in another book that is much more important – the Lamb’s Book of Life, and that I am forever a daughter of the King. God reminded me that I am His child. I am royalty! God’s warm comfort blanket enfolded me with the assurance of His care. I felt His blanket enfold me with the assurance of His care. I felt His presence so strongly that I had tears in my eyes. The warm, comforting feeling of His love splashed over me – EVEN AT THE DMV.
But the specific place really doesn’t matter. Being marinated in God’s love is what counts. It’s your personal relationship with God that makes the difference and brings the joy from His fountain of life. Experience has taught me that only those who have gone from despair to hope can know what a refreshing fountain of life feels like. One of my favorite thoughts is:
GOD LOVES A DANGLING CHRISTIAN.
In other words, God wants the believer to be TOTALLY dependent on Him. And when you cry out to Him for help, His love is the rope that pulls you out of the cesspool to His refreshing fountain. Once you come to the fountain and have been splashed with God’s joy, something happens. You realize that you aren’t the only one who knows what a cesspool is like. Sometimes in our loneliness it is easy to think we are the only ones who have had to suffer, ‘just like this.’ But when God’s love touches us during our suffering, we can see how shallow our caring for others has been … we (need to) get a picture of what it is to be a spirit lifter. Love is the greatest gift we have to give and if we let Him, God will help us be sensitive to loneliness, grief, and pain wherever it exists—which is all around us.”
