“There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.” (1 John 4:18)
All that is not God cannot give us what only God can provide. He has created us to be perfectly loved, and only He can perfectly love us. We experience enough of man’s rejection to fear whether we are lovely or lovable enough to be loved. The wounds of a despised and rejected past form a root of bitterness in us. But we hold out hope that somewhere, with someone, we will find compensation for the past, and the perfect love we have yearned for. But human beings continue to fail us. They love us, but not as much as we want them to. Like the woman at the well, we’re still thirsty.
The experience of God’s perfect love toward us casts out fear and its torment. It is not a flattering, false love that tells us we are loved because we are perfect. It loves us while we are yet unlovely and unloving. It confers value upon our soul, not only when others communicate we are not “good enough,” but even when we have appraised ourselves as unworthy of love.
Resting in God’s perfect love, we see ourselves through no one’s eyes but His. What does He think of us? Our evaluation in God’s sight was so astronomically high that He was willing to pay the highest price to make us His own. The blood of His treasured, beloved Son forever declares how much He wants all who have have been unwanted and unchosen of men. We joyfully wear the title, “beloved,” because we are “accepted in the Beloved.”
And most wonderfully, by His stripes we are healed; healed of years of damage we took in while living outside His love. His perfect love not only casts out fear – it casts out hatred and anger and aggression toward all men. We now not only love Him who first loved us, but we love all those whose love toward us fell short, for the simple reason they are not Him.
Human love cannot make us whole. It cannot make up for and heal the wounds of the past. Look for and find perfect love in the only place it can be found. Knowing and believing the love God has for you is the healing balm your soul desperately needs. It will keep you loving in a world where you are still unloved.