Thanks for joining us once again as we do another podcast of Struggling Well. And as we go this week, Suzi, I wanted to think back on, you know, life is unpredictable in so many ways. And I know that we like to think we can control life. we like to be in control. We have that illusion when our kids are really young and we quickly are hopefully quickly grow out of it cuz we really don't have the control. And for us, the last several years in our lives have been an example to us of the fact that we're not in control. Things have unfolded in our lives in ways that we did not see coming. and in the midst of the struggle of that, and the upheaval of that and the unsteadiness and uncertainty of that, you found some real comfort, by spending a couple years, in the Psalms. So, can you talk about what that did for you and what you found as you spent that extended time in the Psalms?
I think we've probably talked about this a little bit in the beginning of our podcast when we first started, but, it's interesting how even after all this time, I still find myself going back to the Psalms as kind of this anchor. and probably because I'm emotionally driven a lot. I know that's hard to believe. I'm pretty steady most of the time. Said no one ever, but what I love about the Psalms are the is the language. And one of the words that kept coming up and coming up was the word steadfast. And so I'm always fascinated by anything that is repetitive. And so I also like to know why it's being repeated. And I did a little bit of looking. And the word steadfast is used 172 times in the Old Testament. But get this, 120 times in the Psalms. That's a lot. And in Psalm 136, it's used 26 times. So steadfast, steadfast, steadfast. it's a great name. And it's a great name for a church in case you've never been to Steadfast. It's a great church that we know here in Charlotte, but also the word steadfast is, you know, talking about God's mercy and his loving kindness. And Psalm 89 is another place where it shows up. And it's interesting because the psalmist begins with some really it's a long one, but it's a lament in itself. And the psalmist begins with some weighty questions, and it ends without any kind of like and they left happily ever after. forever. but what the psalmist is doing is he's trying to reconcile the fact that they've been in exile, the temple has been destroyed, and how that matches up to God's steadfast love. they had they had been disobedient, but God's love still remains steadfast. And so, that's fascinating to me. it's fascinating to me because I always think that God's love es and flows. it's just kind of some of my past stuff about in Psalm 136 it's his steadfast love endures forever over and over again. And so when you think about love as kind of flowing and ebbing and back and forth then sometimes you can think well that's how God's love is. But that's not true. his steadfast love the word steadfast also means merciful and gracious and abounding. I love that word abounding. And It's from everlasting to everlasting. So, I get a little excited about this and I will let you talk in just a second. So, you could take a nap or have a cup of coffee. But what has really what really thrills me is that word abounding. I love words and I looked up the synonyms for it and it means plentiful, profure, profuse, ample, lavish, overflowing. Everlasting to everlasting means never ending. So now I have to take that and I go okay. So that means when I am totally aloof from God, not, you know, not having any kind of time with him, not praying or anything. My human emotions go, well, he's he left the building. He's not he doesn't love me. And yet, according to scripture, it he says, "My steadfast love endures forever." when I'm busy trying to strategize how to do life and I've left him out completely, he says, "My steadfast love endures forever." There is no situation in which he's going to say, "You know what? I'm done. I, you know, I'm through with you. You have overstepped with God. There's no overstepping unless I blaspheme." But there's no overstepping. And his love continues to come. And yet I wrestle with that love. Not that you could tell, Jimmy. Could you
I'm sorry. Am I allow am I allowed to come in here for a second?
10 words. Go.
All right. Well, yeah. I mean, because there's no there's no comparison. that we have on this earth with any kind of human love that reacts that way. I mean, I could do some things today that would cause you to love me more. I could also do
Shall I name those?
No, you don't need to name those. I could also do some things that would cause you to love me less.
Shall I name those?
No. Okay. Oh, sorry.
Even in the best of human loves, and I think we have a good love for each other, it is not there's nothing there that will guarantee or will produce this changing, steadfast, neverending, never altering kind of love. So on a human level, as I walk around in this world, whether you know whether you're married and it's to your spouse or it's to your kids or kids to parents or to close friends, there's no love that comes anywhere close to this. So we have nothing to compare it with in our life. So we obviously then come to our love with God or his love for us and we think, well, certainly has to change.
Yeah,
certainly it has to give and take depending on how I'm behaving or what I'm doing. And yet there's nothing, you know, again I think it was Yansy who said this in one of his books. there's nothing I can do to cause God to love me more and there's nothing I can do to cause God to love me less. And yet when I grew up in the church, the church I grew up in, it was kind of a performance-based mentality. And therefore, when I really performed well, when I did the things that I was supposed to do, defined by the church, then God was in love with me. And when I didn't do those things, again, defined by the church primarily, then God was on the other side of this big chasm and he had left me.
You know, we just last episode we talked about Micah a little bit and I noticed at the end of Micah something that I think is helpful for me to understand his steadfast love that is un like any other love. It says in chapter seven, am I in? Yeah. It says who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over transgression. So he his love is also involved in that love is the ability or his desire to pardon us of our iniquity. it says he does not retain his anger forever because he delights in steadfast love. So our love for one another can eb and flow if we get angry with one another, maybe we don't feel love at that moment. But that doesn't happen to God. So this incredible merciful, gracious, abounding, everlasting to everlasting love means he pardons our iniquity, passes over our transgression. He says he has compassion on us. He will tread our iniquity iniquities underfoot. He will cast out all our sins into the depths of the sea. And he will show faithfulness and steadfast love to us as he sworn to our fathers of old. That to me that just helps me to understand that his steadfast love is we can get it confused with hallmark love and the ooey gooey love and lyrics of music that we hear. But this is this deep and rich love where he can he loves us and he pardons us and he delights in that. He's faithful.
Yeah. And I'm going to go back to the Psalms and I'm not I didn't spend the amount of time you did there, but one of the psalms I love is a psalm of ascent. in the 130th Psalm and Israel would repeat this every time they went up to Jerusalem. But he's the psalmist there says, "Oh Israel, hope in the Lord for with the Lord there is steadfast love and with him is plentiful redemption. He will redeem Israel from all his iniquities." So there's that sense of this red redeeming, forgiving God who with him is steadfast love. It just it goes with him wherever he goes because it's who he is. And earlier in that psalm it says I wait for the Lord my soul waits and in his word I hope
and what I hope we can all see I mean it's true what you and I need to see it's what I hope those who are listening will see too is that there is this connection between waiting on the Lord and believing in his steadfast love cuz there are some days when it doesn't feel like his love is the way I think it should be.
So when I'm going through a deep valley, when I'm going through something hard, when I have something uncertain in my life. you know, a child is rebelling or I've got a medical diagnosis that I'm waiting to get the results on or it can be everything. It can just be the breaking of a relationship.
it doesn't feel at that moment like there's steadfast love from the Lord.
What sounds to me like what you're saying is what we see in Psalm 89, which I mentioned a little bit ago that There's Israel trying to reconcile that idea of God's steadfast love when they're in exile. Like, how can this be God's steadfast love? And some of it is that whole idea of the meta narrative. They don't know what the whole story is. can I just divert for a second and kind of bring it home to people out there that might be listening?
Sure, babe.
Well, you know, I'm going to I love to ask for permission because it sounds like I'm a very incredibly submissive wife. And I am in the biblical sense. I think I get I have an opportunity to talk to a lot of women on a regular basis. and it is probably my greatest joy to meet with women one-on-one. And I would say without fail, almost all of the women that I have the privilege to meet with struggle with the idea of being loved. They feel like either their past sin, their current sin, the way they look, what they haven't done, they're no they have no gifts or whatever it is that there's that struggle that God would love them regardless that his love for them would be steadfast and then when the women that I have met with go through a difficult time that is where like Israel where the questioning comes in the most of how can God love me if such and such happens and of course it's when the dyest of circumstances happen where it comes into question the most. And I wonder and now I'm speaking to me. I wonder what it would look like in my life to live out a day of being in God's steadfast love. How that would change the way I see things. how it would help me deal with difficulty. How I would treat other people because of the incredible mercul abounding love that I've am receiving and I wonder what it would do to the church universal big C. Just some things that are tripping across my mind.
Yeah. And I wonder too if there is not the connection as it is in the Psalms so many places that as we are looking for his steadfast love and understanding his steadfast love, it's coupled It seems like often with waiting on the Lord.
Mhm.
And what I tend to do is I tend to rush ahead. I want a solution. I want the situation to be resolved and be at least be resolved whether you know there's the way I want it resolved. But then even if it's not the way I want it, I just want it to be resolved. And God many times says, "Wait, wait, wait for me. Wait and see what I'm going to do." And that's not a combination that we like. I don't like it. I
I was hoping you would not do the whole waiting on the Lord thing. That's just it's not my favorite topic. I'm not good at it.
I don't like to wait at McDonald's.
None of us
that's pathetic, but it's true.
but somehow in seeing and understanding his steadfast love in understanding that he has not forsaken me and that he has not left me, which his promises are there. They were there for Israel and they're there for us through Christ. That he will not walk away from us. That he'll walk every step of the journey with us. I will see his steadfast love more clearly when I'm willing to wait on him. And that's what we would encourage you with today. No matter where you may be, know that you're loved by God. It is an unchanging love. But what we need to do at times is to wait and observe it and see it.
Amen.