The Power of Love: Face-to-Face

A family member and I were discussing Facebook the other day. We both agreed that while Facebook has a great benefit of sharing memories with friends and family, we thought it could easily be called "FAKEBOOK" if we assumed that a person's life could be summed up by their happy posts. While Facebook definitely isn't the place to air our dirty laundry, we do need relationships that can handle and work through the tough stuff and where we can be authentic and real.

Vulnerability seems like a dirty word these days. It can be too easy to hide our faults, fears and struggles behind a facade which can leave us feeling alone and helpless. It is easy under pressure to end up an orphan, separated from the love of the Father and separated from the love and support of family and friends because we are too busy hiding. Adam and Eve ended up as orphans as they turned away and looked for fig leaves to cover themselves. They needed God to come, talk with them face-to-face, and walk with them in the garden again and bring them back into relationship. They needed to be vulnerable.

What are your fig leaves made of? The enemy of your soul wants us to cover yourself with things to hide from God. Are you covering yourself with the fig leaves of shame? alcoholism? work-a-holism? Or are your fig leaves embedded in a deep hatred of others? Are you wrapping a useless fig leaf around your heart-wrenching despair? Are you choosing a fig leaf of made up of your own will and blaming others for your mistakes instead of submitting your will to God and taking responsibility for your actions?

Jesus came to make us one with the Father and adopt us back in to the family of God as sons and daughters of the Father. Jesus came to make us one; He sacrificed His place in heaven to make us whole. Jesus came to show us what the unconditional love and acceptance of the Father looks like. Jesus' words ring true today,

"Your ears are open, but you don't hear a thing. Your eyes are awake but you don't see a thing. The

people are blockheads. They stick their fingers in their ears so they won't have to listen. They screw

their eyes shut so they won't have to look, so they don't have to deal with me face-to-face and

let me heal them."

Matthew 13:14-15 MSG

He wanted to heal them. Jesus offered healing to the masses and continues to offer it to you.

This divine desire for our healing and wholeness was expressed through Jesus and continues to be expressed through the Holy Spirit constantly pointing us back into a vulnerable, face-to-face relationship with Papa God.

In the middle of everything, God wants you to know that He loves you.

He. Loves. You. HE LOVES YOU! He.... loves.... you......

The Father accepts you. Papa God accepts you, just as your are, in your imperfection, in your disappointment, in your doubt. He accepts you and loves you. You are called, as His son or daughter, to walk naked with Him in the garden of life. He waits for face-to-face encounters with His beloved. You are His beloved. Give up your fig leaves. Put down your facade; He knows what is in your heart. Run to His beautiful, receptive, encouraging love today!