From the desk of Steve Shultz:
We serve an uncontainable God – without measure... yes! Kathi Pelton's latest word will help you think in a higher way and without limits to what WE can do through Him and His power.
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Chosen: You Are My Desire
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Kathi Pelton:
Uncontainable
For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in Heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of His glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord's holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge – that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Ephesians 3:14-19
When we view human love, no matter how beautiful or deep it may be, it is always a quantity that can be measured. I have tried with great effort to consider the lengths that I am able to love, but no matter the scenario I always imagine a place where my love would falter. It can always be contained within the boundaries of my humanness. Thank God that the Holy Spirit dwells within me with the fullness of His love so that I am not left with my limitations.
As I ponder the issues of love, forgiveness, compassion, grace and other attributes of God, I find that no matter how I look at my personal capacity to give these things to another, they can always be contained in a measurable form. Yet, as I think on God's love, forgiveness, compassion, and grace I know that there is no way to measure or contain His capacity in these things. Every attribute that God has is eternal and cannot be contained or measured.
His love has no beginning and no end; it is eternal in every way. His love was upon us before we were formed and will extend to us throughout eternity. Human love most often depends upon the actions of another, but God's love has no dependency or expectation upon another. He is not capable of withholding love or wavering in His love toward us. Even in the midst of our sin and constant "wavering" affections, His love is immeasurable and unmovable.
The same is true with every attribute of God. His forgiveness is eternal in every sense of the word. His grace, mercy, wisdom, power, righteousness, justice and goodness are absolutely measureless and cannot be contained within time or space. Often we misunderstand God's ways with us as being measurable by believing that He is withholding from us (healing, provision, blessings, etc.). What we need to understand is that in His great wisdom He knows what we do not know and sees what we do not see. My understanding is limited to my experience or my ability to imagine God's ways, but still everything I know or imagine is contained within the limits of my humanity. I am not able to comprehend that which is not comprehensible.
As humans, we live within the boundaries of time and space; God is the only immeasurable thing we know. So how do we do what Ephesians 3:14-19 says? How do we grasp how long, wide, high, or deep is the love of God if it is immeasurable and uncontainable? I think that we can only grasp it by understanding verse 19: "to know this love that surpasses knowledge..." We must grasp the truth that His love will always surpass our knowledge and our limited understanding.
Infinitude
In his book The Knowledge of the Holy, A.W. Tozer writes about the limitless forgiveness of God:
...We can never know the enormity of our sin, neither is it necessary that we should. What we can know is that "where sin abounded, grace did much more abound." To "abound" in sin: that is the worst and the most we could or can do.
The word abound defines the limit of our finite abilities; and although we feel our iniquities rise over us like a mountain, the mountain, nevertheless, has definable boundaries: it is so large, so high, it weighs only this certain amount and no more. But who shall define the limitless grace of God? Its "much more" plunges our thoughts into infinitude and confounds them there. All thanks be to God for grace abounding.
I can sit and read that short quote over and over again and still it confounds me and leaves me speechless. We spend so much time weighed down by our sin and shortcomings, yet we have a Heavenly Father whose grace overshadows and covers every shortcoming without leaving any hint of stain or even the memory that it ever happened. Though this was never an invitation to live recklessly, we can lay our heads down each night knowing that our faltering and shortcomings are completely covered by the enormity of His grace and forgiveness.
Infinitude means to be without bounds or limits. Our sin and our limitations bind us in many ways, but His infinite grace and love removes us from all that binds us and limits us. His infinite grace gives us freedom in the midst of our humanity. "God in us...the hope of glory!"
Waves of Mercy and Grace
I believe that God is renewing our minds with a new hope that is founded in the truth of His infinite love and forgiveness. We have such hope set before us because daily He washes us, renews us, forgives us, and loves us. There is nothing too great for Him to forgive or to deliver us from. Nothing can separate us from the love of Christ! Nothing!
As we, by faith, embrace this truth that surpasses our knowledge and understanding, I believe that He will send waves of mercy and grace over us to wash us and give us hope like never before. As we move forward into the seasons ahead, I pray that we all find ourselves receiving a washing by His Spirit that overwhelms us with freedom and deliverance.
I will leave you with the last two verses from Ephesians 3:20-21:
"Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the Church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen."
May you be overwhelmed by a new experience of His immeasurable and uncontainable power that is at work within you!
Kathi Pelton
Compassion Arise
Email: jkpelton@sbcglobal.net
Kathi Pelton has a passion to encourage, uplift, and serve. As well as being a published writer, she has traveled extensively with Watchmen for the Nations, spoken at conferences, been a member of a national prophetic round-table and co-directed a house of prayer. Her favorite pastime is to spend time with her husband and children.
