Everyone above the age of ten understands what it means to be broken hearted. From loosing a friend because you have to go to different schools. To the pain that comes from being hurt the by words and actions of others. The pain of romantic rejection and being cheated on. Or being hated by people we loved because they could not forgive us for what we had done. But as undesirable as all these are, there are three things we learn about God’s love from the inner pangs of the heart.

To get some perspective on this, a birds eye view from the book of Hosea will help. Because Hosea was a guy God used to make his love more clear through some tough lessons. He showed him how divine love works by taking him through a painful relationship with a woman who would betray her marital vows.

1. God’s love can be rejected.

Hosea 1:2-3 NKJV
When the Lord began to speak by Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea: “Go, take yourself a wife of harlotry And children of harlotry, For the land has committed great harlotry By  departing from the Lord .” So he went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son.

Yes, even God knows what it means to be chucked. It is completely possible to look at the cross, see Christ crucified and still keep your heart to yourself. So yes, we hurt because we feel rejection and betrayal. That is what God’s love is like. The choice and free will that make choosing love possible also make rejection an option.

2. God’s love is always faithful.

Hosea 3:2-3 NKJV
So I bought her for myself for fifteen shekels of silver, and one and one-half homers of barley. And I said to her, “You shall stay with me many days; you shall not play the harlot, nor shall you have a man—so, too, will I be toward you.”

In the midst of Hosea’s pain, God asks him to buy back his adulterous wife. Like purchasing a prostitute from a brothel. That is so very representative of how God loves. Paul reminds us constantly in his writings that God gave us his son to pay for our sins while we were sinners. It breaks my heart to imagine God giving up his son as payment for my sin. Getting the coins ready while I prostituted myself in the brothel of evil.

3. God’s love will accept and embrace you back.

Hosea 6:1-3 NKJV
Come, and let us return to the Lord ; For He has torn, but He will heal us; He has stricken, but He will bind us up. After two days He will revive us; On the third day He will raise us up, That we may live in His sight. Let us know, Let us pursue the knowledge of the Lord . His going forth is established as the morning; He will come to us like the rain, Like the latter and former rain to the earth.

God’s love always wins out in the end. The best illustration I know of why God always wins when people choose his love over the lostness of the world was given by a man called Ravi Zachariah.

“When you love someone and they don’t love you back, you hurt because you have lost something. Nut when God loves you and you don’t love him back, God hurts. But he hurts not because he has lost something, but because you have lost something.” – Ravi Zachariah

So maybe today, regardless of your hurt and my hurt, we could see God clearer. We could understand that he already took the first step in reaching out to us. That he wants us to accept his love so much that he literally made it free.

Have you received his love? Are you abiding in it?  Am I?

Let’s pray;

Dear God,

Thank you for the gift of free will and choice.
Help us be a blessing to the people you have put in our lives.
Show me the persons  I have hurt and need to apologize to.
Help me cope with rejection, being left out and being betrayed.
Help me be a loving child, a caring parent and a Christ led spouse.
In surrender,my fragile heart to you.
Thank you for showing me you more of how you love me.

Amen