You can really only understand the depths of the context of this post, if you read this first from Joe Dallas's blog post titled "Treasured" here:  http://joedallas.com/blog/index.php/2013/02/20/treasured/#more-1831


It's lovely. Stop and read it.

No really.

Go read.

Did you?

Hope so.

I posted this as a longggg comment to it, and I didn't want to lose it,so I'm posting it here as a reminder to myself to take time out to Parrr-taaaay in God's Extravagant Love. 
(The reply is edited too. I saw some places in my reply where I left out words, or had funky sentence structure - more so than I usually do. I try not to be too grammatical in my replies on a comment section, because I feel I lose my 'conversation' voice if I do.)

"This is so beautiful, Joe. I printed it off to keep with my journal. I've been an analyzer for years, or as my counselor told me a few months ago, "You like to contemplate your belly button."


I'm just now coming to the party to revel in God's love for me. In a way, it feels like I felt on my honeymoon - alive, vibrant, beautiful, heady, and a little shocked with literally having a new identity as a wife, not to mention a new last name! (That'll actually mess with your head, lol! You think it's hard to remember how to write the new year number on your checks in January? Think about having to sign your last name as a whole 'nuther name! I voided quite a few checks after I got married. lol.)

I've really struggled with the identity of 'Father' God for so long. Like so many people who have had their own 'bad dad' growing up, I've struggled with trying to imagine that certain gleam of love in Father God's eyes. My earthly dad's eyes were glazed over more than anything else. I'd cry in movies or tv where a father would weep over his child, or beam with pride at her accomplishments. I'd curse the ground and rage that I could not feel that myself, no matter how vicariously I tried to live in that picture.

One day, I told God, "I give up. I don't know what this feels like, so I'm going to just let that desire die. I can't picture You this way towards me. Sorry. Psalm 139 just isn't cutting it for me. I wish I was in heaven even now, so I really could experience that look for myself from You."

I was met with silence.

Wrapped in sadness.

Sometime later, I was hanging out with my kids and they were having this conversation that was pretty deep for little tykes of their age. I marveled with pride and wonder - where did they learn to discuss such deep things? I certainly didn't teach it to them, I thought. And I have no reason to feel proud - as if I made that happen. It didn't matter - it was just as beautiful thing to behold. Especially since most of the time, their lives are filled with: "You did this!" "Did not!" "Did too! I saw yooo!!" "Did not!! Mmmm-ahhhhh-MMmmMMmmMMmm (Mom)!!!"

But in that moment of tranquility and deep reflection for a couple of kids, as I reveled in delight in them, Father God taught me a lesson about He and I. He showed me that though my children are adopted and not of my flesh - I love them fierecly as if they came from my very body. Indeed they DID COME from my HEART - and that is the most painful and beautiful labor process of all sometimes, cause there is no nine month guarantee from start to finish. I waited 11 years for my son, and a year later for my daughter. That's a long time to be 'pregnant' with hope and longing.

And the pride I feel as their mother is just what you said, Joe. It's instinctive. Born in me the moment each one was laid in my arms and looked up at me. I was in love instantly - without thought or hesitation. Oh I had plenty of hesitations on how to *be* a mom...but NOT about being my son's mom...or my daughter's mom. I was theirs the moment we touched each other. Instantaneous. Transforming. Genuine. Deep.

And as Father reminded me about this, He whispered in my ear my own hesitations and doubts of His deep genuine love and affection over me. He told me how He knew that I felt I could never be loved by Him because I never felt "worthy" enough to be loved by a King and God over all of creation. In my heart, I felt that we were too 'different' from one another. He - so holy and perfect...and me - so messy, and well...not.

He reminded me that He had an adoption plan for me, long before the foundation of the world was laid - and a means to make a way for this adoption to be complete, through the blood of His Son, Jesus. Not only that, but Jesus was just as willing for my adoption to take place, so that I could be in His family forever too. It was a joy for Him to do this.

And just like I cannot explain why or how I have such a deep love for children that did not come from my body, yet it is as tangible and deep as the sea, so His thoughts for me, truly number more than the sand on the shore of that sea. Not thoughts of "why can't she get it right?"...but thoughts of "my beloved daughter - how I love her."

You CAN be adopted and loved completely for who you are as YOU. I may not know my children inside and out like the way God knows them and me...but I love every single part of them. Their habits, their hangups don't make me love them less. It makes me yearn for them to learn how deeply they can cling to a God who loves them more than their dad or I or their birth-mom and extended family ever will. And that's a lot of love right there!

And that same kind of love that I have the delight to offer them, is moreover offered to me, to them, to you, to us all - with abundance....much Abundance by a Father who loves us deeper still.

Can I join your revelry? I can party with the best of them. I got my party hat on and my noise-maker. ::fweee!!::

Please give your beloved wife Renee a hug and "hello" from me. :)

Blessings to you both,

Holly