“To be loved but not known is comforting but superficial. To be known and not loved is our greatest fear. But to be fully known and truly loved is, well, a lot like being loved by God. It is what we need more than anything.” – Timothy Keller

Never has the word and meant more than in the above sentence “fully known and truly loved.” Like a bridge crossing a chasm between two foreign countries, ever since Adam and Eve took up the sewing of fig leaves to cover their nakedness, humanity, in our rebellion, has had a hard time believing that God, or anyone, could love all of who we are. And, so, we often feel the need to choose between two countries: one is the realm of being known, where we shed the facade, declare “this is me, like it or not,” and settle for tolerance from others in return. The other is the land of being loved, where we build whatever artifice we believe necessary to ensure that whoever we encounter will see someone who at least appears to have enough of their life together to be admired if not loved.

But to be fully known and deeply loved. That is what we have been created for.

I remember the day that I discovered this and in my own life. I was a new Christian, still a teenager, and I was on one of those prayer walks that is borne out of a psalmist type rage aimed at God for all the ways I felt he was not living up to his end of the bargain. In the midst of my baby Christian temper tantrum, I heard a voice. The voice was not in the wind, nor fire, nor earthquake, but in a whisper that penetrated my heart. A still small voice offered me a bizarre invitation: “tell me about yourself.” I say the invitation was bizarre because I understood myself, intellectually, to be speaking presently to an all knowing God. “What do you mean ‘tell me about yourself?’ You are literally supposed to be all knowing.” How many times we went back and forth like this I do not know, but each time I expressed my frustration, the response was the same “tell me about yourself.” Eventually, I gave in, and began to tell an all knowing God all about myself; that is my hopes and fears, dreams and desires. And for the first time in my life I knew that I was known by God. Known, not in some abstract conceptual way, but actually relationally known by the God of the universe as revealed through Christ Jesus our Lord. Imagine that.

Curt Thompson says that “we all enter the world looking for someone looking for us.” Before then, I knew that I was loved, but after that day I experienced the love of Christ looking back at me.

As Christian’s we need times and spaces that are set aside to tune into the still small voice, often being drowned out by the winds, fires, and earthquakes of our times. Simply reading slowly, prayerfully, and, dare I say, contemplatively the following passage from Ephesians might be a good place to start. (We are going to take some specific time to explore more fully God’s love for us on our upcoming retreat at Corhaven – we’d love for you to join us!)

“That we, being rooted and grounded in love, have the strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.” – Ephesians 3:14