I have been reading a book called Ruthless Trust, by Brennan Manning. He writes:

…the absolute glory of God is revealed in Jesus as absolute love, and we can only be brushed by it. Nevertheless, we are made for that which is too big for us. We are made for God, and nothing else will ever satisfy us.

This view of God is literally beyond comprehension. I’m amazed just letting the thought in. Manning tells me to contemplate it, and I want to. He says the love of God revealed in Jesus is the only thing in life we can be certain of — that this is the basis for trusting God — and my heart leaps to respond.

This is not religion or philosophy; it’s love. It’s not abstract but historical and concrete. (I realize that’s a statement of faith.) Nor is it limited by my understanding. It makes so much that I have done and depended on seem small in perspective.

I don’t have conclusions to present. Nothing that I figured out that caused me to start this blog. Just a desire to recognize how the love of God brushes my life in every day decisions and actions, joys and pains, successes and failures. I want to wander in the vastness of a love big enough to embrace the world and small enough to touch one person. I want to submit to a terrifying love that is perfect in justice and mercy.

Whatever discoveries, walls, thoughts, and journeys that come about along the way, I’ll try to write about them along the way.

Ruthless Trust

Brennan Manning. HarperCollins 2002, Paperback, 190 pages, $13.95