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| Monday, September 14, 2009
Devotional: God in One Word Writer : Aaron Lee"Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love." 1 John 4:8 It was a striking photograph on the front page of the newspaper. A wind-swept expanse of lush green grass and wild flowers stretched as far as the eye could see. Overhead there was a cloudless sky. The late summer light of afternoon flooded everything. And there in the foreground of the photo was Lilly: a 3-year old white-brown mongrel dog with the biggest, happiest grin on her face. A Singapore dog living the "American dream" on a country farm! In fact, Lilly was nothing special. She was found scavenging scraps of food at a construction side near the Kallang Leisure Park. Perhaps her mother was a stray, or perhaps she had been abandoned. But her life changed after an animal welfare action group rescued her. Under a pioneer international adoption programme, an American lady by the name of Amy Ferber agreed to accept her. And so some weeks after Lilly's rescue, she was checked in as "excess baggage" by a volunteer, and took a 20-hour flight to New York. There she was met by a member of the Ferber family and driven in a car to her new home in rural Massachusetts where she was given a warm welcome. After reading Lilly's remarkable story I turned to my wife and said half in jest, "This dog knows now that there is a God!" Do you sometimes forget just how much our creator God loves you? His love sought you out across the oceans of time and space and drew you to Him (Jer. 31:3). It is a love that took responsibility for your welfare and your future. It never gave up on you - not even through your troubled past or the times of your rebellion or self-pity. His love is a safe hiding place from the pain and suffering in your life (Ps. 36:7). It is the love of a doting father (1 John 3:1). Best of all, now that He has found you, nothing in the universe can separate you from His love (Rom 8:38-39). The apostle John says "God is love". You are the object of that love. As you gradually, truly and deeply come to understand that, how will you respond? Will you go on your merry way, thank-you-very-much? Or will you love Him back and love His other children in the same way? I still think about that ordinary dog from Kallang who went through years of misery and neglect. Now, she and Amy Ferber roam the fields each evening. Maybe they play 'catch' with the other two dogs and the little girls, or go "squirrel hunting" in the orchard. Perhaps the beauty of the sunset or the sound of the crickets make them stop in their tracks and look at each other. They need no words, but that smile on Lilly's face says it all: she now knows what love is and her life will never be the same.
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