For the hundreds of times I’ve sung “Jesus Loves Me,” there has always been a disconnect.

For most of my life, it’s been nothing more than a cold repetition of facts. The sky is blue, 2+2=4, Jesus loves me. I accept it as true, and I understand the implications of it, but there is no emotion to the matter whatsoever. For that reason, a love for Him in return is hard to come by.

In other words, for most of my life I’ve felt incredibly distant from God. And I know I’m not the only one in this predicament.

I once read a comment from someone who had come to a conclusion similar to the Calvinist view of predestination. Their view holds that God predestined a certain group of people to be saved. He agreed with that, but took it one step further. He believed that God did not love or care about those who were not predestined. And he believed himself to be in that unloved, unchosen group. He still wanted to serve God because he believed the Bible to be true, but seemed to expect that he would never really feel loved by God.

As sad (and incorrect) as that is, I have to say I can understand where he’s coming from. I get it. When I see people around me so warmed by the love of God, while not knowing if I’ve ever felt it myself, it can be easy to begin to think such thoughts. I’ve often wondered what on earth it is other people have felt when they talk about knowing God’s love and loving Him in return. What they seem to experience and what I do sure don’t seem to align.

It’s not from a lack of knowledge. Like anybody, I’ll always have things I can learn. but there aren’t many concepts that are off my radar. I grew up in Bible class and worship every Sunday. I was baptized in 2003. I graduated preaching school in 2008. I’ve been a full time preacher since 2013. There are not many Bible verses or concepts you can show me that I haven’t read.

I do not need to be told that God’s love is strong enough and big enough to cover even me. That line of reasoning while, fully true and good and wonderful, is like telling someone that God’s love is a credit card with no limit, whose funds cannot ever be exhausted. That’s great, and scores of people need to hear it – but it does little for someone whose card reader is broken.

If you’ve read my work over the years, you’re probably familiar with my struggle with distance from God. This is actually the 4th article in this vein as my thinking has evolved over the years (see 1, 2, and 3 at the links).

The first answer, of course, has always been “pray more, read your Bible more.” As well-intentioned as that advice is, it’s akin to giving a drowning person a cup of water. A cup of water is a life-giving item that we need to regularly consume. But to that particular person, in that particular moment, it’s simply adding to the problem they already have.

I have already tried reading more and praying more. But if one is praying and reading for the wrong reasons, it doesn’t just not help. It actively makes the situation worse. If we’re doing these things from a quid pro quo mindset, that if I do the right rituals God will accept me, I have misunderstood God. He does not need me to make myself worthy before He accepts me. Trying to do even more to make myself worthy just further aggravates the problem.

The second answer was to realize how sinful I am. While this is also a good and necessary step, the problem is that it begins with self-focus. And with such a negative self-focus as the starting point, it’s hard to truly accept the love of God.

The third answer was to develop a sense of awe toward God. As with the other two, this is a vitally important part of the Christian life. But it doesn’t create a relationship with God. I can be in awe of historical figures, of animals, of sunsets… that doesn’t make me close with them.

So, where does a person start when they don’t feel connected to God?

Faith. Training ourselves to believe God when He says something is the biggest step we can take toward feeling the love of God.

“The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. ‘The Lord is my portion,’ says my soul, ‘therefore I will hope in him.'” (Lamentations 3:22-24 ESV).

God’s steadfast love never ceases, and His mercies never end. Like the manna on the ground for Israel, every morning begins with new love and mercy from God. What that means in practical terms: God loves me before I read my Bible and pray. God loves me before I do the good works He wants me to do. God loves me at the end of a day of sin struggles and ineffectiveness.

Those of us who don’t feel the love of God are hardwired to not accept that truth, or to bend it to make it fit our frame of reference better. We think He loves us better when we do more for Him. We think He doesn’t want to hear from us when we’ve sinned. What we need is faith to believe verses like Lamentations 3:22-24.

A practical example of this came in a recent study I did on Jesus’ baptism. Commenting on the Father’s words, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased” (Mark 1:11b), N.T. Wright says,

“The whole Christian gospel could be summed up in this point: that when the living God looks at us, at every baptized and believing Christian, he says to us what he said to Jesus on that day. He sees us, not as we are in ourselves, but as we are in Jesus Christ.”[1]

2 Corinthians 5:21 confirms this idea by telling us that God made us the righteousness of God in Jesus. When you and I come before God each day, He is well pleased with us. When I first read this quote and thought it over, my brain literally could not process it. “God can’t be well pleased with me,” I’d think. “There’s too much wrong with me.”

I still struggle with the thought every day. But He doesn’t love me based on how I did today. He doesn’t fluctuate in His feelings toward me. Even when we turn from Him completely, as the Prodigal did, He stands waiting to embrace us upon our return.

This may seem painfully basic, and perhaps even dumb to many of you. But it really is that simple. To those of us who feel unlovable, accepting that God loves us – not on the basis of achievement, or ritual, or anything else beside His own character – is something that we have to train ourselves to do.

Faith is the key. Faith tells us to stop listening to ourselves and start listening to God and believe Him when He says He loves us. Once we’ve done that, then everything else takes on a whole new light. We read the Bible and pray not to prove ourselves to Him and stay in His good graces, but to draw near to the God who loves us. We serve not out of a sense of transactional duty, but out of joy to serve our Father.

Believe God when He says He loves you. It really is that simple.

[1] N.T. Wright, “Mark for Everyone.” Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press. Kindle Edition, location 289.