Feeling the Love of God

[supersonicthehedgehog]

Why can't I feel it .

[1over137]

Why can't I feel it .

There are times when we do, there are times when we do not.

[Storyteller]

Why can't I feel it .

Honestly? I don't know. But I do know He loves you. Dearly. Eternally.

A few months ago, I felt I couldn't hear God, I think a few of the responses on that thread might help:(Why cant I hear God?)

[EssentialSacrifice]

Why can't I feel it .

You have to be real before it can be... check your batteries. Read your bible... Say more prayer ...

See what happens...

[bippy123]

Why can't I feel it .

There are many ways to feel his love my friend , don't think there is just one .
For me it happens at different times .

One time when I was a teen , I was watching the 60's movie king of kings and I remember Mary magdelene about to be stoned for adultery and Jesus steps in and says "let the one without any sin cast the first stone" . Everyone put their stones down and went home and the look on Mary magdelene's eyes brought tears to my eyes . I was thinking that this girl just slept with another woman's husband and Christ just fir gives her without a second thought .

This is perfect love . You can feel Christ's love from his actions throughout the bible my friend . Just don't force it. Trust me it will come . Be patient and keep knocking because Christ is faithful and he will answer that door to your heart

Trust me my friend , I've been where u are and you will get through it, not just be uses I've been there , but because Christ is faithful and always true to his word

[Kurieuo]

Why can't I feel it .

Because "the world" often causes us to feel a sense hopelessness which buries it.

[Nessa]

I think theres this thing where you feel like you are suppose to just have faith...that feelings of love would be great but its a spiritual luxury of sorts.

I dont feel Gods love...never have
but i know its not the way its suppose to be at all.

We were born to feel

[neo-x]

God's love is not a feeling, nor it can be felt. Its an act. And it can only be observed and then realized. A lot of people leave this earth seeing little to no love, think children born and died in Somalia's famine e.g.

God's love transcends past our material needs too. His love doesn't mean nice things always. Sometimes His love is carried out with his will, like his love for Jonah, who was taken by the fish and stayed in its belly for 3 days.

God hardly shows his love often, consider when churches are burnt, when Stephen was martyred, when Peter was crucified or when Paul was beheaded. Do you think they "felt" God's love right before their unfair deaths?

Or should we define God's love as some more than what we perceive love to be. We love others and if they in trouble we try to rescue them. On the contrary when God loves someone and they are sentenced to death, God hardly ever comes to rescue (think of soviet saints under U.S.S.R and other atheist regimes and people who die to this day because of being Christians).

So count your blessings and if you are still unsure about God's love, just look around and see for yourself. He may not be cuddling you but you're far better than a child working in a sweatshop factory being molested and working slave labor. Or you are not one of the 5000 children that die every day in third world countries because of the lack of clean drinking water.

If I were in your shoes, I'd say God loves you very much.

[Nessa]

God's love is not a feeling, nor it can be felt. Its an act. And it can only be observed and then realized. A lot of people leave this earth seeing little to no love, think children born and died in Somalia's famine e.g.

God's love transcends past our material needs too. His love doesn't mean nice things always. Sometimes His love is carried out with his will, like his love for Jonah, who was taken by the fish and stayed in its belly for 3 days.

God hardly shows his love often, consider when churches are burnt, when Stephen was martyred, when Peter was crucified or when Paul was beheaded. Do you think they "felt" God's love right before their unfair deaths?

Or should we define God's love as some more than what we perceive love to be. We love others and if they in trouble we try to rescue them. On the contrary when God loves someone and they are sentenced to death, God hardly ever comes to rescue (think of soviet saints under U.S.S.R and other atheist regimes and people who die to this day because of being Christians).

So count your blessings and if you are still unsure about God's love, just look around and see for yourself. He may not be cuddling you but you're far better than a child working in a sweatshop factory being molested and working slave labor. Or you are not one of the 5000 children that die every day in third world countries because of the lack of clean drinking water.

If I were in your shoes, I'd say God loves you very much.

Where do I even begin...

Please don't ever be a telephone hotline counsellor.... "You got raped once? Count your blessings you weren't raped by all his friends too..."

Do you think that someone can not feel God's love even before they are about to be unfairly killed? I never equated feeling God's love with favorable circumstances.

Love is not purely a feeling and yes...it is dangerous to just see it as that alone. BUT real love is not without feeling... . And that is communicated all through the bible. God is not some abstract, unfeeling being.. and He didn't make us that way either. We were made to feel love. His love.

I'm watching the tv series "humans" at the mo.. probably shouldn't be but thats another thread.... and by your definition.. we might as well be 'synths'

And "if you were in my shoes"? What kind of thing is that to say to someone you don't know a thing bout?

Though the irony of your post coming across as an "unfeeling act" is quite appropriate

[neo-x]

This was not the intention of that post nor was it written in a smug way. My point was that people don't often count their blessings. And also that we can't always feel God's love because we define love and understand it differently.

If your child was in danger, would you rescue him/her? Well God doesn't even though people are burnt in his name, so we know God loves us, but how do we define it, he often doesn't rescue his people? So shall we say God doesn't love us or just loves us in a way we don't understand entirely?

The love you feel for your child or your spouse or your self is generated by a chemical in your brain and that is why people who lack empathy e.g a serial killer, doesn't feel love the same way we do, that chemical is not produced in his brain the way it does in yours.

So the term, I don't feel God's love can be devastating because of unrealistic expectations of love. Just because we do know he loves us we just can't always expect that we will be treated differently when God does nothing when thousands of children die of hunger each day. So have realistic expectations I guess.

[Nessa]

So to you the feeling of love is just a bunch of chemicals in the brain?

[Nessa]

and like i said before... i'm not equating feeling God's love with favourable circumstances.

[neo-x]

So to you the feeling of love is just a bunch of chemicals in the brain?

In short, yes what else? don't tell me its in your heart?

Love we feel is real. For example, your child loves a comic hero in a book, the hero is a complete piece of imagination, but that love your child feels for that hero is not abstract, its there alright, its very real.

[neo-x]

and like i said before... i'm not equating feeling God's love with favourable circumstances.

Good but in practice, our minds tell us that is exactly what we should be able to see. That is why the problem of evil is such a stumbling block to many, because it is hard to square off the idea that you are raped and then told God loves you and always have and is always there for you, well that doesn't make sense. If he loves us why not save us? I would do absolutely anything to save my child from a rape, so would you. Our heavenly father might not.

[Nessa]

Its more complicated than the rape analogy though. There is free will etc we don't know how much God can intervene in circumstances. He can do anything but He himself has limited himself in order to give that free will. The analogy of God being like a father to us the way psalms describes is limited in the human sense. So taking that analogy to the extreme is what can fuel people's hatred of God.