Emily W Dean

A Quarterly Blog by Emily Dean

Why Easter Reminds Us God Cares

Have you ever struggled to believe that God cares enough to know about you? Not even just to know about you but to know you personally and intimately? I mean, yes of course you believe that God cares for the 7 billion people on the planet, and you
probably regularly exhort people to believe that God cares for them, but what about you? Do you fully believe that God cares for you? A number of years ago I went through a season of struggle with doubt. I wrestled with the question why would God have time for me when there are 7 billion people on the planet? How could He possibly know everyone intimately, and especially why would he even care to know me? It was a time
when my circumstances weren’t what I thought they were going to be. My doubt about God’s direction led me down a spiral of doubt about God’s care and concern for me. I began to think God had bigger, more important things to do than to look after me. Have you ever felt this way? You feel like you’ve followed God to the best of your ability, and yet life is just not working out how you expected? It’s so easy when our circumstances
are not what we want them to be to assume that God doesn’t care. That God doesn’t know.

Yet the scriptures clearly show us that God does know. God knows right where you live. God knows everything about what you’re going through. As I searched the scriptures during that season of doubt, I clung to everything I could that reminded me of the truth that God is sovereign. That He is in control. That he does care. In fact, scripture tells us the proof that we have of God’s love for us is not that our circumstances are great. Instead, God’s love is proven by what Christ did on the cross (Romans 5:8). That’s how we know God cares, not by what’s going on in the world around us but by Christ’s death and resurrection for us.

A.W. Tozer said that if God is not all knowing, then He cannot be sovereign. ¹ To understand God’s sovereignty, we must understand that God is omniscient or all-knowing. During that season as I would bring to Him my doubts and my fears, I tried like the Psalmist to rehearse the truths that I know about God. Over time God began to show me that I was looking at it from my point of view. You see, as a human I only have capacity for a few close relationships, not nearly the 1,000+ friends I have on FB. I can’t possibly have close personal relationships with all the people I interact with on social media. You can’t either. As humans we are limited in our capacity for relationships. So
then, I couldn’t comprehend how God could possibly have capacity for relationships with 7 billion people, but I realized I had a very limited view of God. I was making God in my
own image, not recognizing God for who He is. To understand and believe God’s knowledge of us, we must have correct knowledge of Him.

As ministry leaders it’s easier sometimes to teach others about what to do during seasons of struggle than to practice it ourselves. Here’s a few thoughts on believing what you teach:
1) Be honest with yourself and God

• God knows what you’re going through
• Don’t hide behind shame and guilt
• Confess your doubts to Him
• Ask Him for grace to trust Him more

2) Rehearse the scriptures – say it over and over to yourself until it sinks from your head to your heart

Some of my favorite reminders of God’s care for us are:

• Humble yourselves, therefore under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you at the proper time, casting all your cares on him, because he cares about you. (1 Peter 5:6-7).
• But God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us (Romans 5:8).
• Cast your burden on the Lord and He will sustain you; He will never allow the righteous to be shaken (Psalm 55:22).
• Now the eye of the Lord is on those who fear Him–those who depend on His faithful love (Psalm 33:18)

3) Remember the cross

• When doubt comes to mind, think about the cross
• While the cross was an instrument of death, for us it represents the gift of life

4) Reflect on God’s love

• Sometimes you just need to sit in a quiet space and let the love of God fill you
• Remind yourself that you are loved by God
  Jesus’ death and resurrection was a visible demonstration of God’s love for us. Not only
  does He tell us He loves us in the scriptures, He showed us by coming to earth and
  offering the way to life. In seasons of doubt, let what He did be the proof of His care for you.

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¹ A. W. Tozer, Knowledge of the Holy, (San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1961), 108.