It took sitting beside a swollen river in far north Queensland, hearing a brother with skin far darker than mine, for my ears to hear the soothing words of a God whose love is persistent and indomitable.
I had been asked to serve the church in a small, isolated community in the Gulf Country of Queensland; so this white preacher took his Bible and set off into the sunset with a swag of sermons under his belt. Yet, as has been the case so often, those to whom I was to minister became the means by which God would speak to me.
The morning I heard God speak, it came through the humble mouth of an indigenous brother named Chris Toby as we were sitting quietly by the banks of the Nicholson River. Chris’ testimony would make you weep – it did me. It’s a story is filled with heartache and failure, victory and defeat. And it’s a testimony to the power of the gospel, no matter what your skin-colour or place in society.
But the words that God impressed on me came when Chris shared a simple devotion from John 13:1:
Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.
As the flies droned around my face; as the water rushed past and dogs fought in the dirt; while kids played with a stick nearby, the resounding truth of God’s persistent love came home to me.
…having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.
Having loved them. He loved them to the end.
I had been so familiar with the picture of the servant king who stoops to wash the grime from our feet; familiar too with that exchange between Jesus and the impetuous Peter. But I’d always hurried past the opening – and so missed the vital insight it gives into the heart of our Lord.
The love of Jesus is great, and deep, and wide, and encompassing. Yet John still feels the need chooses to add that phrase, “he loved them to the end.”
In the shadow of the cross—on the eve of his suffering—he loved them to the end.
I needed to hear this. As my brother, Chris Toby recounted the well-known story of Jesus moving methodically around that circle of his disciples, all I could think of was the persistent, indomitable love of Christ. All I could hear on the banks of the river that morning was the sweet whispering of a loving Saviour who reminded me that I am loved to the very end.
…having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.
Photo: Kyle Taylor, flickr
