The apostle Paul wrote, "There has never been the slightest doubt in my mind that the God who started this great work in you would keep at it and bring it to a flourishing finish on the very day Christ Jesus appears" (Phil. 1:6 MSG). You gotta love this. God promises to keep chasing us and working in us even after we start our journey of faith.

This is great news, because the thing we tend to do best is botch things. God forgives us; we fall again. God gives us courage; we get discouraged. God gives us a dream; we make it a self-actualizing quest filled more with us than God. God gives us gifts; we go prodigal with them and use them for our own advantage. Let's face it; if we were God, we would kill us.

The wonderful news is that God knows us completely and still loves us. J. I. Packard writes, "There is tremendous relief in knowing that his love to me is utterly realistic, based at every point on prior knowledge of the worst about me, so that no discovery now can disillusion him about me, in the way I am so often disillusioned about myself."

God bases his decision to pursue us and work in us on his unconditional love. Unconditional love loves without conditions-it isn't based on the actions of the one being loved. This God-kind of love simply sets value and preciousness on us. It isn't an earned thing; it just is. We are loved because we are. We belong because we are. When this truth becomes real to you, there is no more fear of abandonment. In fact, this "perfect love drives out fear" (1 John 4:18).

Virginia Lively tells of a vision she once had of Jesus Christ that gives us a snapshot of this kind of love. She writes, "[The] thing that struck me was his utter lack of condemnation. I realized at once that he knew me down to my very marrow. He knew all the stupid, cruel, silly things I had ever done. But I also realized that none of these things-nothing I could ever do-would alter the absolute caring, the unconditional love that I saw in his eyes. I could not grasp it! It was too immense a fact. I felt that if I gazed at him for a thousand years, I still could not realize the enormity of that love."

I have no idea why, but God loves us. He believes in us. He trusts us. He pursues us. When we see that, really remember that, we can't help but love him back.

Our loving him is a "reflex" action from discovering his love for me. John said, "We love [him] because he first loved us" (1 John 4:19). When you visit the doctor and he hits that "spot" just below your knee (or on your elbow), there is a "reflex"-an autonomic muscle response. Unless you're diseased, you can't help it. The same is true here. Unless you're deeply diseased with sin and deception, the more you hear about and catch a glimpse of God's love with the eyes of your soul, you can only respond with love back towards God. It's a reflex.

I think the secret to loving God "more" is ordering our lives in such a way that we intentionally and consistently experience the face of God. The more we see his face, the more he hits that "spot" in our souls that causes the "reflex" of love back towards him. Loving God more is possible if we intentionally face God more. I think this is why the Psalmist prayed again and again, "Restore us, O God; make your face shine upon us, that we may be saved" (Psa. 80:3).

I want more face time with God. I want to forget him less. The journey of faith is all about gazing at the One who is invisible. I want to journey well. David prayed, "One thing I ask of the LORD, this is what I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and to seek him in his temple" (Psa. 27:4).

We need to find ways that help us experience the face of God. There are lots of ways. I feel like I experience God most easily as I ponder the Scriptures. As I wrestle with texts, grace dawns inside me. My wife, Gail, taps into God's presence as she sings and worships. Others touch God's face most by getting together with other believers or by retreating into times of solitude or by one of the other many spiritual practices modeled in Scripture and church history (i.e. study, worship, celebration, service, prayer, fellowship, confession, submission, solitude, silence, fasting, sacrifice, etc.). Once you find the pathways that help you succeed at experiencing God's presence then commit to practicing those pathways.

Happy journeying.