...rooted and grounded in love...

I write alot about trusting in the Lord's sovereignty.  I wish I could say that's because it's something I've finally gotten figured out.  In reality, it's because it's something I struggle with daily...even more now.  It's so easy to get on here and write about how important it is to rest in the Lord and the fact that He is completely in control of life.  It's quite another when to say that when He completely shakes up life beyond what you ever thought you wanted...
But I'm not the only person who's been in that situation....I'm not the only person who's ever felt that way.  In fact, though I like to play the martyr, the things the Lord has brought about in my life are nothing compared to some of the things others have dealt with.  Look at Paul, who faced imprisonments, shipwrecks, and eventual death...never once did he doubt the Lord or His sovereignty.  Or Joseph, who was imprisoned by his own brothers, yet later forgave them, saying that "the Lord meant it for good."  The list could go on to more current stories of Corrie ten Boom, Jim and Elisabeth Elliot, and even Matt Chandler.
So where does the strength come from to respond in sch a way?  I think there are several things that help a person to rest so fully in the Lord:  absolute faith and trust, the discipline to choose joy, the realization that life is not about me...
Along with all of those, I think that it is absolutely critical to completely rest in the love of the Lord:  that He would allow us to know Him, to bring Him glory, to make much of Him, and to find our deepest joy and delight in Him.  One of my favorite passages I have been reading in Ephesians is found in 3:17-19, "so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith--that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God."
Those words are so rich, and so true...Paul says that by being "rooted and grounded" in love of the Lord, we will be able to know that which surpasses all dimension, all possibility, all measure.  By completely establishing ourself in Him, we gain a glimpse of that which is beyond knowledge for most.  It is by knowing His love and resting in it--come what may--that we are able to be filled with all the fullness that He is.
Today, may you know the insurmountable love of the Lord, and may you be full beyond measure:  full enough to rest in Him without doubt...