Loved Notes

How do we know we are deeply loved by God? We'll look at the Old Testament book of Daniel to see how God sends messengers to tell us about God's deep love.

This season we're exploring how we know we are deeply loved by God. In this episode, I talk about how, during his baptism, Jesus learned that he is deeply loved, and how this is really good news for us. I include a reading from the second chapter of my new book, We Are Beloved.

It's the fourth week of Advent, and our time with the shepherds is coming to an end. But before we go, they have one last lesson to share with us: once we know - deep down in our soul - just how deeply loved by God we are, we will not be able to help it: we will want to share the news of God's deep love with the world.

The signs of God's deep love are literally all around us, but often we don't see them. That's why we're continuing to journey with the shepherds as they go to see Jesus. The shepherds have much to tell us about the spiritual discipline of seeing, and how we can use our vision to notice the signs of God's deep love around us.

This week we're exploring how the shepherds (of the Nativity story) teach us about the spiritual discipline of going. We'll talk about God's invitation to journey with God in faith, and how even when we don't know exactly what God is calling us to, all we have to do is "just put one foot in front of the other." Turns out, this is a wonderful reminder in our journey of learning what it means to be deeply loved by God.

Welcome to the Loved Notes podcast! What started out as a weekly email message is now an audio production, though both have the same purpose: to remind us of how deeply loved by God we are. Even when we don't believe it, or feel it. And really, that's what Loved Notes is about: learning how we know about God's love, acknowledging what keeps us from owning it, and exploring ways to accept and live into and revel in God's deep love. In our first episode, we're looking at the story of the shepherds who were keeping watch by night when God broke into their midst in a big way. Turns out, this scruffy band of shepherds has a lot to teach us about how to listen for God's love in our lives.