Hovering over Psalm 106 this morning — started it yesterday, finished it today. It’s the biography of a people. Not just any people, but God’s people. His chosen ones, His nation, His inheritance (106:4-5). A story of their repeated sin, of His repeated saving, and again of their repeated sin. You would think that where miraculous saving has occurred, multiplied sinning would cease — evidently not. But I don’t need to read Israel’s bio to know that, I have my own story. And that’s what’s got me chewing this morning on the abundance of His steadfast love.

Many times He delivered them,
but they were rebellious in their purposes
and were brought low through their iniquity.

Nevertheless, He looked upon their distress,
when He heard their cry.
For their sake He remembered His covenant,
and relented according to the abundance of His steadfast love.

(Psalm 106:43-45 ESV)

Many times . . . He delivered . . . He looked . . . He heard . . . He remembered . . . according to the abundance of His steadfast love.

I can’t fathom the abundance of His steadfast love. It’s more than just the frequency of His love — though, praise God, it is nothing less. If it was just about an allotted number of “passes”, then I’d be in danger of using up all mine and running out. But it isn’t. And so, I’m not. Praise God for the abundance of His steadfast love!

Yeah, more than just quantity, His abundance is about quality. It’s about the depths of a love which is deeper than I can imagine. It’s about the breadth of His love, wide enough to cover sin of all sorts, and not just what I can imagine doing but also sufficient to cover the sin I cannot imagine doing. It’s length is forever, the abundance of an unfailing and surely to be realized promise. And it’s height? From heaven . . . for God so loved the world that He sent His Son!

If I ever get comfortable with thinking I’ve grasped the love of God, then I’m pretty sure I’ve underestimated it. And if I’ve underestimated it, it’s probably because I’ve overestimated myself, thinking of myself better than I am and thus His love needing to be less abundant than it truly is.

God’s abundant love is not something you grasp, it’s something that takes hold of you. It’s never fully realized, but something which can be fully rested in. Not something to acknowledge and then move on from, but something which forever we will want to lean into.

. . . 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 . . .

(Ephesians 3:17b-19a ESV)

To know the love that surpasses knowledge. How’s that for a lifelong ambition? As one songwriter has penned, “It’s like trying to fit the ocean in a cup” (Three Minute Song by Josh Wilson).

Praise God for the abundance of His steadfast love!

The limitless source of His grace. His eternal signature for His glory.