Love Of The Father

This song was a personal prayer before it was a congregational song.

I remember the night I prayed it for the first time vividly. I was sitting down at the Rhodes in my studio at home late at night, the speaker slightly crackling, journal open in front of me, my wife long asleep in the room across the hall, my dog, Louie, laying on the carpet a couple feet away, and a deep yet holy ache placed within my soul.

It was a night filled to the brim with feelings of comparison, doubt, and questions of worthiness. I’m sure we’ve all been there, at the very least to some extent.

We look back at moments we feel we fell short and replay them time and time again, a frustrating mental record scratch, pulling us and latching us to a moment that, more often than not, isn’t even half true.

I started writing out of that place - a place of feeling as if love was something that had to be earned, a place of feeling that I’m not enough as I am, a place of just craving to be called “BELOVED” and being able to accept it as an actual truth. I felt lost in it all, and thankfully the Lord gave me the clarity to seek His word in it all. I took these feelings and started comparing them to the promises shown to us within the scriptures, the word of God.

...You knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful and I know that full well.

- Psalm 139:13b-14

See what great love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God!

- 1 John 3:1

I have loved you with an everlasting love.

- Jeremiah 31:3

You are loved FOREVER.

- Romans 8:38

That last verse grabbed hold of me and would NOT let go. I had to grapple with that word “FOREVER” for a good, long while. Forever goes in both directions. I was loved before I took a breath or was even a thought in the minds of my parents. I was loved when I entered the world. I was loved after each and every victory, and even more importantly, after each and every sin. I am loved NOW. I’m loved come tomorrow. I’m loved the next time I fall short. I’m loved the next time I get back up again.

A love that is at both sides and directions of eternity kind of love is a love WITHOUT CONDITION. A love without strings, a love meant to stay, a love that couldn’t be earned, a love that carries weight.

Phrases of pain and frustration written on the page in front of me began to shift to phrases of hope and clarity. Realizing that all God wants to do is SHOW ME this love, to let it wash over me like a wave, covering me from all feelings of iniquity, unworthiness, comparison, and lacking.

It’s my prayer and my absolute hope that the words and the prayers within this song do a similar work within and upon you and your heart today. I pray that you feel the love of your Father. It’s real. It’s not an obligatory kind of love - it’s a REAL love. One that won’t abandon you, one that won’t threaten you, but one that you can count on right now and forevermore.

It’s a love that’s in all the days behind you and in all the days in front of you.

If you ever felt that you were not enough, if you’ve felt that you’ve had to earn every last bit of love, I’m here to tell you that He wants you in His arms. He says “I love you, and I will never bring you harm.”

So stop your waiting and fall into His embrace, because your Father loves you. Your Father wants you.

Ethan Rounds

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