We don’t feel our life is significant unless someone has noticed it!! Even when we are serving out of love, we still all have a need for someone to notice what we do!! Attentiveness is what we want from our husbands, children, parents, etc. However no human can possibly give us the amount of attention we desire. We are all imperfect and none of us appreciate and encourage as we should.
If you feel overlooked and haven’t received the love and support from the people around us, take those feelings to Jesus who completely understands. Think about the fact that He was disappointed by those in His home region and by the leaders of the synagogues who did not give Him the recognition He deserved. But Jesus was content to know that the Father was completely attentive and pleased with Him.
We need to realize that only God can fulfill our desire for attentiveness!! St. Augustine said, “God loves each of us as if there were only one of us!!” There are many scriptures that tell us how attentive He is to us.
During a time when I was feeling lonely and thought I wasn’t getting the attention I deserved, God started reminding me of His attentiveness to me through His Word and I started a list of the Scriptures. Nothing is more energizing than hearing and comprehending how God looks on you:
He thinks I’m beautiful from head to toe and cares for every part of me:
Song of Solomon 4:7b (Song of Solomon is a picture of God’s love for us) You’re beautiful from head to toe, my dear love, beautiful beyond compare, absolutely flawless
Psalm 45:11 The king is enthralled by your beauty; honor him, for he is your lord
He notices my hair
Luke 12:7 But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows. (I’m sure no one else in the world knows the number of hairs on my head)
He lifts my head up:
Psalm 3:3 But You, O Lord, are shield for me, My glory and the One who lifts up my head.
He wants to see my face and hear my voice:
Song 2:14 “O my dove, in the clefts of the rock, In the secret places of the cliff, Let me see your face, Let me hear your voice; For your voice is sweet, And your face is lovely.”
He embraces me:
Psalm 68:19 Praise the Lord; praise God our savior! For each day he carries us in his arms.
He holds my hand:
Isaiah 41:13 I am holding you by your right hand—I, the Lord your God. And I say to you, ‘Do not be afraid. I am here to help you.
He knows my heart:
1 Samuel 16:7 For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.
Psalm 44:21 would not God have discovered it, since he knows the secrets of the heart?
God is interested in the details of my life:
Psalm 37:23 The steps of the godly are directed by the Lord. He delights in every detail of their lives.
He stores my tears in a bottle:
Psalm 56:8 You number my wanderings; Put my tears into Your bottle; Are they not in Your book? (our husbands probably don’t want any more of our tears)
He claims me and allows me to claim Him:
Song of Solomon 2:16a My beloved is mine, and I am His…
Zech. 13:9 I will say, ‘This is My people’; And each one will say, ‘The Lord is my God.’ “
He knows what I want:
Psalm 38:9 Lord, all my desire is before You;
He knows when I’m upset:
Psalm 38:9 And my sighing is not hidden from You.
He thinks about me:
Psalm 40:17 As for me, I am poor and needy, but the Lord takes thought for me. You are my help and my deliverer…
Jeremiah 29:11 He has thoughts of good toward me
He won’t forget about me:
Isaiah 49:15 “Never! Can a mother forget her little child and not have love for her own son? Yet even if that should be, I will not forget you.
God loves me as much as he loves Jesus:
John 17:23 I in them and you in me, all being perfected into one. Then the world will know that you sent me and will understand that you love them as much as you love me.
Jesus loves me more than he loves himself:
1 Peter 2:24 He personally carried away our sins in his own body on the cross so we can be dead to sin and live for what is right. You have been healed by his wounds!
Holy Spirit loves us:
Romans 5:5 And this expectation will not disappoint us. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.
God delights in me and sings over me:
Zeph 3:17 For the lord lives among you and takes great delight in you. He renews you with his love and celebrates over you in singing a happy song just for you
Psalm 42:8. “By day the LORD directs his [covenant] love, at night his song is with me, a prayer to the God of my life.”
God rejoices in me:
Psalm 104:31 The Lord rejoices in all he has made!
He knows my name and has tattooed it on His hand to prove I belong to Him:
Isaiah 43:1-2 But now thus says the Lord, who created you, O Jacob, and he who formed you, O Israel: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by your name; You are Mine.
Song of Solomon 2:16 “My lover is mine, and I am his.”
Isaiah 49:16-18 See, I have written your name on my hand.
God has set me apart for Himself and he is ready to listen to me:
Psalm 4:3 “You can be sure of this: the Lord set apart the godly for Himself. The Lord will answer when I call to him.”
He’s interested in my daily happenings and journals about us: (Our memories are so special to God that He takes pains to write down each one. He was so interested in our daily happenings He wrote them in a journal before they ever happened)
Psalm 139:16 “Your eyes saw my unformed body; in Your book all my days were recorded, even those which were purposed before they had come into being.”
I may be overlooked by everyone else but I am handpicked by God:
Romans 8:30 And having chosen them, he called them to come to him. And he gave them right standing with himself, and he promised them his glory.
He chose me from the very beginning to be in His family:
Ephesian. 1:3-6 How we praise God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms because we belong to Christ.
[4] Long ago, even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes.
[5] His unchanging plan has always been to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. And this gave him great pleasure.
[6] So we praise God for the wonderful kindness he has poured out on us because we belong to his dearly loved Son.
God wants me near Him:
James 4:8 Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
God calls us His friend and shares His secrets:
Psalm 25:14 Friendship with God is reserved for those who reverence him. With them alone he shares the secrets of his promises.
John 15:15, “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.”
Lack of human attention should get our attention. God is desiring our company, and He longs to be intimate with us, He waits all night long, watching over us, waiting for us to rise, hoping that He might be the first thought of our morning.
Loneliness has done its work when it drives us to intimacy with God. Seeing how much He is interested in us should compel us to be attentive to Him. It should be less about the attentiveness God gives me and more about my giving God the attention He deserves. Adoring Him, hanging on His every word. And trusting Him completely.
Here is a poem/prayer to pray for ourselves that we might have such an intimate friendship with God:
Lord Jesus, make Thyself to me
A living, bright Reality;
More present to faith’s vision keen
Than any outward object seen;
More dear, more intimately nigh,
Than even the sweetest earthly tie.
By Charlotte Elliott