Dear friend on Friday evening,
Elul began today, the month whose name is a love song. So tonight, the word for the love itself, and a promise that explains why you have been drawn to seek God at all this season. It was never only your idea.
“I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have drawn you with lovingkindness.” (Jeremiah 31:3)
The word is ahavah, אַהֲבָה, “love.” And God attaches an astonishing adjective to his: ahavat olam, אַהֲבַת עוֹלָם, “everlasting love.” Olam means from beyond the horizon of time, without beginning and without end. So God’s love for you is not a response to your recent behavior, good or bad. It did not switch on when you started seeking him this month, and it will not switch off when you fail again. It is olam: it was already running before you were born, and it will still be running when everything else has stopped.
Then comes the word that reframes your whole Elul: “therefore I have drawn you.” The Hebrew is mashakh, מָשַׁךְ, “to draw, to pull, to tug toward yourself.” Feel what God is claiming. The reason you have felt any pull toward him this season, any ache to return, any tug to seek his face, was not you generating spiritual energy. It was him, drawing. “No one comes to me,” Jesus said, “unless the Father draws him” (John 6:44). That restless wanting to come home is the felt evidence of a love that has had hold of you the whole time.
And this love is not soft. The Song of Songs calls it azzah kamavet, עַזָּה כַמָּוֶת, “strong as death“, as fierce, as unstoppable, as final as death itself, a flame that “many waters cannot quench.” Here is the wonder for us: God’s love did not only prove as strong as death. It went into death, on a cross, and came out the other side. A love stronger than death is not a poem. It is a Sunday morning and an empty tomb. That is the ahavah that has been drawing you home.
אַהֲבָה · ahavah · love
אַהֲבַת עוֹלָם · ahavat olam · everlasting love (Jeremiah 31:3)
מָשַׁךְ · mashakh · to draw, to pull toward
עַזָּה כַמָּוֶת · azzah kamavet · “strong as death” (Song 8:6)
Older than your seeking. The great fear underneath a season of repentance is, “what if I only matter to God when I am doing well?” Ahavat olam answers it. His love has no start date tied to your performance. It is everlasting on both ends. You are not loved because you returned; you returned because you were already loved, from before the horizon of time.
The pull was him. If you have felt drawn to God this Elul, even faintly, do not take that lightly, and do not take credit for it. That pull is mashakh, his drawing. Your desire for him is the near end of a rope whose far end is in his hands. Follow the tug home; it leads to the One who has been reeling you in with chesed, steadfast love, the whole way.
Stronger than death. Elul’s love is not sentimental. It is azzah kamavet, fierce enough to walk into a grave and back out. When you wonder whether God’s love for you can survive your worst, your failures, your fears, even your dying, the answer of the Hebrew is: it is as strong as death, and in Christ it has already outlasted death. Nothing in you is stronger than the love drawing you home.
Put a start date on nothing. Tonight, refuse the lie that God’s love began when you got serious. Say it: “everlasting love”, no beginning, no end, not earned.
Name the pull, and follow it. Whatever drew you to seek God this month, thank him for it, it was mashakh, his drawing, not your striving. Then take one more step toward home along that rope.
Trust the strong love. Bring the fear you think could finally separate you from God, and set the verse over it: this love is strong as death, and it has already been through death and won.
Step 2 of tonight’s worksheet helps you recognize the drawing that has been on you all along.
LORD, tonight I stop believing your love for me has a start date. You have loved me with an ahavat olam, an everlasting love, from before I existed and long after I fail. And now I understand the pull I have felt this season: it was you, drawing me, mashakh, with steadfast love. I did not work up my way toward you; you have been reeling me home the whole time. And your love is strong as death, so strong it went into the grave and came back. There is nothing in me it cannot outlast. Draw me all the way in. Amen.
The word is ahavah (ah-hah-VAH), אַהֲבָה, “love.” God calls his ahavat olam (ah-hah-VAT oh-LAHM), “everlasting love” (Jeremiah 31:3), and says he has mashakh (mah-SHAKH), “drawn,” you with it. The Song calls love azzah kamavet (ah-ZAH kah-MAH-vet), “strong as death” (Song 8:6), a love that, in Christ, went through death and out the other side.
The Ahavah Kit:
📄 Ahavah Print Pack · the word, the verse, and the practice as a clean 5×7 PDF for your Binder
✍️ The Love That Drew You · a worksheet to recognize the drawing that’s been on you all along
📖 Ahavah Deep-Dive · Everlasting, and Strong as Death · ahavat olam, mashakh, the drawing, and love that outlasted the grave
🎙️ Ahavah Meditation · a short audio to follow the pull home
🔊 Ahavah Pronunciation Guide · the key words in Hebrew, slow, say-it-after-me
Another page in the Binder you’re building, one word at a time.
Paying readers keep these words free for everyone. Your subscription unlocks tonight’s Kit and carries the free words to the next person who fears God’s love has a start date.
👉 Unlock tonight’s Kit · $70 for the year. About 19 cents a day, and twice daily you get a Kit, a print pack, two worksheets, and two audio guides, for under a dime each. Paid subscribers also get first access to the Hebrew for Christians ebook, out in August.
💛 Happy Elul, and thank you for spending its first day with me. These notes stay free because readers pass them on, so if someone you love thinks they have to earn their way back to God, send them this: he has been drawing them with an everlasting love the whole time.
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