GOD IS INTENSELY INTERESTED IN YOU

God wants nothing but the best for each person and that includes you. 

• God made you for His purposes and His purpose is always good.

...God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. Genesis 1:27 (NIV) 

God saw all that he had made, and it was very good...Genesis 1:31 (NIV) 

But Adam and Eve messed up God's plan by listening to lies and choosing the wrong way. 

You and I followed the wrong way and messed up a lot of God's plans but that did not change God's heart towards us because...

... if a person isn't loving and kind, it shows that he doesn't know God—for GOD IS LOVE. 1 John 4:8 (TLB) 

When we are not loving and kind, it does not change the character of God or the heart of God towards us.

• God is love and he made you because He loved you.

• He loved you before the creation of the world. 

• He loved you when you were conceived and when you were born,

• and He loves you now.

But what if you were conceived in the back seat of a car after your parents had too much to drink?

• That does not change the love of God for you.

What if your parents brought you up in witchcraft and you were demon possessed as a small child?

• That doesn't change God's love for you. He doesn't blame you for what was done to you.

One of the most amazing characters in the Bible was a man with a terrible past. 

• We don't know his name but when he first met Jesus, he was running around naked and cutting himself with stones. He was possessed by hundreds of devils but he still had a human soul. 

When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and fell on his knees in front of him. 

He shouted at the top of his voice, "What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? Swear to God that you won't torture me!" Mark 5:6-7 (NIV)

He was so confused, that he could not distinguish his own thoughts from the thoughts of the demons who controlled him but he responded to Jesus with faith when the demons left him.

For Jesus had said to him, "Come out of this man, you evil spirit!" 

Then Jesus asked him, "What is your name?" "My name is Legion," he replied, "for we are many." Mark 5:8-9 (NIV) 

After Jesus drove out the demons with a word of power, the man was restored to sanity and begged to be allowed to stay with Jesus.

As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon-possessed begged to go with him. Mark 5:18 (NIV) 

But Jesus did an astonishing thing.

Jesus did not let him, but said, "Go home to your family and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you." Mark 5:19 (NIV) 

But the man did far more than tell his family.

So the man started off to visit the Ten Towns of that region and began to proclaim the great things Jesus had done for him; and everyone was amazed at what he told them. Mark 5:20 (NLT) 

After Jesus healed a totally insane and demon possessed man, He immediately commissioned him to go and tell his story to a whole region. 

• He became the evangelist for ten towns.

Before this man began to preach, the people asked Jesus to leave them.

• When Jesus returned later, great crowds followed Him and many people came to faith in the Son of God.

It may be that you have also been rejected and bullied. You may have been tormented by illness, depression or even demonised by involvement in witchcraft, drugs or sexual abuse.

Whatever your story might be, you are important in God’s eyes. He wants to give you a future and a hope.

For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope. Jeremiah 29:11 (NKJV)