God Doesn’t Love Me: 3 Reasons To Be Sure He Does

Inside: When you’re in a season of thinking, “God doesn’t love me,” these 3 hope-filled Bible reasons show why you can be sure He does. Plus how to get through future moments of doubt.

For an eternity of years, I was convinced God didn’t love me. That I didn’t matter to Him.

Can you blame me? I was drowning in misery and begging Him to save me. Once, I literally fell to my knees in my kitchen, weeping out my distress and pleading with Him to help me.

What did I get in return?

Crickets.

It felt like He hadn’t answered my prayers in forever. I felt rejected and unloved by Him, which broke my heart to pieces.

So you know what I did? I pretended like I believed God loved me.

True story.

I went to church every Sunday and cried through praise and worship, looking like I was backstroking through my blessings. But really, I was drowning in despair.

I was desperate for soul-saving hope that maybe—just maybe, despite everything—He loved me after all.

Kinda like where you’re at right now.

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The Taboo of Thinking: God Doesn’t Care about Me

If you’re where I was, your belief that God doesn’t love you is probably your most closely guarded secret. So close, you don’t even write about it in your journal. Because it makes you feel unrighteous and sort of…well, unsettled.

It’s like an exposed electrical socket you avoid at all costs, afraid it’ll shock you to an agonizing death.

Because everyone knows, admitting out loud—or even in the darkest corner of your heart—that God doesn’t love you will make Him smite you and send you directly to hell. No passing Go or collecting two hundred dollars.

Right?

Wrong.

For all those years, I tortured myself with worry that God didn’t love me while hiding it from every single person in my life. Yet here I stand, years later, unsmited and reveling in His unconditional, unfailing love for me.

So don’t worry, your secret fear about God not loving you is safe with me.

But let’s talk about why you doubt His love in the first place, and why you’re dead wrong.

Why Do I Feel like God Doesn’t Love Me?

Suffering and tragedy touch just about every human being. Death, trauma, rejection. Name it and you can be sure it’s been too close for comfort.

But those are expected in every life and don’t necessarily make you doubt God’s love for you. It’s the other niggling everyday things that mostly do the job.

They burrow into your subconscious when you’re not looking and take root. Before you know it, small disappointments become an ingrained belief that God doesn’t love you.

Under your feelings of doubt about God’s love lies one or more of 3 fundamental questions to which you want answers.

Let’s pull these questions to the surface and bring them into the light of day. Because if we don’t address and answer them, they’ll cause your feelings that God doesn’t love you to solidify into an unshakeable belief.

But when you expose and confront them, you take away their faith-stealing power and get back your confidence in God.

1. If God loves me, why doesn’t He help me?

Ah, those pesky unanswered prayers you’ve been hurling at God. It would be one thing if the occasional desperate plea boomeranged back to smack you in your face. But it feels like years since God last bothered to answer you.

Your prayer journals bleed with your anguish.

You’ve begged God to help you; you’ve pleaded with Him to rescue you from your quagmire of misery. You’ve sobbed real tears while begging and pleading.

His response? Deafening silence.

So you wonder: If God loves me, why can’t He see that I’m hanging on by a thread? Why doesn’t He help me? Does God even care that I hurt?

The truth is, God has lots to say about your life and what you’re going through. And the first place to look for an answer is in His Word.

Every part of Scripture is God-breathed and useful one way or another—showing us truth, exposing our rebellion, correcting our mistakes, training us to live God’s way. Through the Word we are put together and shaped up for the tasks God has for us.

2 Timothy 3:16-17 (MSG)

So the question becomes, why aren’t you hearing Him?

Thankfully, the answer is simple: You’re probably muting Him in ways you’re not aware of or don’t want to acknowledge.

For example, you value others’ opinions above His, so you discard what He says because it doesn’t line up with what they say. Or you’re indulging in secret, deliberate sin, which deafens you to godly wisdom.

We’ll tackle this problem in a minute. But first, let’s address the other two elephants in the room.

Bonus: As a bonus for joining my weekly newsletter, get this free printable download—Your Faith & Trust Reboot. It gives you 5 simple tweaks to power up your prayers for direction so you can triumph over doubt and fear.

2. Why would God love me? I’m nothing special.

If the people at your church ever caught wind of your belief that God doesn’t love you, they’d probably squirm in discomfort, tell you to count your blessings, and pelt Bible verses at you from up on their pedestals of righteousness.

John 3:16 would surely end up in the mix.

But you’re not too sure that particular scripture applies to you. Sure, God sent Jesus to die so everyone who confesses their belief in Him can be saved for eternity. But you’re just one faceless woman in a crowd of 7.5 billion people.

Besides, the verse says God so loved the world. All of it.

It doesn’t say God sent Jesus on a seek-and-save mission especially for you. He just sort of worked out a general solution to cover everybody in one shot.

Right?

Wrong.

You’re measuring our divine God by a worldly yardstick, which will never work out well for you.

The truth is, God loves you unconditionally, which—great news!—doesn’t depend on your worthiness.

We’ll get to why shortly.

3. The world has real problems. Why should God care about mine?

Murder and mayhem, accidents and deliberate destruction. It can feel like the world has gone crazy. Five minutes of news on any given day will make you wonder what the heck is going on.

Some days it seems like the world is going down in a flaming ball of fire. Compared to that, it’s easy to feel like God has more pressing issues on His plate than your first-world problems.

Job worries, relationship troubles, and general life concerns crumble to dust next to devastating hurricanes, plane crashes, and terrorist attacks. 

So your boss is a jerk and you hate your job. Who cares? What does the constant friction between you and your partner matter, or that you hate going home? Is it really important that you’re a grown woman who still hasn’t found her calling in life?

Not to God, you reason. Surely not with the real problems on His plate.

Related: Are Your Problems Important To God? The Powerful Truth

There’s your worldly yardstick again, measuring God as if He’s people. Trying to cram Him into human limits.

Put your yardstick down, my darling. It’s only making you more miserable, reinforcing your belief that God doesn’t love you.

Let’s get into the Bible truth of why you’re thinking about this whole thing all wrong.

But Here’s the Thing

One or all of these reasons are why you feel like God doesn’t love you. But you still have a mustard seed grain of hope that He does.

I know, because you’re here, looking for reasons to stop believing the painful thought, “God doesn’t love me.”

Plus, if you didn’t have that kernel of hope, you’d have abandoned your prayers by now.

Instead—like me when I was caught in the thornbush of doubting God’s love—you keep praying because you want to believe He loves you.

You want to believe that your reasons for thinking otherwise, as logical as they seem, are somehow wrong.

You’re right.

They’re wrong!

God loves you more than the words in any article on the internet can say.

No kidding.

Even more, you’re not alone in feeling like God doesn’t love you anymore.

Guess who also felt that way? Besides the lady in the pew next to you, who might be singing, “Oh, how He loves us!” at the top of her lungs but sometimes doubts God’s love too.

David.

My God, my God, why have you abandoned me? Why are you so far away when I groan for help? Every day I call to you, my God, but you do not answer. Every night I lift my voice, but I find no relief.

Psalm 22:1-2 (NLT)

Say what now? David felt like God wasn’t answering his prayers? The same David who was a man after God’s own heart?

Yup.

And you’re not wrong for wondering why the first line of that Psalm sounds so familiar. Jesus quoted it while He was dying on the cross.

God didn’t smite David or Jesus for feeling ignored and abandoned.

So, yes, your reasons for doubting His love feel very real.

But what if they aren’t?

What Are Signs That God Loves You?

You’ve just about convinced yourself that God doesn’t love you because you’re looking for reasons to believe it’s true.

But that feels terrible and—be honest now—all it’s giving you is more misery.

Someone once said you get what you focus on, and they were right. So let’s change your focus and seek out reasons to believe that God does love you.

But we don’t want pie-in-the-sky, just-because-I-said-so, count-your-blessings-and-shut-up-reasons.

Instead, let’s get some solid, Biblical wisdom to help you see God’s love for you.

1. God’s rescue comes right on time.

One reason you feel like God doesn’t love you is that He seems silent in your life. Because it feels like He never answers your prayers for help.

Related: 6 Clear Signs God Is Speaking To You (And You’re Missing It)

But He may be waiting for the right time to rescue you.

The Lord isn’t really being slow about his promise, as some people think. No, he is being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to be destroyed, but wants everyone to repent.

2 Peter 3:9 (NLT)

You’re rolling your eyes, thinking this is some empty, motivational Christianese. That the time for His rescue was 6 months ago.

I get it because I’ve been where you are.

But years on the other side of feeling like God didn’t love me, I look back now and see the truth: He was waiting for me to need Him more than I needed what I was clinging to with a death grip.

You see, deep down, I knew I’d have to release the things making me miserable—mostly my idolatry of other people’s opinions and acceptance. But I wasn’t ready to give it up.

I can admit it now: what I wanted was for God to magically make my life feel good again.

If He’d extended His hand of rescue to me one minute earlier, I’d have pulled a Lot’s wife for sure.

Remember what happened to Lot’s wife! If you cling to your life, you will lose it, and if you let your life go, you will save it.

Luke 17:32-33 (NLT)

Instead, when you trust God’s perfect timing, you take the hand He offers you, let Him pull you from your pit of despair, and say sayonara to that faith-killing death trap forever.

2. God specially made you.

You’ve gotta love David. He wasn’t shy at all about grabbing hold of that exposed electrical socket of doubt you and I avoid for fear of God smiting us.

O Lord, how long will you forget me? Forever? How long will you look the other way? How long must I struggle with anguish in my soul, with sorrow in my heart every day? How long will my enemy have the upper hand?

Psalm 13:1-2 (NLT)

But once he processed his messy feelings—“I am a worm and not a man…I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint”—he always went back to praising God for what he knew to be true.

For it was you who created my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I will praise you because I have been remarkably and wondrously made. Your works are wondrous, and I know this very well.

Psalm 139:13-14 (CSB)

My darling, you’re no cookie-cutter creation that came off an assembly line in Heaven. And God doesn’t look down from heaven and see one giant blob called humanity.

God handmade you.

No one handmakes a common, throwaway item. When something is labeled handmade, you know it’s a unique labor of love, specially crafted by a master. You won’t find another one exactly like it anywhere on Earth.

That’s you.

If God didn’t love you, He wouldn’t have handmade remarkable, wondrous you.

3. God cares about your problems.

Back when I was drowning in misery in my good-looking life, I had a Negative Nelly in my inner circle telling me to suck it up and learn to be grateful.

In essence, he told me I was creating problems where none existed. And I believed him.

What could I say? He seemed right. My life looked great, and I was embarrassed and ashamed for being unhappy.

But he was dead wrong.

You see, no matter what the most condescending person in your life says, your problems are real.

Of course you’re grateful for your job, despite having to pep-talk yourself out of bed every morning. At least it keeps a roof over your head, food in your belly, and your closet decked out with the latest from the outlet mall.

Sure, you love your partner, even though you don’t love how he makes you feel. You’re glad you don’t have to go to the movies or out for dinner alone.

Yes, you have a good life, even though lately it feels like a scratchy, ill-fitting suit. At least you’re more than keeping up with the Joneses.

But why is it wrong to want more from your job than a roof and groceries? To want more from your relationship than a dinner date? And to want more from life than what everyone else calls success?

It isn’t wrong.

These problems exist in your heart, which means they exist, period. And God doesn’t compare them to anyone else’s problems.

Amid the disasters of life, God cares about your specific problems.

How precious are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered! I can’t even count them; they outnumber the grains of sand!

Psalm 139:17-18a (NLT)

If God didn’t love you, He wouldn’t think countless thoughts about you.

So get rid of the thought that God doesn’t care about you or your first-world problems. Because—come on now—what’s the probability of those countless thoughts not including concern for every aspect of your life?

(The answer is nil, in case you hesitated.)

On top of this, our God—who created this universe and untold galaxies beyond—can surely care about large-scale tragedies while still caring about your personal misery.

How to Stop Believing: God Doesn’t Care About Me

You know the 3 reasons why you feel like God doesn’t love you:

1. It looks like He doesn’t answer your prayers and has no plans to send out a rescue party.
2. You feel lost in a crowd of billions and think you’re not special to Him.
3. Your problems can’t possibly be important to Him compared to what’s going on in the world.

You also see now where your reasoning—and therefore your feelings—are all wrong.

1. God’s rescue comes right on time, even if it feels late to you.
2. God specially handmade you, which means you’re uniquely crafted by the Master of the Universe.
3. God doesn’t compare your problems to those of others, and He cares about everything concerning you.

This leaves us with one more problem to solve: how to deal with your doubts when they come back.

Going forward, how do you handle it when you feel like God doesn’t care? What do you do when it feels like God has abandoned you?

1. Surrender when you feel like God doesn’t love you.

Here’s the thing. God isn’t a sniveling little wimp whose feelings get hurt when someone doesn’t like Him.

Jesus—hanging on the cross—cried out His agony and feelings of abandonment to God. You can take it as proof that it’s safe to surrender your doubts to Him.

I made earth, and I created man and woman to live on it. I handcrafted the skies and direct all the constellations in their turnings.

Isaiah 45:12 (MSG)

Our God who did all that is surely big enough and strong enough to bear the burden of your doubts.

But how do you let go of your doubts?

Surrender means you stop looking for reasons to believe God doesn’t love you. And it means you confess your feelings to Him.

All of them. Preferably out loud. Like David did.

He already knows all about them but you’ll get relief when you talk it out with Him.

2. Pray and praise God when think He doesn’t care.

No kidding.

Prayer and praise are weapons, and you need to use them like you’ll die if you don’t.

Hallelujah! Praise God in his holy house of worship, praise him under the open skies; praise him for his acts of power, praise him for his magnificent greatness. Let every living, breathing creature praise God! Hallelujah!

Psalm 150:1-2, 6 (MSG)

Use the weapons of prayer and praise as often as you need to. Non-stop throughout your day, and everywhere you go.

God will never get tired of hearing from you and He won’t tune you out.

For I cried out to him for help, praising him as I spoke. If I had not confessed the sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened. But God did listen! He paid attention to my prayer. Praise God, who did not ignore my prayer or withdraw his unfailing love from me.

Psalm 66:17-20 (NLT)

So if you feel like God doesn’t love you 1000 times a day, pray and praise your doubts away 1001 times.

3. Study about God when you want to know if He loves you.

When you find yourself thinking God doesn’t love you, it’s time to stop depending on your feelings and go straight to the Source.

Because here’s the thing:

God is not a man, that He should tell or act a lie, neither the son of man, that He should feel repentance or compunction [for what He has promised]. Has He said and shall He not do it? Or has He spoken and shall He not make it good?

Numbers 23:19 (AMPC)

On top of which:

And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 8:38-39 (NLT)

Which answers the question, does god ever stop loving you? Through Paul, God answers with a resounding NO.

So if:

1. God is incapable of lying;
2. He says He loves you unconditionally and ceaselessly;
3. But you think God doesn’t love you…

Then you have to wonder: Where’s the lie in this equation?

I’ll call it out to make sure you don’t miss it: the lie is in your fickle feelings and thoughts that He doesn’t love you.

And you need to counteract that lie with the truth from God’s word.

So when you feel like God doesn’t love you, dive deep into His word and soak up everything He says about His love for you.

How Do I Reciprocate God’s Love?

Whew! You made it!

You stuck your finger into the taboo electrical socket, faced your doubts about God’s you, and here you are, unsmited.

Which isn’t surprising when you think about it.

Thomas doubted Jesus’ resurrection but Jesus didn’t smack him in the face and rebuke him for it.

Instead, Jesus graciously understood Thomas’ doubt and helped him through it.

Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here, and look at my hands. Put your hand into the wound in my side. Don’t be faithless any longer. Believe!”

John 20:27 (NLT)

This is the same Thomas who went on to be an apostle, by all accounts evangelizing in Asia and dying for the cause of Christ.

Those years when I thought God didn’t love me were straight-up the most miserable of my life. I was never so glad to be wrong when I learned for myself just how much God loves me.

The next thing I wanted to know was how to love Him back.

You see, when you get God’s love—when its immensity stops you in your tracks—your love in return feels too big to contain and you need an outlet for it.

When this happens, ask God to show you how to pay His love forward.

Whether you help a single mom in your neighborhood, donate time or other resources to a charity, or start a small group Bible study about God’s boundless, unfailing love, you can’t go wrong.

Your Action Checklist for Believing God Loves You

These days, I don’t fake like I believe in God’s love. He’s demonstrated it in countless ways, the same way He shows you.

I see those ways—even though I probably miss many of them—because I look for them, and stopped looking for proof that God doesn’t love me.

You can seek for and find those signs of God’s love for you too.

What’s the price of two or three pet canaries? Some loose change, right? But God never overlooks a single one. And he pays even greater attention to you, down to the last detail—even numbering the hairs on your head! So don’t be intimidated by all this bully talk. You’re worth more than a million canaries.

Luke 12:6-7 (MSG)

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