God's Intimate Love

by Julian of Norwich

The Lord showed me spiritually how intimately He loves us. He showed me a little thing, the size of a hazelnut, on the palm of my hand, round like a ball. I looked at it thoughtfully and wondered, "What is this?"

And the answer came. "It is all that is made." I marvelled that it continued to exist and did not suddenly disintegrate; it was so small. And again my mind supplied the answer. "It exists, both now and for ever, because God loves it." In short, everything owes its existence to the love of God.

In this "little thing" I saw three truths. The first is that God made it; the second is that God loves it; and the third is that God sustains it.


Taken from Revelations of Divine Love by Julian of Norwich, edited by Clifton Wolters (London: Penguin Classics, 1966).