And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him. Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as He is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love. We love Him because He first loved us. (1 John 4:16-19 NKJV)
God is love. Jesus Christ first brought to men the conception that man loves God only because God has first loved him. In vain we search for such an idea in the philosophies of Greece and Rome. The men who fixed this thought in the literature of mankind were followers of Jesus Christ. Might and majesty were the dominating ideas of B.C., but since A.D., we think of love enthroned in the divine nature.
His love passes knowledge. We may apply to it the masterly arraignment of Psalm 139. It winnows our rays. It besets us behind and before. It lays on us its gentle restraining hand. It is high, we cannot attain to it. If we ascend into heaven, it is there; if we make our bed in the grave, it is there to lift us to His heart; if we take the wings of the morning, it shines as sunrise; if we pass into the darkness, it makes the midnight shine as the day. It covered us in our birth; it will tend us in old age. How precious it is, and how infinite in its expression, no mortal lips can tell.
Even our sin will not lessen that love. That Peter sinned deeply; who can doubt, but did it put a screen between him and Christ? Absolutely not, for when Christ arose, He sent specially for him. In the garden He restored him, and at the lakeside He taught him that His love would be as acceptable as ever (Mark 16:7; John 21:15).
His love will not spared. Jesus looked on the young man and loved him! But He read him through and through, and mercifully gave the unwelcome command: "Go, sell all that you have... and follow Me." He went away sad, and Christ went away sad! But He loves us too well to spare us! God's love is consistent with stern dealings at those things which may cause us to fail at doing our best.
We believe in God's love when it seems not so. "We have known," says the Apostle, that "God is Love," unutterable and changeless! But there are times when we have to believe in it, i.e. in the perplexity of life's problems. We are often facing incidents and providences that strike us as inconsistent with God's love. Then we must believe that the same love is still there. God Is love, and nothing can reach us save through His love.
PRAYER
May I not be satisfied with talking or thinking about Your love, Heavenly Father. Grant me the grace of manifesting it, not only in great crisis, but amid petty annoyances and the daily grind of life. I pray this in Jesus' name, AMEN.
God's Daily Promise
Promise #275:
I am righteous in all My ways and kind in all that I do.
Psalm 145:17 (WEB)
Yahweh is righteous in all
his ways,
and gracious in all his
works.
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