In a nutshell: God is love; Jesus is God; Jesus is love incarnate; we are the recipients of His love; we are to share His love with the world.

Yesterday, we covered doing whatever the Lord says to do. Today, we will cover why. God loves us. He always has and always will. He has never stopped loving us. Even sin doesn’t keep Him from loving us. In fact, “He demonstrated His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). What we often fail to see is that Christ’s Coming was a Rescue Mission. It wasn’t to stop the anger of God from falling on us sinners, but to save us from the consequences of our own actions, which destroy us and always lead to death. Jesus could physically heal everyone who comes to Him, but instead, He heals us spiritually by joining us as new creations. He wants to move us beyond this life of the consequences of sin and death to a new life with Him–beginning right NOW! We actually live two places at once: Here on planet Earth and in His kingdom at His throne with Him,

⁴ But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, ⁵ even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— ⁶ and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, Ephesians 2:4-7

Notice why God did what He did through Christ: He is rich in mercy and has great love for us, therefore, He has poured out His grace on us and has raised us up with Him. We are seated with Him in the heavenly places with Christ Jesus!

My favorite verse is John 17:24 from Jesus’ Priestly prayer. In this verse, Jesus states what His ultimate goal is for everyone who will believe in Him, “Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.” This verse is RICH with theology!

1. Jesus calls God His Father,
2. He puts forth His desire to the Father, and is assured of its coming to pass because He knows the Father intimately (John 17:25-26).
3. He wants us to be with Him in glory,
4. That glory has belonged to Christ since before the foundation of the world.

The apostle John says it best in 1 John 4;19, “We love each other as a result of His loving us first.” “And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face Him with confidence because we are like Christ here in this world”* (1 John 4:17).

Abba, thank You for loving us. You have expressed that love through Jesus Christ. All we can say is, “Thank You,” and then live in Your love**. You are love incarnate, Lord Jesus. Help us to learn to be like You and share Your love with the world. Amen.

*We will discuss this verse tomorrow.

**Living in God’s love calls for obedience to His Spirit. Only He knows what is truly best for us; He wants to help us navigate this world with the least amount of damage and with His will being accomplished through us with Him.