“In this is love, not that we have loved God but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins” – 1 John 4:10

WE WILL NEVER fathom the depths of this wonder that God loved us when no love for Him could ever be found in our hearts. We had no regard for God whatsoever, no interest in seeking Him, seeking first His kingdom and His righteousness. While we were enemies of God, in fact, God sent forth His own Son. Pause on this for a moment, despite all our familiarity: God sent His own Son; He gave the best He had to love us. This is not some kind of philanthropist who gives generously reserving the best for themselves; no, this is God pouring out His life to reconcile us to Himself.

We would never have loved God had He not stooped so mercifully and tenderly toward us in our hopeless state. This is not just a God of love but also a God of wrath Who would have been perfectly righteous to give us all that we justly deserved. “While we were enemies”, do we really comprehend that? That isn’t just some of us; it’s every one of us. Yes, we were enemies of God; we opposed God by our very sinful and disobedient nature. We were born with it and we all carried the very guilt of Adam. That is what we inherited (Romans 5:12, 18-19); our DNA carried that spiritual malignant gene and we were completely helpless to remedy that irreversible sentence. Now that has been gloriously reversed if we are new creatures in Christ (Romans 5:15-17). A thousand people may speak or write so eloquently about this and we may have heard and read it a thousand times, but if this wonderful Truth is not made real to us by God Himself, we are still a captive to our condemned nature. No, it is not Truth just heard or read; we have to be moved by it and of course it involves emotion – a great deal of it.

The question was asked by George Whitefield to Howell Harris on their first meeting, “Mr Harris, do you know your sins are forgiven?” and there is the difference; do we know we have been forgiven; does the Spirit impress upon us that we have been adopted and reconciled to God? Do we know we are children of God and that we are loved by Him? Let it be taken further: do we feel that we belong to God, that we are indeed heirs of Him? I know this domain of feelings has been abused in the realm of Christendom and of course feelings can be misleading, but when it comes to the witness of the Spirit with our spirits, feelings and emotions are never absent, never.

This kind of Love that first sought us and clothed us with the righteousness of Christ does not end there. It is amazing in and of itself that God condescended so low to redeem us, but will such Love end? Would our failings ever exhaust this ocean? When Paul states in Romans 8 that nothing in all of creation shall separate us from the love of God, does that take into account our future weakness and sin? Is it your fear that somehow you will not persevere until the end? I think we have all known such fear. When we consider Peter’s faith not failing because Christ – our Great High Priest – prayed that it would withstand all that would be powerful enough to obliterate it, does it not console us and remove such clouds of despair? Yes, of course we would fail to the point of no return and were it not for the longsuffering Love of God we would all have ample reason to remain perturbed and distressed. How we were brought into the Grace in which we currently stand is how we are going to continue running this great race with perseverance to cross over that finishing line. There will never come a point of man boasting before God because salvation is ALL of Him from beginning to end. It is a Love that first found us and a Love which begun a good work in our hearts that shall most certainly be brought to completion. God will not justify those whom He will not glorify (Romans 8:30). Shall an artist bring dishonour to themselves by abandoning their greatest work uncompleted? Neither will God bring to dishonour His workmanship. This is Truth we can be confident in because Scripture indisputably states that (Philippians 1:6), but it is also Truth that motivates us to love and serve God in ways we have yet to.