Wednesday, August 24, 2016

You Are Loved

God wants a love relationship with us. The Bible commands us to love God. Yet, man in sin has no desire to love God. How can we love God until we know God? People know about God, but we don't know Him through experience, until His love pursues us. "We love Him because He first loved us" (1 John 4:19). You are loved by God.

Why should God love us? Certainly, not because of any merit on our part. We have all failed God in one way or another. God's love for us is motivated by who He is. "God is love" (1 John 4:8). God's love for us is unconditional and everlasting. His love for us is proven at the cross of Jesus. "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son . . ." (John 3:16). You are loved.

How do we experience God's love? It can only be experienced in your heart, through the Holy Spirit. "The love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us" (Romans 5:5). God's love changes our hearts. The gift of the Holy Spirit is the gift of God's love in us.

Being in love with God is an everlasting relationship. He loves us with a love which is from everlasting to everlasting. The Bible assures us that nothing "shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:39). You are loved forever.

God's love works through us to love others. You become a conduit for God's love to flow through you to touch the lives of others. God's love is never static. It is always active through us for others. "Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another" (1 John 4:11). You are loved to love others.