The Reality of God’s Love

Foreword

Over the decades, much has been preached, taught, and written about God’s love, but very little scriptural truth has been revealed about it.

The Bible is where God’s character and the basic concepts of godly love are revealed to humankind. For the most part, Christians are comfortable with the beliefs that have developed about this feature of God’s character.

Christians often claim that because God is love, he loves everyone; he loves us because he created us, he loves us from birth, he loves us equally and unconditionally, and he will never stop loving us.

We in the Christian community do not question any aspect of these principles and reject any argument to the contrary. We reason that our beliefs are true because that is what we have been told, and we rarely question what we are told.

Because we don’t want to offend anyone by mentioning the subject of sin, we have turned this single godly attribute into our gospel message. However, the simple message “God loves you” does nothing to convey the need for a personal Savior.

The concept of God’s love is woefully misrepresented throughout the corporate church. Consequently, we have effectively altered God’s character and diminished his holiness and sovereignty. As a result, we have become complacent about others’ salvation. We function on our comfort level and have settled for lifestyles in which our relationship with God has lost its significance.

Much of our spiritual knowledge is derived from a steady diet of soft sermons and introspective reading material rather than on God-centered teaching designed to illuminate spiritual truths and stimulate growth.

We have become a community of believers with little depth of understanding focused on our needs and what God can do for us; we are convinced we are in good standing with the Lord.

In this book, we will explore our beliefs about godly love by examining the spiritual truth in scripture. Scripture in this book is paraphrased or quoted from the NIV Life Application Study Bible. I hope you will find this enlightening and thought provoking as the Holy Spirit leads you through this fascinating study.

Chapter 1

God Is Love

God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.

—1 John 4:16

Let’s start by delving into the meaning of this scripture starting with the first three words, God is love.

God refers to the eternal creator (Psalm 90:2; Isaiah 40:28), and the word is is to make something evident, to point out, or give knowledge of something invisible, a form of the word (be: to exist, have reality). Is gives evidence to the existence of God’s love and expresses the knowledge of the invisible characteristic in the omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent God.

Am is another form of the word be—greatness, abundance, largeness, unstressed, not subjected to physical, psychological, or emotional pressure; “I AM WHO I AM” (Exodus 3:14). The eternal, invisible, present, self-existent Creator and sustainer of life is never stressed or pressured.

YHWH/YAHWEH—God’s personal name is a verb meaning “to be,” a continuous action.

God is a continual reality in our lives working in us and through us.

Love is something that cannot be seen. Its components include:

• emotion—feeling, sentiment, sensation, passion

• virtue—desirable quality, kindness, affection

• attitude or mind-set—a way of thinking or behaving

• characteristic—a feature that distinguishes or represents a person

• force—an invisible power in our lives

Love is a tender affection, kindness, and personal attachment to someone. It seeks the best interests of others regardless of their actions.

Some other godly characteristics include the following.

• compassion—pity, sympathy, or understanding for the suffering of others often including a desire to help: “The Lord is full of compassion and mercy” (James 5:11); “Because of His goodness, the Lord shows compassion to everyone” (Psalm 145:8–9).

• mercy—kindness or forgiveness shown to someone. Because of His kindness and love, we are saved by His mercy (Titus 3:4).

• forgiveness—to pardon and release from the penalty for wrongdoing. Everyone who believes in the name of Jesus receives forgiveness (Acts 10:43). God is faithful and just and will forgive our confessed sins (1 John 1:9).

• grace—the unearned favor of God that provides for our salvation. We are justified by His grace (Romans 3:24); the Lord is compassionate, gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in love (Psalm 103:8).

Love is probably the most identifiable of God’s virtues. It brings joy, contentment, comfort, and peace. It is the unseen force that gives meaning to our lives.