Understanding How Much God Loves Us

Many people go through life afraid that they will never be good enough to satisfy God, even if Jesus did pay for their sins.  When things go well they are on top of the world, excited about God’s blessings but when something goes wrong, they are in the dumps, wondering what they did wrong to make him upset.  Satan plays on these emotions, making people doubt their salvation and false teachers convince them they need to rededicate their lives or get saved all over again.  Some go to the altar every week as a result, not realizing that their emotions are a result of a lack of faith. 

The cure for such emotional instability is to take the time to really understand how much God loves us.  I John 3:1 tells us to examine his love more closely.  “Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not.”   God has shown his love for us by adopting us as his children, as Galatians 4:4-5 tells us.  “But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.”  Titus 3:5-7 makes it very clear that adoption as his children was not based on anything we had done.   “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; Which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour; That being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.” 

Romans 5:8-10 expands on this point, stressing that God loved us even whem we were his enemies.  “But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.  Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.  For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.”  We were not just reconciled so that we don’t have to face God’s wrath at the judgment.  We have also received a new life in which we are no longer under sin’s power, according to Romans 6:3-6.  “Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?  Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.  For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection: Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.”

As we saw in I John 2:1-2 it is not God’s will that we sin, but he has made provision if we do.    “My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.” 

God has invested a great deal into us, and will allow nothing to wipe out his investment.  Romans 8:32-39 reminds us, “He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?  Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth.  Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.  Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?  As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.  Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.  For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”    

Since Christ is our advocate, and he was the one who gave his life to justify and cleanse us, making full payment for our sin, so that we could be adopted, there is no one who has the power to successfully challenge our adoption.  There is nothing that can weaken or destroy his love for us.  He knows the worst things about us and still loves us. 

While he may find it necessary to chasten us, he is never arbitrary, but always acts with our good in mind, as Hebrews 12:6-10 tells us.  “For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.  If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?  But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons.  Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live?  For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness.”  Even the chastening we receive is proof of his love, and is for the purpose of teaching us to understand and do what is right.  When we understand how much he loves us, we will no longer struggle with the fear and doubt.