No one loves us as God does. This devotional reading looks at how God’s love is different from worldly love.
Nuggets
- God’s love is unconditional.
- God’s love is meaningful.
- Jesus’ love is unselfish and unstinting.
- Jesus’ love is functional.
- Our love with Jesus has to grow us and branch out to our relationship with others.
We have to remember the love being discussed here is not a worldly love. It is a spiritual love.
That alone would make it unique. But there is more.
Let's Put It into Context
To read devotions in the On the Day of the Lord theme, click the button below.
Devotions in the Getting Started in Revelation study
The foundation of this series is Witherspoon’s sermon The Love of Christ in Redemption.
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We the People
A Unique Love
“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love” (Jn. 15: 9 ESV)
God’s love is unconditional.
We are used to love coming and going. We tend to love only when certain conditions are met.
God isn’t like that. God loves us unconditionally.
We can’t earn God’s love. It isn’t based on what we do or don’t do.
No, being a good person isn’t going to make God love us more. But then neither is keeping all His laws and commandments.
God’s love for us is sacrificial. It is the crux of His Plan of Salvation. It is the foundation of the gospel, the law, and the prophets.
Just as God showed His love for us by giving up His Son, Jesus showed His love for us by dying for us.
Jesus told us to continue in His love. We are to imitate Jesus. He imitates God. That means He imitates God’s love for Him.
We should, too.
Once we see how great a love God and Jesus have for us, we should joyfully believe it is so.
Witherspoon said that we should be obedient because of God’s redeeming love. That is a fantastic motivation.
But Thomas took that a step farther. He said that love is sustained by obedience. “If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love” (Jn. 15: 10 ESV).
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That should make us want to give love in return to Them.
No, John 15: 10 does not make God’s love conditional. “If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love …” (Jn. 15: 10 ESV).
It doesn’t say anything about God’s love for us. It says we will persist, endure and abide.
That’s the hard part, isn’t it – abiding in Jesus’ love? There are so many motivations for us to love Him.
- We want fire insurance, but we’ll go on living as we always have lived.
- We want to cover all bases so that — surely — one way will get us into Heaven..
- We think it is a prosperity gospel.
- We want to follow God because of His benevolence but not because of His Sovereignty.
- We like the idea that there is someone in control, but we don’t like giving control to that person.
- There are probably as many motivations as there are people.
Maclaren said that we should be the object of God’s love. Sometimes, it is difficult to be the object of anyone’s love. He explained it this way:
“What is meant is not our continuance in the attitude of love to Him, but rather our continuance in the atmosphere of His love to us. But then, whosoever thus abides in Christ’s love to Him will echo it back again in an equally continuous love to Him.”
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What does Maclaren mean by atmosphere? We live in the environment of God’s love. We let it surround us.
We may not be feeling it at any given time. Or we may have a different opinion as to how that plays out in a relationship.
We have to realize that spiritual love is unique in that we are expected to embrace all the different things that encompasses. It is infinite, unchangeable, and everlasting.
An Expressive Love
“Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you” (Jn. 15: 3 ESV)
God’s love is meaningful.
This is an interesting verse. But I think we need the context here.
Jesus was celebrating His last Passover with His disciples. He was telling them He was the true vine.
But it was more than that. “Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit” (Jn. 15: 2 ESV).
As disciples, we need to bear fruit. So many times, we just see that as witnessing, but that isn’t what Paul said. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law” (Gal. 5: 22-23 ESV).
Yes, witnessing is a part of sanctification. It isn’t a part of salvation.
We are to work out our salvation to become more like God.
Then Jesus told the Apostles they are already clean. Why? “… because of the word …” (Jn. 15: 3 ESV).
The disciples were clean because they believed in Jesus’ message.
That belief is to change us to bring meaning to our lives.
A Generous and Disinterested Love
“And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God” (Eph. 5: 2 ESV)
Jesus’ love is unselfish and unstinting.
Usually, we wouldn’t say being disinterested is a good thing. We think it to mean that we don’t care enough.
Well, sort of, but no.
We can say that Jesus wasn’t interested in the trappings of His Deity. His priority was not His glory.
Instead, our redemption was Jesus’ priority. He had an unselfish love for us.
Jesus gave up everything to accomplish the Plan of Salvation. “who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited. Instead he emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity. And when he had come as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death — even to death on a cross” (Phil. 2: 6-8 CSB).
Oh, don’t get me wrong. Jesus was still God. He was still divine.
I think the New Living Translation explains it the best. “Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When he appeared in human form” (Phil. 2: 7 NLT).
Jesus sacrificed Himself because that was God’s Plan to restore our relationship with God. He gave Himself for us.
There was nothing we could do to restore our relationship with God – except accept His love. Jesus loved us even though He would never receive anything from us.
It is in that love which we are supposed to walk. Walking is the term used to describe how we live our lives, specifically our habitual state of mind, behavior, and manners.
Let’s look at some verses that talk about Jesus offering Himself for us.
- “He has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for his own sins and then for those of the people, since he did this once for all when he offered up himself” (Heb. 7: 27 ESV).
- “how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God” (Heb. 9: 14 ESV).
- “so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him” (Heb. 9: 28 ESV).
- “Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you really are unleavened. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed” (I Cor. 5: 7. ESV).
- “for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself” (Heb. 9: 26 ESV).
- “So Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through his own blood” (Heb. 13: 12 ESV).
- “But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering” (Heb. 2: 9-10 ESV).
This offering was voluntary. God didn’t force Jesus to do this. God asked, and Jesus agreed.
Yes, the object of God’s love is sinners.
The intensity of Jesus’ love is immense. It is unmatched.
A Most Fruitful, Active, and Beneficent Love
“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another” (Jn. 13: 34 ESV)
Jesus’ love is functional.
Yes, Jesus wants us to believe in Him as God’s Son, but that has to have some impact on us. It has to be more than a thought in our heads.
Belief in Jesus has to change our lives.
Our love has to be built on our relationship with Christ. It has to be vital. It has to be applied.
Our love with Jesus has to grow us and branch out to our relationship with others.
Jesus didn’t just preach at people. He ministered to them.
We are called to do the same.
Being fruitful is what we were talking about before. We can’t just be a good person and not have God’s love change us.
But then again, we can’t be changed and not share that with others.
Both must flow out of our relationship with God.
Jesus’ love in us has to be shown in our consideration of the needs of others.
Making the Connections
Maclaren showed us the connection among love, obedience, and joy.
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We must abide in love. This is our duty. Because we remain in God, we are blessed.
We’ve already said that love is sustained through obedience. If we are not going to obey His commandments, how can we say that we love God?
That obedience brings us joy. It also brings us peace.
How Do We Apply This?
- Remain in God’s love.
- Keep God’s laws and commandments.
- Firmly believe in Christ.
- Apply Jesus’ love to our lives.
- Recognize Jesus’ sacrifice and be willing to sacrifice ourselves.
- Make sure our sacrifices are perfect for God.
- Exhibit Jesus’ righteousness, not our own.
- Don’t refuse God.
- Sympathize with God.
- Show our love for Jesus to others.
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What do you think?
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