The Bible tells us that God is love and we are supposed to love as Christ loved us. However, God’s definition of love is different than the world’s definition. This devotion looks at those differences and explains why Jesus’ loves us more.
Nuggets
- The world’s love is predicated on tolerance, but Jesus’ love goes straight to the heart.
- World love says, “I’ll love you as long as …” but Jesus loved us enough to die on the cross for us.
- While the worldview wants to give the illusion that it is inclusive, but it isn’t; Jesus truly is inclusive.
- It seems that many world relationships do not last very long, but Jesus wants to spend eternity with us.
- People may not love as they say, but Jesus loves us with a pure love.
We put a lot of emphasis on the emotion of love. Unfortunately, many people think about love only the way the world does. This is not how God loves.
God is love (I Jn. 4: 8). He has demonstrated that love to in us countless ways — if we will open the eyes of our hearts to see it.
And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
Ephesians 5: 2 (RSV)
We are supposed to live according to that love. How is God’s live and Jesus’ love different from that if the worlds?
The World Love Is Shallow
“May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God” (Eph. 3: 19 NLT)
The world’s love is predicated on tolerance. “You show me you love me by letting me do what I want, and I’ll love you by letting you do what I find acceptable — and we will get along fine.”
Part of the problem with the world’s love is it changes all the time. It really doesn’t have roots.
Jesus’ love is much deeper than that. It goes straight to the heart. That is where He lives in disciples, isn’t it? (Shake your head yes.)
Jesus’ love never changes. “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” (Heb. 13: 8 ESV).
The World’s Love is Conditional
“For I am certain that nothing can separate us from his love: neither death nor life, neither angels nor other heavenly rulers or powers, neither the present nor the future, neither the world above nor the world below—there is nothing in all creation that will ever be able to separate us from the love of God which is ours through Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 8: 38-39 GNT)
Did you read that up there? World love says, “I’ll love you by letting you do what I find acceptable.” It says, “I’ll love you as long as …”
What happens when I do something you don’t find acceptable? Audios. Auf Wiedersehen. Goodbye.
Now, look at Jesus’ love for us. “But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners” (Rom. 5: 8 NLT).
Yes, that is talking about God loving us. God did the sending, but Jesus did the dying.
Do you think Jesus is going to go through all of that pain and humiliation if He doesn’t love us? If He doesn’t see the need for the plan of salvation?
If you have not admitted that your relationship is not right with God,
have not asked Jesus to be your Lord and Savior,
and have not confessed your sins,
please read through the Plan of Salvation and prayerfully consider what God is asking you to do.
The World’s Love is Selective
“And He died for all so that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for the One who died for them and was raised” (II Cor. 5: 15 HCSB)
The worldview wants to give the illusion that it is inclusive, but it isn’t. The world still has its cliques. Here where I live, the trend is to put a “Qualifier”-American in front of everything.
That is inclusion? No, that is division.
Jesus truly is inclusive. Remember what Paul told the Ephesians a couple of devotions ago? “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3: 28 NASB). Love promotes unity, not dissension.
The World’s Love Is Fleeting
“He had always loved his followers in this world, and he loved them to the very end” (Jn. 13: 1 CEV)
It seems that many world relationships do not last very long. Part of the problem is we are not looking for Mr./Mrs. Right — we are looking for Mr./Mrs. Right Now. Some have gotten used to changing partners almost as often as they change their shoes.
Jesus wants us to grow together. In fact, He encourages it.
And not just for a short time. Jesus wants us to spend eternity together.
The World Really Keeps Its Love to Itself
“Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law” (Rom. 13: 8 NASB)
People may say they love others, but have you ever known someone who said it but didn’t really mean it?
They may have kept their love to themselves because it is a defense mechanism. They have been hurt too many times by the worldly love it put themselves out there again. So, they go through the motions, but part of them is closed off to protect themselves.
There are those people that have ulterior motives when telling someone they love them. It may be control, manipulation, exploitation … the list could go on and on.
Jesus loves us with a pure love. He is giving and giving … and giving some more.
The World’s Love Can’t Save Us
“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (Jn. 3: 16 NIV)
Sometimes, we look for people who can save us. We want them to either fix us or completely change us.
Not going to happen. Even if they could, it would only be temporary.
There is nothing they can do to change our status from spiritually dead to spiritually alive. They can’t even change their own.
Only Jesus can save us. “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me” (Jn. 14: 6 NKJV).
Making the Connections
When we make the comparisons, the world’s love falls flat. How could we expect it to stand up to Jesus’ love?
Love is the reason Jesus did all He did. What did He do?
Redemption is where something is used in exchange for something else to gain or regain something. Jesus is our Redeemer because He was born of a virgin, making Him 100% God and 100% man; died a painful and humiliating death on the cross for us so that His blood could pay the price for our sins; and because of God’s great might and power, rose from the grave, conquering death and paying the price for our sins. Atonement made it a repayment for a wrong (a.k.a. our sins).
Jesus sacrificed Himself — substituted Himself — became the propitiation — for us so He could do the hard stuff, the stuff we would never be able to do. Jesus knew God’s wrath had to be appeased so He shed His blood to pay the price for our sins.
Sanctification means to make holy. Holy mean to be set apart, perfect, and pure. We were made holy because Jesus redeemed us and atoned for our sins.
Redemption allows us to receive forgiveness for our sins. Forgiveness is when God pardons us because we have broken His laws and commandments. We accept the pardon by letting go of the guilt and remorse that we feel because we have done something wrong. It is a conscious decision to accept His forgiveness.
This can’t be said too much — Jesus gave His life freely for us. He didn’t have to do that. He wanted to do that.
I love the line in What a Beautiful Name. “You didn’t want heaven without us So Jesus, You brought heaven down.”
What a Beautiful Name
Vocalist: Elaine Guthals
Pianist: Chris Vieth
We were the reason God designed the plan of salvation. Jesus was the willing sacrifice that carried out the plan. Nope, it is beyond my scope of understanding how that was all able to take place.
I don’t have to know. I have to believe.
You don’t have to know. You have to believe.
How Do We Apply This?
We access this grace through faith. Faith is the belief that the doctrines stated in God’s Word are true, even if we do not understand all aspects of them. Faith is a product of love. We have to have faith to accept God’s love.
We have to accept the gift of salvation wholeheartedly. We can’t say, “Well, we’ll take this Jesus cat up on His offer just in case.” Or we can’t say, “We’ll take the fire insurance, but we aren’t going to live for Him.”
Think of it this way. Jesus paid the price for our sins — if we accept His gift of salvation. If we don’t accept the gift, we have to pay the price ourselves.
Father God. Your Word tells us You are love. We see evidence of that all around — with our eyes, with the eyes of our minds, and with the eyes of our hearts. Help us to grow in that love. Help us to withstand when the world’s love tries to pull us away from You. Amen.
What do you think?
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Why does it say ‘nuggets’????.????????
I used to say cliff notes, but I switched it to nuggets. I decided to have it to be the main point of the section. I put them in the social media posts and emails I send out to show what the devotion will be about.