The Lord has appeared of old to me, saying: ‘Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you.’
Jeremiah 31: 3 (NKJV)
Scripture: 1 John 4
I had a friend tell me that he has issues with the word “reckless” in Cory Asbury’s song, Reckless Love. I know I questioned it at first, but I kind of liked the idea that God would love us so much, He wouldn’t consider the consequences of His actions. But what my friend said got me thinking. This devotion looks at what reckless really means and how it applies to God’s love for us.
If you Google the definition of reckless, you get several. They talk about being careless and irresponsible, not thinking about the actions themselves, not caring about the danger and consequences, not worried that the end result might be bad, and not caring about the affect of the actions on others.
I can see my friend’s point. And I see where the word fits.
God does nothing that doesn’t fit into His plan. He is not careless and irresponsible. God sent Jesus to die because of the consequences. We may not fully understand how Jesus’ death on the cross paid the price for our sins, but God had thought it through. He did it because of us, so yes, He cared about the affect of His actions on others.
However, from our perspective, isn’t God’s love almost a reckless love?
Careless and irresponsible. We call a parent being responsible for a child’s death an irresponsible parent. Parents are supposed to love and protect their children, not kill them or willingly send them off to die.
But that is what God did. He sent Jesus to be born of a virgin to save us from our sins (Mt. 1: 21-23). He gave up His Son for the plan. His plan.
Not thinking of the actions themselves. Do you think God was dreading the day when Jesus had to hang on the cross and He would have to turn away? He is a loving Heavenly Father. He called Jesus His beloved Son (Mt. 17: 5).
I think that day probably weighed on God. But He loves us as much as He loves Jesus (Jn. 17: 23). He went through with the plan anyway. God was going through with this plan no matter the cost to Him or Jesus.
Not caring about the danger and the consequences. I’d never really thought about it before, but was it always a given that Jesus wouldn’t chuck the whole and and say, “I’m not doing this!”? We know He prayed in the garden for another way (Mt. 26: 39). We know He was tempted by Satan (Mt. 4: 1-11).
How close was Jesus ever to giving into the temptation? If He is to have gone through everything that we go through and overcame temptation, He would have to been close sometimes. Was this one of the times or was He so utterly committed to the plan, He didn’t have moments of doubt? We know Jesus struggled in the Gethsemane.
So even though God is all-seeing and all-knowing and knew the end result, there had to be some element of God not caring that Jesus could possibly throw in the towel. Jesus also had free will, just as we do. We like to think Jesus was totally strong and wasn’t tempted in the least bit, but He was human. What if the human part of Him really wanted to not do this?
Not worried that the end result might be bad. We just talked about it could have ended badly if Jesus said it was too hard for Him to accomplish. But God would know it would partly end bad. God wants everyone to be saved (I Tim. 2:4; 2 Pet. 3:9; Eze. 18:23; Mt. 23:37). He knows it is not going to happen. He knows that there are people who will never get it until they are standing in hell, suffering he consequences of their actions.
Would we have only gone through with the plan if we would have known everyone would be saved? God and Jesus both had to say, “We’re doing this, even though we won’t get 100%.”
Not caring about the affect of the actions on others. We talked about this already. God had to send Jesus to earth knowing He would be beaten, ridiculed, and ultimately killed. He had to know Jesus would do a lot of walking. He would be hungry. He was human, so He would get sick. He would be sad (Jn. 11: 35). God sent Jesus anyway.
God had to say that the plan takes precedence. That He did. I can see the overwhelming reckless love of God.
Father. Your love is overwhelming. It is never ending. And yes, Lord, it is reckless. You are love, and you have chosen to bestow this love on us. We don’t deserve it. There is nothing that we could do to be valuable enough to earn it. Yet, You say it is ours — if only we admit, believe, and confess. Loving Heavenly Father, we admit, we believe, and we confess. Amen.
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I am concerned we are caught up into the way songs make us feel rather than true worship in Spirit and in truth. The verses need to be Biblically sound. The New Age movement and the false teachings of the prosperity gospel preached by Bethel and Hillsong have no place in the Evangelical Church. We are living in times where Satan is attacking the church from within.
I agree Satan is attacking the church from within. We must evaluate things carefully to ensue they point to the One true God.