Yes! I Love You

1John 4:19 "We love him because he first loved us"

Devine love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us...Without God's initial act of love towards us in sending his Son, we would have lived haphazardly and died without hope and without purpose.But God commended his love toward us in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.In our absolute worst state and even in our absolute best efforts, we could neither destroy nor earn his love.

The bible is filled with characters who could have taken the easy way out.Instead, they sacrificed because they loved God,they desired to do his will,and they loved God's people.For example, Noah built an ark at the Lord's command and preached to the people,warning them of the storm to come.He suffered ridicule and never had one convert outside of his on family.But he loved and obeyed God.

Esther could have easily said to her cousin Mordecai,who asked her to sacrifice her life for the Jewish people, but instead , she laid her life on the line and went before the king and pleaded for the lives of her people .Paul suffered beatings and unfair treatment many times because he refused to stop talking about Jesus.He sacrificed his life and his health for the cause of Christ.Can you add your name to this list? Most Christian can quote John 3:16, which is almost the Bible's definition of what love is. However, many times when we hear something repeatedly, the words lose their meaning.We must not let that happen to us.We need to continue to go back to the beginning and reexamine how we love and if our love measures up to God's standards.

"By This all men shall know you are my disciples, if ye have love one to another" Nothing else, not the sacrifice of our worldly goods or our life, can replace the command God gave us to love.Not as the world loves,but as God has loved us.According to his grace love" beareth all things,believeth all things, endureth all things." This is the revelation of Christ and his love for his Father, that he shared with us, as he bore our sins,believed we would change, and endured the shame of the cross and died, all because he love us.