HOW GOD PROVES HIS LOVE

To believe in Jesus is to cast yourself entirely upon Him. It is to “bank on” what He says and on what He has done. He really lived upon this earth. He really died upon the cross. We really have life because of Him. He is reality and truth. Everything about our eternal salvation comes through Him.

We should walk through life content to know that what Christ has done for us is sufficient to set us right with God in every way. Faith in Christ is a matter of deciding to believe that He is incapable of lying to us. He is truth incarnate. He is the embodiment of all spiritual reality. He is everything that we have ever needed or ever will need. Life is about Him. The universe is about Him. Our relationship with God is about Him. To understand the centrality of Christ in everything is to know real, abiding joy, and purpose in life. The love of Christ changes us. It makes us different people. When we embrace it, it becomes a part of who we are.

When we talk about Christ and love, there is love for Christ and there is the love of Christ. Love for Christ means that we have love for Him in our hearts. The love of Christ refers to the love that He has for us.

One of these grows out of the other. And surely we know immediately which one comes first. It is by focusing on the love of Christ that we find appropriate love for Christ. Our love is a response to His. “We love Him because He loved us first“ (1 John 4:19).

Do you want to love Christ? Then focus on His love for you. Think about it and meditate upon it. Think about what it means that Christ loves you. He was willing to pay any price necessary to save you. He is always interested in doing what we need Him to do. He has our well-being, our good, close to His heart. He thought of us rather than Himself by living on this earth and going to the cross. That is real love. Love thinks of others rather than self. He did that. He thought of you. And He still thinks of you.

So Christianity, simply stated, is loving Christ back. It is deciding to put His desires above our own. Love for Christ compels us to do what is right. And what is right is always what He wants. “What is the right thing to do?” That question has an easy answer. “Doing the right thing” is to do what God wants in every situation.

Paul dealt with how unique and magnificent the love of Christ is in the Book of Romans. “When we had no good in us, and could not help ourselves, Christ came at the perfect time and died for us, the ungodly. Very few people in the world will die for someone else. Although, someone might possibly give their life for an exceptionally good person. But God proved His great love for us by the fact that Christ died for us while we were still sinners” (Romans 5:6-8).

Consider the point carefully. Christ did not die for good people. He did not die for those who deserved it. He died for us when we were miserable and wretched rebels against our Creator. If you want to know if God loves you, that is where to look. It is the death of Christ—His sacrifice for us—that proves His love.

Dewayne Dunaway