So many statements we here about love ”LOVE IS BLIND”,”MONEY CAN’T BUY LOVE” and indeed the statements are very true, Love is defined by Wikipedia as ” an emotion of a strong affection and personal attachment.” And indeed this definition is correct but I want to ask a question, can God love ? that may seem as a foolish question but to others it is a question straight from the heart not that if God loves, but if God will love them based on the things that they have done and even what others have done to them, Now before I answer that question I must look at the word love biblically. In the New Testament the word love can refer to several types of love for example brotherly love(greek word for it is PHILEO ) and unconditional love (greek word for it is agapo).What I want us to look is this type of love known as the agape(agapo =verb) love.
We can find an example of this type of love in John 3:16,” For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” This verse in scripture shows us clearly that God does indeed love us, and because of His love he gave His son to die for our sins, so that we can have a chance of gaining eternal life.
In Isaiah 53 it speaks of Christ act of love”.
Isaiah 53:3 He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Isaiah 53:4 Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. Isaiah 53:5 But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.
Isaiah 53:10 Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. Isaiah 53:11 He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities.
It was man who caused himself to sin but Christ and His Father decided that Christ would die in man’s place, so that man can receive eternal life .But unless we give our lives to Christ we can never receive the pardon for sins that Christ offers us.You see God does love us ,If you were the only sinner on earth Jesus would still have come to earth just to save you, the greatest act of love that any one can do is as the bible says in John 15:13 ,’Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. ‘and Jesus did just that, proving that he loves us to the maximum,suffering a life of shame ,sorrow ,reproach and sadness to save you and me, He could have stayed in heaven lived a life of glamour and splendor but he chose to die for us risking eternal death if he had sin. No matter what you have done or what has happened to you ,God loves you and the cross testifies of that,God is ready and willing to pardon our sins if we only confess them to HIM.
Romans 5:8 But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
1John 4:10 Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Written by Karim Campbell, 15year old youth leader, deacon, personnel ministries secretary and preacher,
email address [email protected]
