MONDAY 20th
1 John 4:10
ESV (v10) ‘In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.’
I ended the previous devotion with this verse of Scripture, and I want to use it today again for us to ponder something of the wonder of the love of God.
In the words of the well-known song:
The love of God is greater far,
Than tongue or pen can ever tell.
It goes beyond the highest star,
And reaches to the lowest hell.
The guilty pair, bowed down with care,
God gave His Son to win,
His erring child He reconciled,
And pardoned from his sin.
Could we with ink the ocean fill,
And were the skies of parchment made.
Were every stalk on earth a quill,
And every man a scribe by trade.
To write the love of God above,
Would drain the ocean dry.
Nor could the scroll contain the whole,
Though stretched from sky to sky.
We are familiar with the various Scriptures that speak of the love of God, for example it was such that he sent his one and only Son into the world, (John 3:16) it is so immense and powerful that nothing shall ever separate those who trust in him from the love of God. (Romans 8:31-39) As the song I have quoted says, it reaches to the lowest hell, that is to the most depraved of all sinners, (and we are all utterly depraved) all can be reached with the love of God, it is so deep and so powerful it can make the worst of wretches into the greatest of saints, it can take the lowest of the low and set them in high places. To me the most amazing thing about God’s love is that he loves me! Our text says that this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us! God didn’t wait for me to show a flicker of love in my heart toward him, he loved me as I was and he loved me so much that he gave his Son to die for me, and the same is for everyone of us, there is not one of us outside the reach of the love of God.
You may have come across this devotion today ‘by accident’ and you may have absolutely no time for God, you may even have a heart that is full of hate toward him, but it doesn’t change the fact that however you feel, nor whoever you are that God loves you, he came to die for you so that you could enter into a living and powerful relationship with him. He awaits with his arms held out toward you to accept you, to embrace you regardless of who you are or what you may have done, and to grant you forgiveness and bring wholeness to you. What should you do? Simply put, you come to him admitting you are a sinner, you accept that Jesus came to die for you as an atoning sacrifice for your sin and you believe in him, you put your faith and trust in what he has done for you and allow him to come as Saviour and Lord in your life.