Skip to main content

Precious Love

Your steadfast love, O Lord, extends to the heavens,
your faithfulness to the clouds.
Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains of God;
your judgments are like the great deep;
man and beast you save, O Lord.

How precious is your steadfast love, O God!
The children of mankind take refuge
in the shadow of your wings.
Psalm 36:5-7

God continues to show me just how incredible His love really is.

Consider this with me:
For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person--though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die--but God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Romans 5:6-8

God’s steadfast love was displayed in Jesus Christ for all of creation to see and experience. It is a love that was offered freely to sinful, hateful people. It is a love that saves us through unimaginable grace (Ephesians 2:8, 9). It is a love that never changes or falters because God Himself is called the Father of lights in whom there is no variation or shadow due to change (James 1:17). It is perfect love that casts out fear (1 John 4:18). It is a love that allows us to love (1 John 4:19). It is a love that spared no expense (John 3:16). It is unmerited. It is without clause. It is final. It is God.

Notice how David doesn’t stop at talking about God’s love. He goes on to describe God’s faithfulness, righteousness, justice, and saving power. These attributes are not able to be separated or ignored. We cannot accept a few of them and discard the ones that we don’t like. We can’t assume that we know what the character of God entails and what it does not. We must trust His Word that He is good, just, and righteous. All of these attributes fall underneath love’s umbrella. However, without justice, grace loses its character. Without punishment for evil, what good is righteousness?

What is God’s love? Putting every living thing in subjection under Jesus Christ because He is the authority on life. He is the perfect One. He knows what is best for us far more than we do. He extends His arms to us like the father of the prodigal son just waiting for us to come home. He gave His very life and took my sins to the Cross. He made me a new creation. He will come again and call me home.

How precious is God’s steadfast love? I’ve only scratched the surface. I can’t wait to dig deeper!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Convicting And Compelling Gospel

Which adjective in the title more closely aligns with your predisposed way of thinking about and speaking the gospel to yourself and others?   Are you more likely to present a gospel that is heavy on the convicting realities of sin, righteousness and judgment?   Or do you find yourself more readily appealing to the benefits of following Jesus?   If you think about it, neither adjective fully encapsulates the message of Jesus.   It’s right to compel people using the promises of God and the joy filled benefits of a life submitted to Jesus.   But it’s also right to warn of the consequences of rejecting Him.   Since we’re all naturally inclined to emphasize one, we need to allow the other to constrain us, to balance us from taking our natural disposition to the extreme, which may confuse the gospel and the Jesus we wish to present.   Let me attempt to illustrate one example of an unconstrained leaning toward each in turn.   A compelling gospel that is...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Off-The-Charts Good Providence Of God

What do Joseph, Jonah, Paul, Naomi, David, and Job have in common?   Besides all of these folks’ lives being recorded for us in Scripture, they also all suffered serious trials for God’s good purposes.   Joseph’s brothers sold him into slavery.   Jonah got a sunburn (it was worse than it sounds!).   Paul was shipwrecked, bitten by a viper, stoned, beaten.   David was chased by a spear-chuckin’ king for years.   Job lost all of his wealth and all of his children.   Naomi lost her husband and two sons from famine. Amazing things resulted from many of these situations.   Joseph saved God’s people from famine when he rose from a slave to second in command in Egypt.   Paul planted who knows how many churches and saved countless people after evangelizing the entire known world in the first century.   Naomi’s lineage eventually brings us Jesus the Savior.   Job’s sufferings shamed satan by showcasing why a man would worship God despit...
Post a Comment
Read more

Life Update: A Growing Confidence

    It’s been awhile since we updated everyone on things, and this seems like a particularly pivotal time to do so.   June 14th is my last day of service as associate pastor of Christ The King Church, Kenosha, WI, where I’ve been privileged to serve for the past three years on staff, and where, more importantly, Elyse and I have been built up into Jesus for the past 7 years.   Our relationships and experiences at Christ The King have been instrumental in both our personal sanctification and in our sense of call toward church planting, specifically a multiethnic church, and ministering to the poor and marginalized.   I’ve become a little bit better at preaching, a little bit better at leading, and I hope both spring from being a little bit better learner of Jesus, my King.   I’m fully aware of my deficiencies as His student, but nonetheless there is an unwavering commitment to keep at it since where else could I go to find the words of eternal life? ...
Post a Comment
Read more