Good News about God: God is Love

I John 4:8,10 "...God is love...In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins."

When asked in his later years to summarize his twelve volumes on church dogmatics, the well-known theologian Karl Barth answered by repeating a line from an old children's hymn: “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so."

Among believers, the good news that God is love may be one of the most intellectually known truths about God while being one of the least experienced truths about Him.

The phrase, “…this I know…”, in this children’s song is key. Apart from the deep experiential knowing that I am unconditionally loved and accepted by God as His child, I will continue to unconsciously strive for His acceptance and run away from Him when I falter or fail.

As simple and elementary as this truth about God is, I find that it is what the world, the flesh, and the devil fight most to keep obscured from those of us who belong to God. It is one of the most appealing and attractive realities about God’s personality but is so contrary to fallen human nature that we don't want Him around in our times of failure or when we feel like we haven't measured up to His expectations.

I believe our offense over such love is because of our religious nature that instructs us that we are lovable and desirable to God only when we look and perform well. And so we refuse to allow God to love on us in our failure until after we have run off to “fix” ourselves; only then will we present ourselves to Him again. The irony of this is that we run from the only One Who can “fix” us!

This, of course, is what Adam and Eve did when they suddenly experienced painful self-consciousness in His presence after they chose their own way. Such was the pain of self-consciousness that they hid from Him and attempted to cover their nakedness apart from Him. We know from the Word and from our own experience that human attempts to fix ourselves never work; only God, by His utter acceptance of us in Christ Jesus, can free us from the horror of self-consciousness and the shame that is attached to that.

It is in remaining (abiding) in Him that we are restored and continue in fellowship with Him; He isn’t fooled by our “fig leaves”. He knows everything about me and isn’t taken by surprise with the things that come to the surface in me under pressure. He wants me to run to Him, not away from Him, in my worst moments, and there in His presence (painful as it may be) to experience His acceptance of me in Jesus.

One way to experience this radical love of the Father in Jesus is to deliberately wait before the Lord (both in good times and bad times) and ask the Holy Spirit to reveal the Father’s affectionate emotions for me and to keep saying “yes” to Him. As I do this (and this takes a lifetime), little by little I am healed and cleansed and strengthened; and lo and behold, the painful self-consciousness begins to drop off as the ongoing receiving of the Father’s love builds confidence in me about who I am to Him!

May He empower us this week to stand in the fire of His unrelenting affection and therein sing boldly, “Jesus loves me, this I know!”

The following are Scriptures to help nurture your heart and mind in this reality: Genesis 3:8-10; 3:21; I John 3:1,2; I John 4:7-12; 4:19; John 15:9,10; Romans 5:6-10; I Cor. 13:4-7; Psalm 30:5.