God’s Love
God is good. How often have we heard and said that?
By the goodness of God, we tend to mean almost exclusively His love. We say, “God is Love,” and from there we postulate all sorts of ideas, both helpful and distracting.
We must understand that the goodness of God is more than love. A view of God based solely on our human idea of love is incomplete. In our flesh, we think of Divine love in terms of perceived kindness, and with it, the desire to see us happy.
C.S. Lewis once remarked, “What would really satisfy us would be a God who said of anything we happened to like doing, (what does it matter so long as they are contented?) We want, in fact, not so much a Father in Heaven as a grandfather in heaven – a senile benevolence who…liked to see [us] enjoying [our]selves, and whose plan for the universe was simply that it might be truly said at the end of each day, ‘a good time was had by all.’”
No one admits this!
No one describes God like this, but the idea lurks in the back of our carnal minds.
Let us be honest: it is licentiousness that wants to define love as unconditional benevolence.
So, we must also understand that God’s love is not this universal permissive kindness that the flesh craves. Yet the idea of unconditional universal kindness dominates the conversations of the lost and the carnal-minded.
Lost people say things like this: “If we suppose God does exist…how do we know he is good? 150,000 humans just today will have died on this planet in all manner of ways. Logical thinking then might tell you that if he does exist he is more likely to be a slightly uncaring masochistic individual/gas type thing.” –eggpuff, internet.
Why does he say this?
It is because he ascribes to the notion that God, if he exists, ought to be a “good” person who provides for everyone’s happiness and well-being, regardless of circumstance or purpose. He is implying that because bad things happen, God must be evil and therefore probably doesn’t even exist, that He is an elaborate fairy-tale we tell ourselves for comfort. Even though this man is an atheist, or agnostic, he admits his own narrow view of love, defined solely by perceived kindness, devoid of purpose or justice.
Incidentally, we should remember that Jesus said, “Just not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment.” (John 7:24) Human perception simply cannot be the basis for judging righteousness or ultimately, divine justice.
Eventually, we must also study the goodness of God in terms of purpose and justice, but for now we will try to examine the question: What is God’s love?
Another quote: “If there was a God then he would be evil not good, I mean why would he create the earth and put us on it and then leave us for the devil to possess…” –lostworld, internet
Again, what is left unsaid reveals much about the person. He is presupposing the idea, which he undoubtedly holds, that Divine goodness is measured solely by benevolence. We know this because he voices his dismay at the perceived absence of universal benevolence, which to him means that there is no loving God.
So far I have not quoted anyone who says God loves us. But we can see that even the unbeliever holds in his heart the idea of a universally kind and benevolent God who wouldn’t let bad things happen. He sees divine love, again, as purposeless and really devoid of justice. He holds the “heavenly grandfather” concept of divine love that Lewis wrote about.
Here’s one from Jackibo, who claims to believe in God, via the internet: “I believe God is good. My God has no truck with all that Hell and Damnation stuff! My God loves and forgives all. My God is rather nice! It does me no harm to believe in Him!”
There it is! “Does me no harm…” If we, in our flesh, could create a God, he would be exactly like this. (To me, this is proof enough that we didn’t invent Him.) But once again, in our modern society, people generally fall into two categories: people who believe God is unconditionally loving and kind and undemanding, and those who don’t believe He exists because He is not those things.
How do we combat such simple and ignorant notions? They dominate all public discussion forums in this country, from Hollywood to schools to Main Street.
We will study now the aspects of God’s love in terms of man’s relationship, in love, to His creator.
Why? We must understand that equating love to kindness is not only incomplete, it is ultimately destructive.
Again, C.S. Lewis: “There is kindness in Love: but…when kindness (in the sense given above) is separated from the other elements of Love, it involves a certain fundamental indifference to its object, and even something like contempt of it. Kindness readily consents to the removal of its object – we have all met people whose kindness to animals is constantly leading them to kill animals lest they should suffer. Kindness, merely as such, cares not whether its object becomes good or bad, …only that it escapes suffering.”
The Bible says in Hebrews 12:8: “But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then ye are bastards, and not sons.” The basic idea here is that bastards get no correction; sons, who are cherished, are punished.
The divine principle is reflected in our own dealings. For people we care nothing about, we can imagine happiness on any easy terms: with our own dear ones (family, spouses, children) we are exacting in morality and justice.
Truly, if we were to be honest, we would rather see our loves ones suffer the consequences of their sin, than to see them happy-go-lucky while living in the most sordid and sinful conditions.
Therefore, if God is Love (and He is), He is more than mere kindness. God has loved us, and has demonstrated that love in the most awful way, beyond our imagination and comprehension. What manner of God would leave His glory and suffer a horrible death for you?
Nay, but God’s love is so much more than this kindness we crave and expect, that we must strive to understand it a little better each day.
Consider this, Friend: God is both closer to us and further from us, than any other being. He is further because the sheer difference between us and Him is so great it defies description. No being is remotely like Him. But at the same time, because He created us, because we consist in Him, there is an intimacy between God and the individual that is closer than with any other being.
Admittedly, we can only draw up incomplete analogies to describe God’s relationship to us. These illustrations may be inadequate; however, they will give us a usable concept of God’s love for us.
We will look at four human relationships which can teach us about God’s love for us. From lowest to highest, they are:
- Man’s love for his handiwork
- Man’s love for his beast
- Man’s love for his children
- Man’s love for his wife
Man’s love for his handiwork:
Jeremiah 18:3-6: “Then I went down to the potter’s house, and behold he wrought a work on the wheels. And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it. Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying O house of Israel, cannot I do with you as this potter? saith the Lord. Behold, as the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house of Israel.”
The imagery of the potter and the clay is often used to describe a God who lovingly molds us with His hand into what we ought to be.
We are, in a sense, a Divine work of art, one that God is shaping and molding and making, and will not be satisfied until we attain a certain character.
We understand this analogy for two reasons: We know great artwork is a labor of love, and we know that the final product is the result of removing imperfections; often through a painstaking process.
A famous Renaissance artist, when asked how he sculpts a man said, “I start with a great chunk of marble, and then I chip away everything that is not a man.”
We know that God loves us when he “chips away” at all those things He doesn’t want us to be. We call it sanctification.
We all might scribble pictures for a child, quickly and without respect as to how closely what we are drawing resembles the original object. But for a great work of art, no such indifference will suffice. For the work that we love, whether it is a painting, or a cabinet, or a boat, or our own house, we take endless trouble with it.
Now imagine if that painting, or boat, or carving, were alive. By taking endless trouble with it, we would be giving it endless trouble. And so it seems with our walk with God. He toils endlessly, with patience and longsuffering, to shape us and mold. Thus in our daily sin and shortcomings, we can be sure of His love by His endless dealings with our hearts and souls.
People who want less correction want less love, not more. People who demand that a loving God just leave them alone, in truth, wish not to be loved, but despised.
Man’s love for his beast:
Psalms 100:3 “Know ye that the Lord he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.”
The relationship between a man and his beast is useful in that in this analogy the object of love is alive and aware, although clearly inferior to man. It should be noted that a man does not make his beast, and so can never fully understand it like the Creator can understand us. Still, it is worth noting the similarities.
A man tames a dog that he may love it, not that is may love him, and that it may serve him, not that he may serve it.
What is important is that left alone, a beast is not very loveable. A dog must be washed, house-trained, taught and corrected. This whole process may seem at times disagreeable to the dog, but the master knows that in doing so he is opening a world of possibilities of love, affection, interest and comforts that is quite beyond the dog’s natural reach.
Psalms 8:4 asks, “What is man, that thou art mindful of him?”
And yet we experience God in a personal way that transforms us beyond our capabilities.
Ephesians 2:1-3 reads, “And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins; wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience: Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of the flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.”
As surely as an animal left in the wild is unavoidably prone to savagery and filthiness and uninhibited fulfilling of its every whim and desire, so a man left to himself is a slave to his flesh, unholy and unrighteous, and as far as the Lord is concerned, unlovable on his own merits.
But then something happens. Read on, in Ephesians 2:4-6: “But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;) And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.”
Why does He do this? Because He loves us. He raises us up into a life of peace, joy and hope unknown to us in our previous condition. The oxen fed with corn, housed in a warm stable, sheltered from rain, knows peace unlike the starving wildebeest, roaming the field in constant fear of predators having no assurance or hope or expectation of safety, food or happiness. The master of the tamed beast is its sole anchor, its sole source of these comforts. This is how God loves us.
And yet it should be noted that a man does not develop the fullness of service from his beast without also, in a sense, serving it. And he does not disregard the interests of the beast for its being so inferior to himself. Rather, he knows that by providing for the beast’s welfare and training he is not only greatly benefitting the beast, but he is also cultivating the best service from his beast.
A man takes such pains with his animals partly because it is an animal high on the scale – “because it is so nearly loveable that it is worth his while to make it fully loveable.” A man doesn’t bother with roaches and beetles or worms.
Likewise, we are made in God’s image, designed for a higher purpose. We are undeserving of His love, yet we are created to be loved, and God doesn’t consider it a waste of His time to make us more loveable, more like Him.
Once again, one might wish that God had not paid us such a high compliment, that He would let us go on being our own wretched self-interested selves. Bu that is wanting less love, not more.
Man’s love for his children:
In Luke 22:42, Jesus says: “Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done.”
The order that God has ordained is one of patriarchal rule, and exists even with the Trinity. The Father-son relationship entails authority on the one side, obedience on the other.
So the father-child relationship is useful for many reasons.
For one thing we are called His children, we who are saved. John 1:12 says, “But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.”
An earthly father uses his authority, in love, to mold his son into the person he wants him to be. Even in today’s twisted society, where parental rights are undermined by social programs, public mis-education, pop culture and idolatry, no man says of his child, “I love my son but don’t care if he becomes a drunk, or bum, or scoundrel, as long as he’s happy.” That would be nonsense. You don’t love someone if you don’t care what sort of person they become.
True love, especially in the father-child relationship, is exacting love, requires obedience and betterment of the self. The sort of nonchalant, disinterested attitude that lost people call “acceptance” or “tolerance” is not love at all, but disdain.
Proverbs 13:24 “He that spareth his rod hateth his son: but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes.”
Once again, we can be sure of the Father’s love because He corrects us. Indeed, we can be sure He is our Father because he corrects us. If He did not, we would be bastards.
Finally, the father-son love relationship is one of providence. The Bible says, in Luke 11:11-13, “If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?”
Indeed, human fathers provide for their children. (Well, some do…) If a father loves his son, and his son asks for water, he would not give him whisky or some other rottenness.
In the Father’s love, we can live a life of faith. His love undergirds the exercising of our faith, it is evidence of hope’s desire. Matthew 6:31-32 reads, “Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? Or, What shall we drink? Or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek) for your heavenly father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.”
Far beyond the providence of our baser needs, He provides all the abundance of his Holy Spirit: love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance. Not one of these things can we fully experience apart from the Father’s love.
Once again, a boy who wishes his father to simply leave him be and not be correcting him all the time is not wishing for more love, but less. Likewise, a man who does not desire the chastening love of the Heavenly Father does not wish to be loved by Him at all.
Man’s love for his wife
Man’s love for his wife is compared to God’s love toward man. The comparison is used often in scripture, especially in comparing Israel or the church to a bride.
Jeremiah 2: 2 reads: “Go and cry in the ears of Jerusalem, saying, Thus saith the LORD; I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown.”
Here Israel is compared to a bride that was once in love with her husband and has now gone astray, who used to follow after her husband, but now goes her own way.
Ezekiel 16: 6-14 reads: “And when I passed by thee, and saw thee polluted in thine own blood, I said unto thee when thou wast in thy blood, Live; yea, I said unto thee when thou wast in thy blood, Live. I have caused thee to multiply as the bud of the field, and thou hast increased and waxen great, and thou art come to excellent ornaments: thy breasts are fashioned, and thine hair is grown, whereas thou wast naked and bare. Now when I passed by thee, and looked upon thee, behold, thy time was the time of love; and I spread my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness: yea, I sware unto thee, and entered into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord GOD, and thou becamest mine. Then washed I thee with water; yea, I throughly washed away thy blood from thee, and I anointed thee with oil. I clothed thee also with broidered work, and shod thee with badgers’ skin, and I girded thee about with fine linen, and I covered thee with silk. I decked thee also with ornaments, and I put bracelets upon thy hands, and a chain on thy neck. And I put a jewel on thy forehead, and earrings in thine ears, and a beautiful crown upon thine head. Thus wast thou decked with gold and silver; and thy raiment was of fine linen, and silk, and broidered work; thou didst eat fine flour, and honey, and oil: and thou wast exceeding beautiful, and thou didst prosper into a kingdom. And thy renown went forth among the heathen for thy beauty: for it was perfect through my comeliness, which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord GOD.”
Here is a picture of a man who finds a woman broken and destitute and through love picks her up out of her state, washes her, clothes her with fine clothes, becomes betrothed to her. She blossoms in His love to the point that others around her begin to take notice what a beautiful woman she has become. It is a picture of God, who fashioned the nation of Israel out of nothing, who took an old man from out of a heathen land and built him into a nation mightier and fairer than all the nations of the world.
It is also a picture of God who loves the sinner, though he be sunk in the mire, covered in filth, wretched and without hope. He makes us His when He adopts us. He imputes holiness and righteousness to our account because of His love for us. We are entered into a covenant relationship, after the Abrahamic covenant relationship, in which God alone is mediator and agent, and in His power alone do we become anything like the people He created us to be. His love acts to cleanse us and adorn us in His goodness.
In the New Testament, the church is the Lord’s bride. James 4: 4 reads: “Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.”
Why does God say adulterers? Adultery is committed by a spouse. God is saying that the church is His bride and that when it goes astray from His word, it commits adultery.
Finally, look at Ephesians 5: 25-27: “Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.”
A husband’s love for his wife should be a picture of Christ’s love for the church. Notice the phrase “not having a spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.”
Once again, a man’s love is shown as having a purifying and edifying effect on his beloved, just like the passage in Ezekiel. His love exacts holiness and eliminates imperfections.
The point is that Love demands the perfecting of the beloved; that simple kindness, which tolerates anything except suffering in its object, is not really love at all. If we are honest about the deepest and most abiding love we have for another human being, we can agree with the following statement:
“When we fall in love with a woman, do we cease to care whether she is clean or dirty, fair or foul? Do we not rather then first begin to care? Does any woman regard it as a sign of love in a man that he neither knows nor cares how she is looking? Love may, indeed, love the beloved when her beauty is lost; but not because of it is lost. Love may forgive all infirmities and love still in spite of them; but Love cannot cease to will their removal. Love is more sensitive than hatred itself to every blemish in the beloved…[A man] may be pleased with little, but demands all. (C.S. Lewis)”
Doesn’t this picture God’s love toward us? He loved us when we were lost, but not because we were lost. He loves us in spite of our sin, not because of our sin. He forgives us our sins, but He never ceases to will that we be rid of them. The Lord has been described by many preachers as the most sensitive person, so much so that not a trace of sin can be allowed into Heaven; yet He loved us enough to want us to be with Him there. And in our daily walk, He is pleased with the littlest things, though in truth He demands perfection.
Once again, we see the true nature of Love and the true nature of those who spurn it. People who do not want to live consecrated, separated lives do not want God’s love, because that’s the sort of life God’s love produces. People who want to reach out to God on their own terms will not ever enter Heaven, because it is only through the Love He demonstrated and continues to demonstrate, that we can enter into His presence.
Taking all four points together, we can say the following. God’s love is a chastening love. It corrects and molds and separates and sanctifies. God’s love is a demanding love. It wants us to be perfect and holy. God’s love is a nurturing love. It provides for our needs that we might better serve Him. God’s love is an edifying love. He makes us into who He wants us to be and adorns us with goodness, righteousness, comeliness of spirit. God’s love is a covenant love. It is all-enduring, unfailing, and dedicated to our eventual perfection and glorification. God’s love is all-consuming and worthy of all thankfulness, praise, effort and honor. Why else does the Bible say, “And thou shalt love the Lord with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might?” (Deuteronomy 6:5)
But that’s not what most people mean when they say “God is love” or “God loves you.” By love they mean “tolerance”, “permissiveness”, “kindness”, and worst of all, “indifference.” A statement like “A loving God wouldn’t send you to hell,” cannot possibly be true unless the one who says it means that God is indifferent to sin, uncaring toward the condition of the soul, aloof to sin’s consequences. And that kind of person doesn’t know God’s love at all.
The Good that I Would 