The God Kind Of Love 1.3
Catching up
We saw previously that God is love. Jesus always acknowledged God‘s love for Himself in prayer and conversation. We saw the enduring nature of God‘s Love. Then we talked about knowing and developing faith in this love. We moved on and looked at the failure of natural human love. Last week we looked at the different kinds of love so that we may locate and pinpoint what exactly the love of God is not, and what it is. We are now going to see the manifestation of God’s love for Jesus while on the earth and how it mirrors His love for us.
What does it mean when you tell someone “God loves you”. We will look to scriptures we have already looked at previously in this series and start from there.
John 5:20 (ESV) For the Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing. And greater works than these will he show him, so that you may marvel.
Notice the results of God loving Jesus in the first 2 verses? How exactly did God love Jesus? The Fathers love is the basis of the authority Jesus carried on the earth. In John 5:20, Jesus makes the statement of greater works the Father will show through Him, after being challenged for healing someone on the Sabbath. What He was saying was “you are offended at the miracle I performed, but because the Father loves me, He will perform greater miracles than these through me.
The crux of these verses is - because the Father loves the Son, he holds nothing back from Him. The Father, loving him, has placed all things in his hand and shown him all his works.
Both verses we looked at make love the basis for something the Father does for the Son. Love is not just feeling; it is functional. It produces action.
God loved Jesus soo much, that He caused Jesus to do things that caused men to marvel. The same applies to you who endeavours to know and believe God’s love for you.
God loves, but not with a full stop. God loves and then does something to show that love:
God loved the world. There is not a full stop after this statement. It goes on to say…. “He gave”. There is no love without giving. Selfish love is a sentimental sympathetic powerless love. The God kind of love is not action less. The God kind of love has results for those whom it loves. If you know and believe that God loves you, then there will be results. The results of God’s love for Jesus followed Him all His life.
The son being loved by the Father, in turn loves the believers. Each benefit mirrors what the Father’s love gave the Son. We must learn to continue in His love. How? By knowing and believing His love for us and manifesting the same love to others.
Now let us see that the same things given to the Lord Jesus by the Father because of His love to the son, are given to us because the son loves us.
John 14:12 (KJV) Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father.
John 15:15 (KJV) Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you.
John 17:26 (KJV) And I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it: that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.
Notice that the same benefits the Lord enjoyed are enjoyed by us.
Some people have argued with me that their love has not been acknowledged. I have been there. You see, if people can accuse God for not loving them the way they think He should, then who are you?
There is a dearth of people knowing and believing God’s love for them. That is why nobody wants to walk in love like God. They simply do not believe it. Jesus believed it, and so should you. Marvellous great things will happen to you. I have had the roof of the house open up and the glory of God come and envelop me. Several times I have been teleported from work to home because I had no bus fare. These things came as a result constantly being loved by God and continuing in His love.
Never underestimate the love of God for Jesus. Never underestimate the love of God for you.
Just like God constantly made people marvel through the works He did through Jesus, people will also marvel at the works God has done through you if you continue in His love for you. I urge you to know and believe His love for you.
God publicly demonstrates His love for us. I went to a certain place and there was a crowd. The gospel was being preached and a man wearing many skull rings and piercings punched a muslim man who was standing with us. The next thing I remember is that I was standing away from the crowd and the police were arresting him. He looked puzzled at how he punched the man instead of me. He tried to tell the police that he wanted to punch me instead, but it seemed the police could not see me. How God pulled me away from the crowd so fast puzzles me to this day. I still do not have an exact understanding of what happened, save it was an unmistakable miracle.