Probably the most famous verse in the
Bible talks about the love of God. "For
God so loved the world that He gave His
only begotten Son that whoever would
believe in Him would not perish but have
everlasting life." And so a huge part of
our message is the love of God. The
difficulty is, how do we talk about the
love of God when the world has a
different understanding of the notion of
love and, a lot of times, imports that
understanding into the notion of the
love of God? And this is where we just
have to be more aggressive in how we
characterize it. And I think of the love
of God as patient, as sacrificial, but
also as demanding. And when I say patient,
what we think of, love is patient,
that's the first part of the
description of love in 1 Corinthians
13. God is long-suffering. He is
patient with us. But keep in mind that a
love that is patient means that it's
putting up with someone who's doing
things they ought not to do and
patiently waiting for something. And
unfortunately, the way the world
characterizes love is that love is not
patient in that sense because we are we
are not waiting for something to change.
It's just a matter of accepting what
everybody does. And that's the
characterization that we have to clarify.
Yes, God is love, and God's
love is patient, but it's patiently waiting.
And what is it waiting for? And this is
the second point. These, by the way, are
characteristic of this famous verse.
God's love is sacrificial. It gives. What
does it give? It gives something on
behalf of us that we desperately need in
light of our rebellion against Him. So He
gives His son so that we might be
forgiven, have eternal life. And this
is the third thing that we need to
clarify, that God's love is also
demanding. God's love isn't this,
"Well, boys will be boys," kind of attitude
and just goes along with everything that
we want to do.
Instead, God's love requires that we
be good.
Love does not rejoice in unrighteousness.
It's because we are unrighteous that
God's love patiently indures until we
respond, if we do, to the sacrificial gift
that He gives us so that now we can lead
a different kind of life. So we talk
about love in the world's context, if we
just simply say, "God is love," and we don't
qualify it, we're gonna be in trouble.
Because they're going to insert their
own definitions in it. We have to
clarify that God's love is patient. His
loving-kindness indures forever. But He's
patient because there's something He
needs to be patient regarding, and that
is a rebellion. And so He has sacrificed
out of love something of Himself so that
we can be forgiven of the guilt of that
rebellion. And it's because God's love
does not rejoice in unrighteousness. It's
demanding. And so because it's demanding,
when we become followers of Christ, the
love of God compels us to live more
morally righteous and virtuous lives.
They all go together.
Is this like the world's love? It's
nothing like the world's love, which is
why we need to clarify exactly what we
mean when we say, "God is love." It's patient.
It's sacrificial. It's also demanding.
That's the love of God.
