God Loves You
Karl Barth, a famous theologian of the last century wrote a massive series called, Church Dogmatics. It is 13 volumes containing 6 million words. He began it in 1932 and it ended with his death in 1968.
A reporter once asked Barth if he could summarize what he had said in his Dogmatics. Barth though for a moment and then said: ‘Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.”
As we approach Holy Week, and the events which resulted in our Lord’s crucifixion and resurrection, we need to be reminded why the Lord did what he did.
And there is a very simple explanation: God loves you. And yes, the Bible tells me, so; but so also do the cross and resurrection.
I want to look at a portion of a letter in the NT, called 1 John, especially chapter 4.10.
1 John 4:10 (ESV)
10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Throughout this letter the apostle wants Christians to know for sure that God loves them, and he gives various ‘tests’ as John Stott said to help them evaluate their standing, the standing of others with the Lord.
1 John 5:13 (ESV)
13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life.
How can we know that we have eternal life. That takes us to our passage.
I must admit that my 3 points are taken from a sermon I heard another give, (if you are worried about that), but I think he is ‘spot on’ (he’s English).
Point One: God loves you -
Jeremiah 31:3 (ESV)
3 the Lord appeared to him from far away. I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.
What is surprising in that statement is that is given to a people who had not loved God very much at all. Indeed, they had forsaken God and worshipped idols.
The Lord likens Israel to a faithless wife, and he castigates them for their faithlessness in general. Indeed, Israel has lavished her love on gods of the heathens, gods that are impotent, gods that can’t give them anything, and gods that one day will be destroyed.
So, as Leon Morris says, There is nothing in all this to prepare us for God’s resounding declaration “I have love you with an everlasting love.”
Despite all that they have done, God loves them.
And so in 1 John, what surprises me is the way John defines God’s love. Notice he defines it in contrast to our love for God.
1 John 4:10 (ESV)
10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Usually we say the summary of the law:
Mark 12:30-31 (ESV)
30 And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' 31 The second is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these."
But have we?
a) Say, a boy gives his girl friend a present – a picture. She loves it, and says so. The next day, the boyfriend calls to when they can go out. She answers; I can’t, because I’m starring at this picture.
I don’t want to see you, I want to see the picture – shove off!
Paul in Romans 1:25 (ESV)
25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.
b) In another sense our love falls short of God’s love. We love what is lovely. God loves you and me who are not.
Romans 5:7-8 (ESV)
7 For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— 8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
c) Koran – misstatement. Allah is never said to love. That is incorrect.
surely Allah loves those who turn much (to Him), and He loves those who purify themselves.
Allah does not love any ungrateful sinner.
Sura 3.31 comes closest:
If you love Allah, then follow me, Allah will love you and forgive you your faults, and Allah is Forgiving, Merciful
Notice – if, then Allah will love you
1 John 4:10 (ESV)
10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Point Two: God is angry with you
This point must be made. The word, propitiation, requires that this point be made.
You might ask, “Well, which is it? Love or anger. It can’t be both. Ah – but it is!
Propitiation is, I think, the right word here. The NIV translates it, atoning sacrifice – or RSV, expiation.
Leon Morris makes a very good case for the word propitiation.
To propitiate means to appease the anger of another.
to gain or regain the favor or goodwill of :
that is, a means of quenching God’s personal penal wrath against us by blotting out our sins from his sight. – JI Packer
You may remember Romans 1:18 (ESV)
18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.
Think of our first example. What is the reaction of the boyfriend when his girlfriend rejects him for the picture he gave her? Wouldn’t you be angry, and why? Because of your love for her.
I understand there are more emotions and considerations other than that, but there is that.
Moses was concerned about the Lord’s anger as well.
Deuteronomy 9:19 (ESV)
19 For I was afraid of the anger and hot displeasure that the Lord bore against you, so that he was ready to destroy you. But the Lord listened to me that time also.
All that God had done for his people resulted in their forsaking him and clinging to idols they had fashioned out of their own hands.
Further, the absence of anger can mean that there is no love. Parents can go overboard on discipline, of course, but often the absence of anger is a result of the absence of love or concern for the child.
And, of course, our anger is not pure; whereas God’s anger is.
We know John 3.16; but in that same chapter we read this:
John 3:36 (ESV)
36 Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.
And if we remain unforgiven, then the wrath of God will mean judgment and hell for me.
Point Three: God Loves us by Being Angry at Jesus
Because of his love for us, God sent his Son
Despite the fact that God abhors sin: Habakkuk 1:13 (ESV)
13 You who are of purer eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrong, why do you idly look at traitors and are silent when the wicked swallows up the man more righteous than he?
Despite the fact that God takes sin so seriously that he will see to it that the sinner is punished. He is so totally opposed to sin and all evil that we are so amazed, with good reason, that he still loves us, and has done something about our situation.
He sent his Son into the world
I Howard Marshall put it this way:
This is what God has done for rebellious mankind: he pardons their sins against himself at his own cost. Some have denied that that a loving God needs to be propitiated for human sin and have suggested that this makes him less than loving. They have not realized that the depth of God’s love is to be seen precisely in the way in which it bears the wounds inflicted on it by mankind and offers full and free pardon.
The Lord Jesus, perfectly God and perfectly man, came into the world to save us from our sin, and he did so by also bearing God’s wrath justly directed at sinners like you and me.
Summary
God loves you.
God is angry with you
God took his anger out on his Son
For you and me.
Well, we do need to respond to that love.
When a man asks a women, “Will you marry me.” She won’t say, “Well, I’ll make a note of that and get back to you later.”
But that is often the way it is with us and God.
1 John 5:1 (ESV)
1 Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of him.
Can you say that?
Let us pray.
