Remarkable Love of God
Our theme for Influencers this year is remarkable. Remarkable means uncommon, unique, attention-getting, novel and unexpected. Remarkable people attract others and make them want to know what makes them extraordinary. Jesus Christ himself was the remarkable son of God. He was God’s remarkable and unique personification of God’s love.
Jesus was remarkable in that he attracted those whose hearts God had prepared to receive him. Jesus said, be ye kindly affectioned one to another, tender hearted forgiving one another even as God for Christ’s sake has forgiven you. According to Romans, it’s the goodness, love and mercy of God that calls a man to repentance.
The world understands human love but it cannot understand God’s love. Unless we receive God’s gift of Holy Spirit we cannot understand the remarkable unconditional love of God. A man of God’s heart’s desire is to spend the rest of his life wanting to become just like Jesus. Through the trials of life he will teach us what it means to understand the love of God. For tribulation worketh patience and patience experience, and experience hope, and hope maketh not ashamed because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given to us. Thank God for breaking our hearts for what breaks his. He’ll reconcile us to himself through his son’s love, for there is one God and one mediator between God and men the man Christ Jesus.
There are three types of worldly love in the Greek language. These three types of love are reciprocal…they require love in return. Worldly love is conditional on the response of the other party. All relationships in this world will end in sorrow and pain except for one. Jesus said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” The love of God is characterized by Jesus Christ. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son….
Jesus said in Matthew 5:43-44, “Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you…” Even sinners love those who love them back. However, love those who persecute you and despitefully use you. The love of God loves the unloveable. We ourselves were once enemies with God. Herein is love made perfect… for in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for the ungodly. Jesus said, “A new commandment have I given you…that ye love one another even as I have loved you.”
The prayer from the Puritan Prayer book about Christian love says, “It is your will, O Lord, that I should love you. For you God sent your only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish but have everlasting life. Herein is love made perfect. Not that we loved him but that he loved us. Thou didst love me before I loved thee. When I was an enemy, a sinner, a loathsome worm, thou didst claim me when I disclaimed myself. By thy love thou didst claim me as a son.”
Accordint to the Sh’ma, “Hear O Israel, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy might.” Unless we love God above all we cannot love our neighbor as ourself. The first of the Ten Commandments says “thou shalt have no other Gods before me.” One translation says, “you shall have no other Gods between your face and my face.”
As David prayed in repentance, “Against you and you only God have I sinned. Judge me not according to my sin but according to your loving kindness and tender mercy. Blot out my transgressions and create in me a new heart O Lord.”
Our prayer is that we will love our wives with Christ’s heart behind our heart. As the apostle Paul said, Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her.
The unconditional agape love of God continues on in the face of rejection. The love of God loves the unloveable and gives regardless of the response of the other party. As Suzan said, “never let how others treat you determine how you treat them.” According to Romans 12, “Recompense to no man evil for evil. Be not overcome of evil but overcome evil with good.”
There is no malice in God’s remarkable love. The love of God suffers long and is kind. It is never rude, never resentful, never prideful or boastful. The love of God always expects the best. It is not easily provoked. The unconditional love of God keeps no record of wrongs done. Agape love beareth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Love never fails.
There’s nothing wrong with our wives that God can’t fix in us. The love of God will change us from the inside out. To reconcile our hearts we must meet our wives at the foot of the cross. For there is one God and one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus.
According to 1 John 4:10-11, “Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation (the full payment and never ending sacrifice) for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another.”
In loving God above all and our neighbor as ourselves,
May we ever live to the praise of the glory of His grace!
Your brother in Christ,