This week’s blog covers the topic of God’s great love. Being Christmas time, we reflect on the love expressed when God sent His Son to this earth as a sacrifice for our sins. God not only has love, He not only operates in love... but He is Love.
He who does not love has not become acquainted with God [does not and never did know Him], for God is love.
1 John 4:8 [AMP]
Your Christmas edition of the Powerhouse Blog features teachings by Pastor Jake, Brotha DC, David River, and Judypie. Merry Christmas... and happy New Year!
God’s Love
by James C. Sanford
It is only by the love of Christ that we can experience and appreciate the love of God:
- The love of God for man moved him to give Christ for his redemption (John 3:16; Ephesians 2:4)
| - Christ’s love for man moved him to give his life’s blood for his salvation (Galatians 1:4; 2:20; Ephesians 5:2; Ephesians 5:25; 1 Timothy 2:6; Titus 2:14).
| - The gift of Christ to man is the measure of God’s love.
| - The death of Christ for man is the measure of Christ’s love.
| - Christ loved us, and gave himself for us.
We can know all these things, yet God’s love surpasses our full comprehension; therefore we can only speak of it in terms of the depth of our experience and what has been revealed to us from the Holy Scriptures. Therefore God’s love is not known but is experienced through a personal relationship with Him through His Son Jesus.
There is something about God’s love that is so tender, so sweet—so beautiful; one who has experienced God’s love has enjoyed the pleasure of it as a soothing ointment flowing over his total being; and is a healing for the soul. His love is like eye-salve that allows one to see God’s beauty through the eyes of Christ. To experience God’s love is to know joy and peace that surpasses all understanding. To experience God’s love is to know life and perfect rest. To be perfected in love is to be filled with love, meekness, gentleness, goodness, justice, holiness, mercy, and truth---to be made perfect—to be filled to all the fullness of God. Heaven and earth hold no greater treasure.
Love is the supreme attribute of God and is the very core and nucleus of His glory. Love is also a state of being, a living life form---or as the Bible declares, “God is love” (1 John 4:8, 16). God is love just as truly as He is “light” (1:5), “truth” (1:6), and “spirit” (John 4:24). Just as Spirit and light are expressions of His essential nature; love is the expression of His personality corresponding to His nature. This love is the highest expression of God and His relation to mankind, so it must be that this love be the highest expression of man’s relation to his Creator---and to his fellow man.
The love of God is that part of His nature which leads Him to express Himself in terms of endearment toward His creatures, and to actively manifest that interest and affection in acts of loving care and self-sacrifice (John 1:1-2) in behalf of the objects of His love. Thus we can think of God as the fountain of love.
God not merely loves, He imparts this nature to be the sphere in which His children dwell, for “he that abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him” (1 John 4:16).
Not only do the children of God dwell in the presence of His love the very nature of God is thus imparted to His children. Love directed to both God and man is fundamental to true believers. For this reason the reality and power of God’s love are properly executed only under the infilling and guidance of our Heavenly Father’s own Holy Spirit.
The Apostle Paul writes,
The love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
Romans 5:5
Thus we understand love is the first and foremost element of the fruit of the Spirit -- a divine impartation to God’s children (Galatians 5:22; see also 1 John 3:14).
If God is the fountain of love, then it must be that His Son, the living Word of God, is the expression or out-flowing of that love (John 3:16).
While we were yet sinners and did not know or love God,
He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
2 Corinthians 5:21 [NASU]
God made Jesus (who was innocent) to be a sacrifice on the altar of the cross for the sinner. In other words, Christ died in our stead that by repentance (Acts 2:38) and faith we might through this act of grace (Ephesians 2:8) be partakers of eternal life; there is no greater love than this.
All virtue springs out of divine love; hence the love that is presented in the Gospel as the mainspring of holy living is grateful love. A revelation and conviction of sin and the punishment that is due followed by a revelation of God’s love and the price He paid for man’s deliverance and redemption, humbles the heart to the point of gratefulness. This impartation of grateful love is the highest motive or ground of moral actions. All other self-effort motives fall short of furnishing the true stimulus for obedience leading to righteous living. “We love, because He first loved us” are words that rightly express the whole matter (1 John 4:19; 2 Corinthians 5:14; Romans 12:1-2).
Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.
1 John 4:7 [NASU]
Selah.
Hesed
by Brotha DCBy day Jehovah commandeth His kindness, And by night a song [is] with me, A prayer to the God of my life.
Psalm 42:8 [YLT]
The Lord your God is in the midst of you, a Mighty One, a Savior [Who saves]! He will rejoice over you with joy; He will rest [in silent satisfaction] and in His love He will be silent and make no mention [of past sins, or even recall them]; He will exult over you with singing.
Zephaniah 3:17 [AMP]
That I love you
Can you feel
My Presence near?
How I long
to love you
Hold you close
And calm all fear
More than a mother
with a baby at her breast
I want to hold you
and forever give you rest
Don’t you know it hurts Me
when you pull away
Come to the peaceful waters
My precious son, My daughter
Come to the peaceful waters
Do you think
I’d forsake you?
Have you read
My promises?
Come to Me,
My children
You will be
Forever blessed
More than a mother
with a baby at her breast
I want to hold you
and forever give you rest
Don’t you know it hurts Me
when you pull away
Come to the peaceful waters
My precious son, My daughter
Come to the peaceful waters
Agape
by Brotha DC20 But you, beloved, build yourselves up [founded] on your most holy faith [make progress, rise like an edifice higher and higher], praying in the Holy Spirit;
21 Guard and keep yourselves in the love of God; expect and patiently wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah)--[which will bring you] unto life eternal.
21 Guard and keep yourselves in the love of God; expect and patiently wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah)--[which will bring you] unto life eternal.
Jude 20-21 [AMP]
After my songwriting partner Cameron Towner and I completed the song on the Hebrew word for God’s love (Hesed), I began work on one using the Greek version of the same word (Agape). This is a supernatural love... one that is difficult to achieve but invaluable to practice.
Tell me, how bad did it hurt when you found it wasn’t true?
But there’s a love
Unlike any other
Love that won’t wear out...
it’s always new
Know that I have a love for you
Agape
Uncompromising love, it’s true
Agape
I’ll love you when your heart turns black
I’ll love you if you don’t love back
And even if you turn away from Me
There’ll always be Agape
How many times has your heart longed to hear, “I love you?”
Tell Me... how bad did you feel When your love turned his back on you?
Run to My arms
I will always love you
You have My promise
I won’t leave you
Know that I have a love for you
Agape
Uncompromising love, it’s true
Agape
I’ll love you when your heart turns black
I’ll love you if you don’t love back
And even if you turn away from Me
There’ll always be Agape
My love will lift you from the ground
My love will turn your life around
Fear reverently and you will always stay
in My Agape
A Letter from God
by David River
My Dearest Child,
When I created the heavens and the earth, I spoke them into being. When I created man, I formed him from the dust of the ground and breathed life into his nostrils. But you, woman I did not create from the dirt. I made you from man as a symbol that you are “within” man, just as my bride is “within” me.
I fashioned you after I breathed the breath of life into man because you are too delicate. I allowed a deep sleep to come over him so I could patiently and perfectly form you. As a surgeon would put a patient under anesthesia, man was put to sleep so that he could not interfere with my creativity. From man’s one bone, I fashioned you. I chose the bone that protects his very life. I chose the rib; that which protects his heart and lungs and supports him as you are meant to do. Around this one bone I shaped you... I molded you. I created you tenderly, beautifully, and perfectly.
Your characteristics are as the rib; strong yet delicate and fragile. You provide protection for the most delicate organ within man, his heart. His heart is the center of his being; his lungs hold the breath of life. The ribcage will allow itself to be broken before it will allow damage to the heart. I created you to support man as the rib cage supports the body. You were not taken from his feet, to be under him, nor were you taken from his head, to be above him. You were taken from his side closest to his heart, to stand beside him and be held close to his side and dear to his heart.
You woman are my perfect creation. You are my beautiful little girl. You have grown to be a splendid woman of excellence, and my eyes fill when I see the virtues in your heart. Your eyes are as beautiful as a golden sunset. Your lips; how lovely when they part in prayer. Your nose; so perfect in form. Your hands so gentle to touch. I’ve caressed your face in your deepest sleep. I’ve whispered tender words of love in your ear. I hold your heart here within mine. Of all that lives and breathes, you are most like me. Your pure heart is most like mine. You my precious angel are the climax of my creation. You are a representation of my pure and spotless bride. When man loves you, he loves me, and the more deeply he loves you, the more deeply he loves me.
Adam walked with me in the cool of the day, yet he was lonely. So everything I wanted Adam to share and experience with me, I fashioned in you as a physical representation of myself upon the earth. You possess my holiness, my strength, my purity, my beauty, my love, my protection and my support.
So man... treat woman well. Love her extravagantly; treasure her royally, for she is fragile. In hurting her, you only hurt me. What you do to her, you do to me. In crushing her, you only damage your own heart; her heart, and also my heart.
Woman, support man. In humility, show him the power of emotion I have given you. In gentle quietness, show your strength. In love, show him that you are the rib that protects his very life; that you the bone that shelters his very heart.
Signed,
The One Who Created and Loves You
God’s Valentine Gift
by Joanna Fuchs
Was not a bunch of flowers;
It wasn’t candy, or a book
To while away the hours.
His gift was to become a man,
So He could freely give
His sacrificial love for us,
So you and I could live.
He gave us sweet salvation, and
Instruction, good and true--
To love our friends and enemies
And love our Savior, too.
So as we give our Valentines,
Let’s thank our Lord and King;
The reason we have love to give
Is that He gave everything
Confidence in His Love
by JesusLover Judy
I know that You love me and care for me, and those for whom I am praying. Today I make all my requests known to You with thanksgiving.
I know You hear me, and I believe Your best answers are on the way from the moment I ask. Amen.
Give thanks to the Lord because he is good.
His love continues forever.
His love continues forever.
Psalm 136:1 [NCV]
Do not fret or have any anxiety about anything, but in every circumstance and in everything, by prayer and petition (definite requests), with thanksgiving, continue to make your wants known to God.
Philippians 4:6 [AMP]
1 Peter 5:7 [AMP]
No comments:
Post a Comment