Everlasting Love
God is in love with you!
The LORD God says to every
Christian believer, “I have loved you with an
everlasting love; therefore, with loving-kindness
have I draw you” (Jeremiah 31:3).
Those words are a great
encouragement for every believer.
God’s love for you is an eternal love.
It is filled with unfailing care and mercy.
He does not say, “I will love you,” but “I
have loved you with an everlasting love.”
In New Testament terms the
apostle John states the same wonderful truth. “We
love, because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19).
How do we know such an awesome
fact is true? “In this is love, not that we loved
God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the
propitiation for my sins” (v. 10). There has never
been a time, or even a moment, when He did not love
you.
Nothing but the love of God
could accomplish such an amazing feat. He loved us
and sent His son to be the “propitiation for our
sins.” God’s holiness is satisfied, and His wrath is
turned away from us because of what Jesus did for us
on our behalf. God’s justice has now been satisfied
because His perfect, sinless Son paid our debt in
full.
God’s wrath is a settled,
controlled, holy, antagonism against all sin. The
Law says, “The soul that sins shall die!” “The wages
of sin is death.” But a righteous and just God
intervened in His sovereign grace. “By this the love
of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His
only begotten Son into the world so that we might
live through Him” (1 John 4:9). “And the witness is
this, that God has given us eternal life, and this
life is in His Son. He who has the Son has the life;
he who does not have the Son of God does not have
the life” (5:11, 12).
God keeps saying over and over
again to us, “I have loved you with an everlasting
love; therefore I have drawn you with
loving-kindness.” I love you and I have demonstrated
that love once and forever in the death of My Son on
your behalf.
The Holy Spirit spreads abroad
through the heart this amazing love of God which is
given to us and then we love Him with all our heart.
We never understand God’s love
for us until He appears to us in that demonstration
of His grace. By nature we are dead to the presence
of God. We are in no condition to apprehend His love
until God reveals Himself. We cannot see God and His
love until God the Holy Spirit removes the scales
off our spiritual eyes. Our heart is dead to any
movement of God’s grace until the Holy Spirit
changes us. Our conversion or new birth is the work
of the Spirit. It is a divine operation. Man cannot
do it. True knowledge of the love of God is a divine
work.
God says to us, “I have loved
you with an everlasting love; therefore I have drawn
you with lovingkindness.”
Does your heart swell up with
gratitude of a million, “Thank you”? God says, “I
have drawn you with lovingkindness.” His arms are
always outstretched and reaching down to us even
when we were spiritually dead and unaware of it. It
is always a mighty act of grace when He comes to the
confessing, believing, repenting, trusting sinner.
“Oh, to grace, how great a debtor!” His love and
grace is patient with us.
“No one can come to Me,” Jesus
said, “unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and
I will raise him up on the last day” (John 6:44).
Jesus said, “All that the
Father gives Me shall come to Me; and the one who
comes to Me I will certainly not cast out” (John
6:37). God always finishes what He begins. Our
salvation is no exception. His everlasting love will
see us through to the end. “All that the Father
gives Me shall come to Me,” and with a double
negative in the original language He says, “I will
certainly not [no, never] cast out.” That
everlasting love gives us confidence and assurance
of eternal life with Him in heaven.
“All that the Father gives Me
shall come to Me . . .” Have you come? Will you come
to Him right now? With open arms His everlasting
love pleads, “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who
believers has eternal life. I am the bread of life”
(John 6:47-48).
Selah!
Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006
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Unless otherwise noted "Scripture quotations taken from the NASB." "Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE" © Copyright 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation Used by permission." (www.Lockman.org)
Scripture quoted by permission. Quotations designated (NET) are from the NET Bible copyright ©1996-2006 by Biblical Studies Press, L.L.C. http://www.bible.org/. All rights reserved.
Wil is a graduate of William Carey University, B. A.; New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, Th. M.; and Azusa Pacific University, M. A. He has pastored in Panama, Ecuador and the U. S, and served for over 20 years as missionary in Ecuador and Honduras. He had a daily expository Bible teaching ministry head in over 100 countries from 1972-2005. He continues to seek opportunities to be personally involved in world missions. Wil and his wife Ann have three grown daughters. He currently serves as a Baptist pastor and teaches seminary extension courses in Ecuador.
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