For the Love of God

The first four articles in “Trying to Walk” have dealt with the existence of God.  There will be more such articles, but this article is of a slightly different nature.  Humans are curious creatures, looking for answers to many different questions. As such we have increased our knowledge base by several orders of magnitude since the days of Adam and Eve.  However, some questions have not lent themselves to easy solutions or even discoverable answers.  There are things we may not know for certain until time gives way to eternity.

One such question is, “Why did God create people?”  You will search the Bible in vain for a definitive answer to this question.  Although Genesis begins by explaining that God created everything, it is not so quick to tell us why.  Why did God create the universe and everything in it?  Actually, that answer is implied in Genesis 1:28-30.  God created everything in this universe for people to use, or prosper from, or simply to enjoy.  But the question that is not explicitly answered is, why did God create people?

Since God didn’t answer that question we won’t know the answer for sure until such a time as He tells us.  But our curiosity leads us to ponder and speculate.  My pondering and speculating has led me to an answer that doesn’t violate anything that God has revealed in His Bible and seems to me in keeping with the character of God.

John tells us in 1 John 4:8, “Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.”  What a fascinating statement.  John doesn’t say that God is loving, or full of love, or overflowing with love.  Instead he says that God IS love.  God is love.  This is mind-boggling.  Whatever love is, that is what God is.  God and love are one and the same.  Can we take that in, wrap our minds around it and be comfortable with what it means?  I’m not so sure.

There are ideas and concepts in the Bible that can be put into words and we can say those words, but often without comprehension of what we are talking about.  “God said, ‘let there be light,’ and there was light.” Those are simple words but what do they imply?  How did something like that take place?  I don’t know.  I can’t comprehend that.  But I can say it.  There are some things about God that are beyond our comprehension. (Isaiah 55:8-9)

But what we can take away from John’s statement is that love is an inherent and important part of God’s very being.  So much so, that an individual who does not possess an adequate amount of love cannot even know much of anything about God.  Love is the most important response, by far, that we can and should have to God. Mark 12:30, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy [heart, mind, soul, and strength.]. And the second . . . Love thy neighbor as thyself.  There is none other commandment greater than these.”  Love is what makes the entire spiritual offering that we give to God of any value at all.

1 Cor. 13:1-3, " . . .if I have not love I am a clanging brass, or a tinkling cymbal . . . And have not love, I am nothing . . . And have not love it profits me nothing.” All of this, and so much more, flows from the fact that God is love.

At this point, there are two important things that we should note regarding God.  First of all is the idea that God is love.  The second is that we are made in His image, Genesis 1:27.  We know regarding humans that people who are filled with love have an urge to share that love.  That we are made in the image of God is an indication that a God who IS love, (not filled with love, but is love) would also wish to share that love with others.  In order to be able to share His love, God created people whom He could love and who could love Him in return,

1 John 4:10.

It is my belief that we were created for the love of God. This love is meant to flow in both directions, first from Him to us, and also from us to Him. What’s more, God placed His creation on a remarkable earth that displayed many aspects of His awesomeness and specifically placed people (the sole focus of His creation) in a beautiful garden where all their needs were met and in which He met with them, “walked with them”.  The beauty of the earth, and the majesty of the heavens were from God to humans something on the order of a young man bringing a bouquet of flowers to the girl he is taking out for the evening, but much greater in every way.

To achieve the relationship He desired, God had to create us as free moral agents, able to make our own choices.  Our love for Him has to be a choice we make, not an obligation programmed into us. The result is that we sometimes make bad choices. We sin. God is so holy, righteous and pure that He cannot even be in the presence of sin. So sin separates us from God, Isaiah 59:1-2. God, who desired to live with His people throughout all eternity, knew this would happen.  In fact, the heavens and the earth were not the first thing He created.

God had already planned for man’s sin and what needed to be done to redeem him before He created the “heavens and the earth,” Ephesians 1:4-5.  Read all of Ephesians 1.  Take it in.  Dwell on it.  Before He even laid “the foundation of the world,” before He even began His creative work, He had a plan in place for the salvation of man whom He knew would sin.  God knew if He created man it would be necessary for His son, Jesus Christ, to die on a cross to redeem man from man’s sin and back into the presence of this loving God.  He knew that.  Yet His love for His soon to be creation was so great that He created us anyway.

It defies comprehension.  This God whose awesomeness, power and majesty have been discussed in prior articles, who spoke an entire universe into existence loved us with such a great love that He was willing to make an extreme sacrifice just to have us with Him through eternity.  Lest we forget, note that Jesus, God, the Son, was as much a part of this as God, the Father. John 1:1-3, 10, 14.  Jesus agreed to His own death on the cross by being part of the creative process while knowing the plan necessary to redeem man from man’s sins.

As much as, no, more than “God said ‘let there be light’ and there was light,” the concepts of the preceding paragraphs can be put into words, and we can say those words, but will any of us ever truly understand the full import of what we are saying?  Maybe that will happen when we are at last in His presence forever.  How blessed we are that this awesome, majestic God before whom no one can stand is not just full of love.  Our God IS love.