Apicontent

Day 7

God is love. (1 John 4:8, 16) 

We had this verse a few days ago, but since it is twice repeated in Scripture, it seemed good to repeat it here as well. 

How did I come to write 40 Days of God’s Love? How did I begin to realize God was not like I had grown up thinking that He was? 

Let me tell you my story. 

I grew up in a Christian home. In Sunday school we sang, “Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so.” When I was 16, I accepted Jesus into my heart. I believed “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). On some level I knew that God loved me. But I thought He somehow loved me less when I did “bad” things and more when I did “good” things. 

So I tried to do more and more “good” things. I earned a Ph. D. in Developmental Psychology with the intent of helping poor, forgotten children. My hope was that my husband (a pediatrician) and I, together with our children, could establish Christian orphanages in developing countries. I wanted to share Jesus with others. 

But just after our fourth child was born, at age 32, I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. I couldn’t walk in a straight line. My whole body felt weak and tingly. My eyes wouldn’t focus. All my plans of helping orphans faded. I couldn’t even care for our own children. My sister and her family moved from 2,000 miles away to help us. Day after day I lay on the couch trying to be strong and hide my tears. What was happening to me? “God, You said, ‘All things work together for good to those who love you….’ God, you promised! But this isn’t good!” 

This time in my life was horribly difficult, not only because of the physical symptoms, but because of my distorted view of God. I felt deserving of love only as I did good things and I couldn’t do anything. 

Month after month as I lay on the couch, feeling worthless and unloved, there grew in me a desperate longing to know God. I didn’t understand the longing. I thought I knew God; I had accepted Christ, gone to church and lived a moral “Christian” life. But the desire grew and grew. Like a person dying of thirst in the desert craves water, I had to know God. 

Then one night, about three years after the diagnosis, I went to hear a guest speaker at church. After the service, I made my way to the front. “What do you want?” the visiting pastor asked me. And I sobbed out, “I just want God.” 

“Lift up your hands and say I surrender all,” he said. A huge resistance came over me. “What about my family?” I thought. “What about the ‘good’ I want to do?” But so much had been stripped away already. So I lifted up my hands and said, “I surrender all.” 

In that moment, from the cross at the front of the church—from the very center where the horizontal and vertical beams meet—pure love cascaded down upon me. It came in drops of liquid light that moved in flowing waves. I couldn’t stand up. As I lay on the floor, wave after wave of love poured down directly into my heart. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t move. 

For hours I lay there. Pure love just kept coming. I wasn’t reprimanded for past failings. I wasn’t healed from Multiple Sclerosis. I wasn’t given direction about something “good” to do. I’d said, “I just want God” and I got love. 

That night 25 years ago changed my life in ways too deep for words. “God is love.” He doesn’t love me because I am a human doing; He loves me because I am a human being. He loves me when I am sick. He loves me when I can’t do anything. He loves me in my partial belief. He love(s) me when I sin. 

Ponder for a Moment 

In what ways might you be thinking that God’s love for you is somehow related to what you do or don’t do? 

Describe an instance in your life when you knew you were loved.

Day 8

No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him. (John 1:18) 

In heaven, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit live together in perfect harmony. The Trinity desires that this same perfect togetherness—this same life in the love of God— be known to each and every one of us. 

But how could people understand this? How could we begin to comprehend God’s heavenly love? How could we know His feelings toward us? How could God communicate Himself to us? After the fall, people were cut off from God; their blind eyes couldn’t see Him as He really was. 

Imagine yourself watching an ant colony. The ants scurry around unaware of your presence. Some are searching for food. Others are digging a nest. Then you notice that a nearby stream is flooding and the colony is in danger of being destroyed. You see a better nesting site with abundant food just a few paces up the hill and out of danger from the waters. So you call down to the ants, “Run to higher ground. Come live in a safe place.” But they continue working on the old nesting site. You bend down and try to redirect their path with a stick. But the ants swarm about in confusion as if you are trying to hurt them. 

What can you do to help them? What if you became an ant yourself and communicated with them in a way they understood? 

In this sense, God the Son willingly became an ant for us. 

In Jesus, “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). Jesus is the Word; He is the essence of communication. And what is He communicating? What is Jesus expressing? 

Jesus is expressing God, who is love. As a man with a nature and feelings like ours, Jesus cared for people with loving-kindness expressed in actions and words we can understand. The Son of God came to share God with us in tangible, human ways we can see, feel and relate to. 

In Jesus’ life on earth, He communicated to us who God the Father really is. Jesus said, “He who has seen Me has seen the Father” (John 14:9). Hebrews 1:3 describes Jesus as being “the brightness of His [the Father’s] glory and the expressed image of His person.” When you see Jesus, you are seeing God in human form. The actions and words that pour forth from Jesus show us the Father’s heart.

In Jesus, we see God walking around in the time and space of earth; we see God as Someone we can relate to. He is not angry at us. He is not waiting to punish us for our failures or unbelief. He does not hold Himself apart as holy or superior. Rather, He is welcoming to those rejected by society and actually enjoys being with common people. He is up-close, personal, and intimately concerned with your physical, emotional, and spiritual needs. 

In Christ, the God we perceived as powerful and punishing, high and holy, became a helpless baby born to an unwed mother in a filthy animal shed. As a man, Jesus reached out to the poor, the sick, and those shunned by society. He befriended prostitutes and adulterers. He welcomed little children. He turned aside to talk to tax collectors, thieves, and those crazed by demons. And to the scribes and Pharisees who thought they understood God, He spoke words of truth that cut to the heart and showed them how lost they too really were … so they also could be made whole. 

With the purpose of bringing God’s life to all, Jesus showed us the greatest love the world will ever know. The “friend of sinners” (Luke 7:34) died on the cross for us. 

This is God in our language; this is love in a language you and I can understand. 

Ponder for a Moment 

Why do you think Jesus was willing to come to earth as a man? 

How would you communicate to someone who didn’t understand your language that you valued and treasured them? 

Day 9

Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people. But when He saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd. (Matthew 9:35–36) 

When we see Jesus going about His life on earth, we see the Father’s compassion. Jesus said, “The Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do; for whatever He does, the Son does in like manner” (John 5:19). When we see Jesus, we see God dressed in the flesh and blood of a man; we see love flowing out of a human like ourselves. 

The miracles Jesus did demonstrate the amazing power of God. Spectacular events—like opening blind eyes, healing lepers, and raising the dead—are eye-catching. But Jesus didn’t do miracles to attract attention or draw crowds. Compassion compelled Jesus to act as He did. Behind every miracle, sensational as it may have been, was the quiet, steadfast, uncompromising, unconditional love of God. 

One day a crowd was following Jesus as He walked to Jericho. Two poor, blind beggars were sitting in the dust beside the road. When they heard that Jesus was coming, they began calling out “Have mercy on us.” Those in the crowd rebuked them. They felt Jesus had more important things to do then pay attention to these worthless men. 

But still the men cried out. “Have mercy on us O Lord.” And Jesus’ heart of mercy went out to them. He stopped and bent down. 

“‘What do you want Me to do for you?’ They said to Him, ‘Lord, that our eyes may be opened.’ So Jesus had compassion and touched their eyes. And immediately their eyes received sight, and they followed Him” (Matthew 20:32–34). 

The blind beggars weren’t made to see in a blast of holy lightening from heaven. They received their sight when Jesus disregarded the crowd’s rebuke, paused in His journey, stooped down beside the dusty road and touched their blind eyes. 

Feel the compassion behind that touch. 

On another occasion, Jesus was preaching and casting out demons when a man with leprosy came to Him. In Jesus’ day, lepers were outcast from families and society. People feared to touch or associate with them for fear of getting the flesh-eating disease.

“A leper came to Him, imploring Him, kneeling down to Him and saying to Him, ‘If You are willing, you can make me clean.’ Then Jesus, moved with compassion, stretched out His hand and touched him, and said to him, ‘I am willing; be cleansed.’ As soon as He had spoken, immediately the leprosy left him” (Mark 1:40–42). 

Leprosy didn’t stop the love of God. Jesus stretched out His hand. 

Feel the compassion behind that touch. 

Yet another time, Jesus and some of His disciples were entering a city when a funeral procession was leaving through the gate. The dead man was the only son of a widow. Without a husband or a son, women in that culture had no respect or means of support. It was like the woman’s life too was ending with the death of her treasured only son. He had been everything to her and he was gone. And so she wept. Jesus saw the woman’s deep pain and His heart went out to her. 

“When the Lord saw her, He had compassion on her and said to her, ‘Do not weep.’ Then He came and touched the coffin, and those who carried him stood still. And He said, ‘Young man, I say to you, arise.’ So he who was dead sat up and began to speak” (Luke 7:13–15). 

Jesus felt the widow’s grief. God knew her pain. His only Son too would die. And so, God reached down through Jesus’ hands. 

Feel the compassion behind that touch. 

Ponder for a Moment 

Pretend you have no preconceived ideas about God and you are seeing Him for the first time in these events. Describe God as you see Him in these situations. 

Just as it was over 2,000 years ago, Jesus’ touch of compassion is here for you now. What do you need compassion for today? 

Day 10

The LORD has appeared of old to me saying: “Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you.” (Jeremiah 31:3) 

With lovingkindness, God draws us to Himself. As amazing as it sounds, God who created the universe wants to be with you. Regardless of your position in life, your religion, or your sins, you—exactly as you are right now—are cherished by God. 

You are not a project to God. His goal is not to have you act certain ways or believe certain doctrines. God doesn’t just love you and put up with you; He actually likes you and delights in being with you. 

Each member of the Trinity works together, in love, to draw us into love. 

God the Father had a plan to bring us back into His family. That plan involved sending His Son. “In this the love of God was manifest toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him” (1 John 4:9). 

God the Son came to earth as fully God and fully man to do for us what we could not do for ourselves. Jesus stepped down from heaven and took our sin upon Himself. Then He died on the cross to free us forever from that sin. Jesus said, “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends” (John 15:13). 

Today God the Spirit works in you and me to reveal the Son’s complete accomplishment of the Father’s plan. The Holy Spirit wants you to know that Jesus has done everything required to bring you back into unity with God. He makes agape love real in living experience. “The love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us” (Romans 5:5). 

Deep in the core of each of us is a desperate longing to be loved. Our souls were created to be adored and treasured in intimate, honest relationships. God designed the human race to grow and flourish in union with Him. Like two magnets when they are properly aligned attract each other, God’s love pulls us in and holds us close in life-giving, soul-satisfying union. 

But, if we are blind to God’s lovingkindness, we will resist Him. No one wants to be with someone who they think is aloof and distant or demanding and fault-finding. We avoid such people. And if we wrongly believe God to be this way, we will avoid Him too. 

Like two magnets when they are misaligned push each other apart, our misunderstanding of God keeps us from Him.

But in Jesus, we hear God welcoming us. Standing on a hill above the holy city, Jesus cried out, “Oh Jerusalem…. How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing” (Matthew 23:37). 

Can you hear the passion in His voice? Can you feel His longing? Think of a mother hen spreading her wings wide to cover and protect her brood of little chicks. Jesus doesn’t want you trying to survive on your own. He wants you coming to Him, resting in the security and strength of His arms and knowing that you are accepted. 

Jesus doesn’t point accusing fingers. He doesn’t clench angry fists. His arms are not folded tight across His chest; they are spread wide in welcome. He wants you. 

Wherever you are today, God is calling you. “Come to Me. Lay down the burden of your do’s and don’ts. Lay down your efforts to make yourself acceptable. Give up the hurtful, untrue thoughts you hold about yourself and about Me. Please, I’m here for you. I desire you. Come and rest in My love.” 

Ponder for a Moment 

What do you feel when you hear God’s words, “I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you”? 

How might your life have been different if you had known from early on that you were loved and valued, treasured, and adored? 

How might your life be different going forward if you embrace the truth of God’s love for you?

Day 11

Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance? (Romans 2:4) 

“The goodness of God leads you to repentance.” Another translation reads: “God’s kindness leads you toward repentance” (NIV). God’s nature of lovingkindness makes a way for repentance. 

But what is repentance? What is it that knowing God’s goodness and kindness leads us toward? 

Repentance does not mean beating yourself up and feeling guilty because you have done something wrong. It is not confessing your sins to a priest or kneeling in guilt-ridden prayer. Repentance may conjure up images of an angry father shouting, “Say you are sorry … or else,” but this image springs from an incorrect understanding of repentance … and of God. 

The Greek word for repentance is metanola. Metanola refers to a change of mind from confusion to clarity. Repentance indicates a radical reorientation—a paradigm shift—in the way we think of God. It implies a true change of heart resulting in a wiser view. 

John the Baptist bridged the gap between the law-based system of the Old Testament—the “Old Covenant”—and the grace-based system of the New Testament—the “New Covenant.” He came preaching, “a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins” (Luke 3:3). God was about to show humanity His stunning goodness, and a completely new mindset was necessary to grasp it. 

John announced Jesus’ arrival, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 3:2). He was saying, “Change your mind. God in heaven is drawing near. Get ready to know God as you have not known Him before.” 

Seeing God’s kindness in Jesus Christ changes our mind about who God is … and about who we are. It is the goodness of God that leads us to repentance. 

How did we get into the position of seeing God incorrectly in the first place? Why is it so difficult for us to understand God is agape? 

Our problem is with the “opened” eyes we inherited when Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Before the fall, the first couple had only known God’s goodness, acceptance and care for them. But after eating the forbidden fruit, their diseased eyes saw life through the veil good and evil; they saw that God was good, pure and right … and they were not. They had done evil and holy God hated evil. 

In their darkened minds, the only way back was to try and win God’s acceptance by following rules to make themselves good. But even when God Himself gave His laws to follow (the Ten Commandments), people couldn’t obey; the law-based system didn’t work. 

Throughout the ages since the fall, people have used various religions (including Christianity), each with its own set of laws and moral codes, to get us back to the God we see with our “opened” eyes. 

But God wants us to see Him as He really is: holy and hating sin, but loving us in spite of it. 

And so, we are called to repent—to change our minds about Him—to see the goodness of God in the face of Jesus Christ. 

When you know God is good, there is no need to hide from Him. In Christ, you do not need to fear that God will abandon you because of your sins. You do not have to punish yourself or try in your own strength to fix the bad side of yourself. You need not live with the stress and anxiety of trying to be “good” enough to satisfy your mind’s warped view of God. 

Truly, “the goodness of God leads you to repentance.” Jesus came to open our eyes to who God really is … so our minds would be changed and we could live in the freedom of knowing His love. 

Ponder for a Moment 

Regardless of your religious affiliation or lack thereof, in what ways might you be relying on good works or obedience to laws to make yourself right? 

Consider how God may be calling you to repentance, not so much for moral failure or breaking the law, but for a change of mind in the way you think of Him. 

Day 12

But when he [the prodigal son] was still a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion, and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him. And the son said to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight, and am no longer worthy to be called your son.” But the father said to his servants, “Bring out the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and sandals on his feet. And bring the fatted calf here and kill it, and let us eat and be merry; for this my son was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.” (Luke 15:20–24) 

Stories have a way of sneaking past our defenses. We hear the story, something within us resonates with it, and then we realize it is speaking to us. Jesus told this story to open our eyes to the truth of how our Father feels about us. 

A father had two sons. The older son worked hard on his father’s farm and followed the rules. The younger son did not. He wanted to do his own thing. So he asked his father for his inheritance, went to a far-away place and squandered all that his father had given him. Until … he ended up feeding pigs and eating their food to stay alive. 

Then the prodigal son came to his senses and realized that even his father’s servants were better off than he. So he decided to go home. Along the way, he thought of what he might say to appease his father. He would admit his sin. He would forfeit his sonship. He would ask only to be a servant in his father’s house. 

As the son neared home, the father saw him coming! He ran to meet his son, flung his arms around him and kissed him. Can you see the father running on his tottery, old legs? Can you see the joyful tears streaming down his cheeks? 

The father didn’t think about what his son had done; that the money was squandered, that his heart had been torn with grief, that the prodigal had sinned. The father didn’t bargain with his son: “You are welcomed home if.…” He was simply overjoyed at his return. And so he had the servants bring fine clothes to replace his son’s tattered rags. This was cause for celebration. “My son was dead and is alive again.” 

“My son.” Can you hear the father’s adoration? “My precious son is alive!” Relationship with a lost family is restored! 

The older, responsible son was working in his father’s fields. But when he arrived home and heard that a party was being given for his younger brother, he was mad. The thought of welcoming home this sinner, this failure, this lazy good-for-nothing made him angry. For all these years, he had done right. It was he who deserved a party. 

The father reassured his older son of his position in the family and invited him to join the celebration. Again his words are laced with love. “Son, you are always with me, and all that I have is yours. It was right that we should make merry and be glad, for your brother was dead and is alive again, and was lost and is found.” 

But the older son viewed his father’s actions toward his brother with disdain. His father’s heartwarming welcome of this prodigal wasn’t fair. His sinful, lazy brother had done nothing to earn such treatment. He was wiser than such nonsense. He was better than that—above forgiveness, above mercy, above his father’s grace, above the joy of reunion. 

The question is not: Does the father love his sons? Clearly, he loves both. 

The critical question is: Will the sons accept their father’s undeserved, unconditional love? 

You and I, along with every human being on the planet, are cherished by God. But we each have a choice as to how we respond. That choice doesn’t affect the Father’s love for us, but it does have a monumental impact on our lives. 

Ponder for a Moment 

Where are you in this story? Which son are you? In what ways might you be a combination of the two? 

Think of a time when someone was overjoyed to see you. What did their joy tell you about how they felt about you?

Day 13

God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8) 

In this verse, we see the essence of God’s heart toward us. He is not filled with wrath and anger. His thoughts toward us are not about judgment or punishment. His heart is, and always has been, filled with love for us. 

In the Old Testament, we often read of the wrath and judgment of God. People were punished for their sins. But even before He sent His Son, we see that the Father’s kindness and mercy trump His anger. Scripture tells us, “With a little wrath I hid My face from you for a moment; but with everlasting kindness I will have mercy on you” (Isaiah 54:8). 

Actually, God’s wrath is as much a part of His love as are mercy and forgiveness. God’s love for us is demonstrated in His fierce wrath toward anything that would harm us. God hates sin because it damages you and me and He can’t stand that. The full force of His anger is directed against sin because it hurts us—the “very good” of His creation—the masterpieces of His design. Regardless of the cost—regardless of the sacrifice—He will fight to rid us of sin and death. 

But what is sin? When Jesus died for our sins, what did He die for? 

The Greek word for sin is hamartia. Hamartia means missing the true goal of life. All of us sin, not just in a moral or legal sense, but by missing the mark of living as God designed. When we consider our sin, we usually think of things we know we have done wrong or are doing wrong. But sin goes deeper than that. Hamartia encompasses ways of thinking, feeling and acting that we don’t even know about that block us from living in the relationship with God for which we were created. 

Jesus is the “Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). Jesus died to free us of the sin keeping us from the Father and preventing us from being the people He created us to be. As the sinless Son of Man, the Son of God took our sin upon Himself and paid the full penalty for it. Jesus took the wrath of God our sins deserved; He took the separation they required. 

Hanging on the cross, Jesus cried out, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me” (Matthew 27:46). And then He descended into hell—the hell we deserved for our sin but, in Christ, will never hold us captive. 

In His death, Jesus fulfilled the righteous requirements of the Old Covenant law so that we sinners could know the love of God. In Christ, the Father doesn’t remember your sins. He said, “Their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more” (Hebrews 8:12). In Christ, God sees you washed clean in the blood of His Son. 

But no matter where we are in life, Satan, the “accuser of the brethren” (Revelation 12:10), will pester us with thoughts to keep us from life in the fullness of God’s love. He will try to convince us that we are not “good” enough for God. We may be tempted to think God is mad at us in some way. We may fear that our trials are punishment for our sin. 

Many of us try so hard to pull ourselves up to the level of holiness we think God desires. We work tirelessly to leave our sinful humanity behind. Like modern-day Pharisees, we use religion (including Christianity) to try to improve ourselves. 

You may never be the person you want to be, but that is OK. The Father, Son, and Spirit welcome real people like you and me—with sins we can’t seem to overcome. God loves you as are you are. He sent His Son to restore you to the relationship with God for which you were designed. 

Ponder for a Moment 

Have you sinned in some way that you feel excludes you from God’s love? If so, Explain. 

What conditions might you have placed on God’s unconditional love? 

What does this passage tell you about how God actually sees you?

Day 14

This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. (John 17:3) 

Eternal life is not just going to heaven when you die. It is not a one-time gift God gives to you and then He walks away. Eternal life is not a destination to be reached; it is a relationship to be enjoyed. Eternal life is you sharing yourself with God and God sharing Himself with you. It is living as part of the Trinity’s mutual love and goodness. Eternal life is knowing God. 

The Greek word for know is ginosko. Ginosko does not refer to a learning of facts like one might memorize important dates in history or learn about key events in someone’s life. Ginosko means to be connected intimately in experience, like two people come to know each other in marriage. Ginosko implies a deep, honest, relational knowing of the heart. 

There is a chasm of difference between knowing about someone and actually knowing someone in experience. 

A huge gap exists between knowing about God and actually knowing God. We can correctly define God as all-powerful, all-knowing, everywhere-present—even as loving. These facts are true, but knowing the facts is not the same as knowing Him. Our spiritual journeys can start as intellectual pursuits, but they won’t find fulfillment there. Eternal life cannot be reduced to truths we learn in a Bible study or by reading Scripture. 

All too often, honest, searching people give up on God because religion tells them about God, but discourages them from knowing and experiencing Him. Christianity wasn’t meant to be a religion. It wasn’t meant to be reduced to a set of theological truths. Christianity is knowing Jesus—God made a man you can relate to—in an ongoing, relational way, as you know a spouse or a best friend. 

But, how do you come to know God? 

Relationships don’t happen all at once. They begin gradually and grow over time. 

The Holy Spirit helps make the truth of the Father and the Son a living reality in our lives. He uses our life experiences, character flaws and sins to help us see that God accepts us unconditionally. He reveals God to us through Scripture, answered prayer, dreams, the actions of others … the simple beauty of a flower, a forest or a sunset. The Holy Spirit is wonderfully creative in the ways He opens our eyes and encourages us to trust in Jesus.

Our only part is to come to Jesus. Nothing else is required. He accepts us as the fearful, skeptical, sinful, needy people, we really are. Jesus said, “The one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out” (John 6:37). 

God created each one of us for eternal life; we are meant to know Him. Without Him we are incomplete. Deep in the soul of every man, woman and child is the need to be appreciated, valued, and loved. This is the need God wants to satisfy. With heartfelt longing the Trinity desire you. 

However, God gives us free choice. He won’t force us into a relationship with Him—into eternal life. He won’t force us … because love, by its very nature, can’t be forced. Love can only be given and received by choice. Think of a young man who loves a certain woman. He wants to be with her. He lavishes her with gifts that he wants her to enjoy. He delights in her and he wants her to feel the same about him. But the young woman doesn’t have to accept his love. Mutual loving relationship is only possible where there is freedom to choose. Our participation is voluntary, not mandatory. 

The passion of the Trinity for us is more than we can fathom. Jesus made the greatest sacrifice for you. Nothing brings heaven greater joy than that you choose Him. 

Ponder for a Moment 

If you desire to have a relationship with Jesus, sincerely say these words, or something similar, to Him. 

Dear Jesus, You are the Son of God. You died on the cross for my sins. You love me just as I am right now. 

Jesus, I welcome You. Be with me in the ups and downs of life. Teach me Your ways and be Lord of my life. 

Thank You Jesus for coming to live in my heart and welcoming me into eternal life with You. Open my eyes and help me to see You as You really are. I want to know You more. 

Day 15

Then one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him and saying, “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?”
Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'” (Matthew 22:35–39) 

Jesus summed up the most important commands in the Old Covenant by pointing to the importance of love. When asked by a Pharisee about the greatest commandment in the law, Jesus responded, “You shall love the LORD your God….” and, “You shall love your neighbor….” 

Both the Old and New Covenant emphasize that love is to be our highest calling. 

The Apostle John wrote, “For this is the message that you heard from the beginning, that we should love one another” (1 John 3:11). He said, “And this is His commandment that we should believe on the name of His Son Jesus Christ and love one another, as He gave us commandment” (1 John 3:23). His admonition was, “If God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (1 John 4:11). 

The Apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “Let all that you do be done with love” (1 Corinthians 16:14). He encouraged the Ephesians, “Therefore be imitators of God as dear children and walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us” (Ephesians 5:1–2). And to the Colossians Paul said, “But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection” (Colossians 3:14). 

But how do we do the ought John spoke of? How do we walk in love or put on love as Paul encouraged? If we think of these New Testament scriptures as something we are to try in our own strength to do—as commands to be followed in the Old Covenant way—they become impossible to obey. 

And to make their impossibility blatantly clear, Jesus raised the bar on love. He said, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemy, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for who spitefully use you and persecute you” (Matthew 5:43–44). How can we love like that? 

God is love and we were created in His image—to be like Him—to be part of His family and share agape.

Jesus came to show people what agape looks like in a human form, but His intent was never that we try to copy His actions by designing our own ways to help ourselves become more Christlike. 

Jesus came as the living embodiment of love so we could know and believe the love that God has for us. Jesus freely gives us the love that we share with others. Knowing we are loved allows us to love. We radiate agape because we have received agape. 

But I grew up, as many do, not fully understanding this. Somehow I understood that eternal life was mine despite my sins, but at the same time, I thought life on earth was to be lived by following “good,” “Christian” standards to improve myself. In a distorted way, I believed the law-based system of the Old Covenant was still in effect and that, while I was fully saved by grace, it was my job to live life on earth by trying to be honest, obedient, kind … and most of all loving. 

At the time I had no words or understanding for why I was struggling. I knew something wasn’t working, but I just kept trying harder to make my version of the “Christian” life work 

God, in His mercy, would show me the root of the problem, but it would be a rough and painful journey … 

Ponder for a Moment 

In the past, have you ever felt that something wasn’t right in your life, but had no words or understanding about the root cause? If so, describe such a time. 

If you could give your emotional/thought life to a friend, would they want what you have? How would they describe that life? 

Day 16

Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing. (1 Corinthians 13:1–3) 

The truth of those words crashed down upon me one hot, August morning. It had been about ten years since God had poured out His love on me that unforgettable evening as I lay on the floor of the church. 

From Scripture, I understood the importance of loving God and neighbor. So, like a “good” Christian, I was trying my hardest to do what I absolutely knew God wanted me to do—to be kind, caring, and compassionate like He was. 

But in the years since that night at church, I’d failed miserably. I’d had an affair. How could I have done such a terrible thing—especially after experiencing God’s love in such a dramatic way? I felt as though I’d spit in God’s face and told Him He wasn’t enough. I had sinned horribly. I felt like I didn’t deserve to be loved. 

“God is love.” I knew that intellectually. But I simply couldn’t accept it personally—down in the core of myself. I felt that I needed to clean myself up before I could be acceptable to God. So I shut myself off from relationship—receiving what I felt I absolutely did not deserve. 

In order to keep from sinning in such a horrible way again, I put all sorts of additional, Christian-sounding rules on myself: “Mary, you have to pray more.” “You have to walk in the Spirit.” “Don’t ever be alone with a man except your husband.” Like a modern-day Pharisee, I plastered myself with rules to prevent sin from coming out. 

I couldn’t fathom that, after what I’d done, God could still love me. In my twisted thinking, I believed I had to earn God’s love by obeying His commands … so I could prove I loved Him … so He would then want to be in relationship with me. I had no understanding of the spirit, soul, and body, and that the core need of my soul was to know God’s love—the very love I had shut myself off from by thinking my sin disqualified me. 

This was the condition of my life that hot, August day … when during a morning Bible study with a dear, older friend, she leaned forward and said, “Mary, can I tell you something?” The intensity of her eyes told me it was important.

“Yes,” I said. 

Her blue eyes looked into mine. “Mary, you don’t love.” 

The words hit me like a freight train. It was true—horribly true. I didn’t love. The first few verses of 1 Corinthians 13 flashed through my mind. “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal.…” I didn’t love and love was the most important thing. I was nothing—nothing but a loud, irritating noise-maker. 

I was failing miserably at the most important thing in life. The affair had ended years ago. I’d told my husband and he had forgiven me. We were going to church as a family and had youth group meetings in our home. Multiple Sclerosis was less of an issue for me and I was able to care for our children and do volunteer work for a mission organization. I was trying so hard to be good and love God and others. But life wasn’t working and I didn’t know why. 

I came out of my chair and lay face down on the living room carpet. What was wrong with me anyway? Why couldn’t I love? 

In total desperation, a prayer gushed out. “God, fix the wrong in me. I want to love. Whatever it takes.” 

Ponder for a Moment 

Consider a time in your life when you felt you didn’t deserve to be loved. What made you feel that way? 

Do you think God agreed with your opinion of yourself as being undeserving of love? Why or why not?