I love a lot of things in life.
I love good music, I love a good movie, I love my nieces and nephews. Love is a weird word.
I love my wife, I love my mum, I love a good chicken panang curry, but they love means very different things in each of those situations.
How do you know God loves you?
In the book of Romans, Paul give us really good evidence that God loves us.
For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. Indeed, rarely will anyone die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person someone might actually dare to die. But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us. (Romans 5:6-8 NRSV)
1. God's love is not dependant on you
The first thing that Paul wants to make clear is that God’s love is not dependant on us.
Paul’s talks about this in verse 6. Check it out. He says “For while we were still weak”.
God made us and loved us, and we don’t a very good job at loving him back. That’s what the whole Old Testament is about. We tried to love God in our own strength, and how far did it get us? How long did we last in the story of the Bible before we sinned? About 3 pages.
There’s nothing we can do to jump start the relationship with God by ourselves.
We have nothing in our hands that we can bring to him. It’s out of our power. We need help.
He loved us at just the right time time. Not when we were perfect, but when we were imperfect. God’s love isn’t dependant on you. Isn’t that a relief?
2. God's love isn't proven by how we feel
Love isn’t a feeling.
Feelings don’t always tell us what is true.
If our hope in God’s love was based on feelings and emotions, I go through about 20 different emotions before lunch every day. We need better proof than that. Something that doesn’t change as flippantly as our emotions.
Love is more than feelings. Love is an action.
If you want unshakable, beyond a shadow of a doubt evidence that God loves you, we need him to do something more reliable than our emotional state. Something real that proves he truly loves us. Right?
Well, we don’t have to wait. God did that.
He met us. He became human. And this. This is where everything changes.
3. God's love is proven by his actions
How do we know if God loves us?
He proved it. Jesus defines God’s love in action.
Because while we were out of line, while we were running as fast and as far away from him as we could, he pursued us. He came after us.
How is our relationship relationship with God described in Romans 5:6-8 before Jesus? Have a look.
Were we friends on Facebook? Best buddies? Acquaintances?
No, it says we were ungodly, sinners, enemies.
But God doesn’t wait for us to be right with him. He loves us first.
4. Jesus is the ultimate proof of God's love
You want to know what love really is? Check out Jesus.
Jesus redefines love. He moved towards broken people, not away from them. He had compassion even when he was exhausted, he kept loving. He didn’t care if he looked awkward, or people were embarrassed. He loved when it wasn’t expected or required. He loved outside his job description, his social group, his family. He didn’t wait for us to change, he walked with us while we were still in need.
Christ died for the ungodly.
While we were sinners Christ died for us.
He loved us, a desperate group of people, and nothing, not even death was going to stop him from letting the whole world how much he loves you.
He didn’t just use empty words, or rely on feelings to prove his love. He did it in action. He poured out every part of himself. While we were against him, he was for us. We had nothing in our hands, and he gave up everything for us. He didn’t just give us his death, he gave up his life for us.
How do we know if God loves us? Still need proof? It’s right there in verse 8.
But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us.
Jesus proves God’s love.