Category Archives: General

What kind of student were you in high school?  What about college?  What was your Grade Point Average—what students and educators alike refer to as the GPA?  Regardless of how low the GPA recorded on your official transcripts, in God’s grade book, if you have placed your trust in Jesus Christ, you are a straight “A” student with a perfect 4.0 GPA!  Because of Christ’s atoning work on your behalf, everyone who is in Christ has received an A+ . . . when only a grade of “Zero” was deserved.  “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it” (James 2:10 NIV).  But thanks to Christ’s perfect life, sacrificial death, and miraculous resurrection, all our bad grades have been erased forever, as if they never existed, and only Christ’s perfect score remains.

Now, this does not change the fact that we are called to do our very best in the school of life.  It doesn’t mean we may forsake the spiritual disciplines and the continuous effort required to grow up into Christ.  But it does mean that, regardless of our performance (good or bad) and attention to spiritual discipline (consistent or inconsistent), Jesus has already secured for us God’s eternal approval, acceptance, and affection.  No matter what we do, God will never change our grade; an A+ was reserved for us in God’s grade book from the beginning of time (see Ephesians 1:4) and that perfect grade can never be lowered or erased (see Romans 8:38-39).

I understand that many will misunderstand, misuse, and abuse this incredible gift of Gospel grace.  The Scriptures make this clear in a number of passages.

[W]atch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you have been taught; avoid them. For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites, and by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the naïve.  (Romans 16:17-18)

For certain people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this condemnation, ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.  (Jude 4) 

Yet our weaknesses, failures, and outright rebellion don’t change the truth about grace.  Frankly, if you have never wrestled with the concept of grace so amazing—grace that is unwarranted, unmerited, unconditional, and unending—then you have not yet been fully seized by its truth.

John Newton, the sinful slave trader turned clergyman by the grace of God, poured out the latter half of his life proclaiming the “Amazing Grace” of God.  As he neared the end of his time on earth, his health having deteriorated to the point where it affected his thinking and his speech, Newton acknowledged, “My memory is nearly gone, but I remember two things: that I am a great sinner, and that Christ is a great Savior.”

John Newton truly got it right in his magnificent hymn; Christian, drink in these timeless words!

Amazing grace!  How sweet the sound

that saved a wretch like me!

I once was lost, but now am found;

was blind, but now I see.

‘Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,

and grace my fears relieved;

how precious did that grace appear

the hour I first believed.

Through many dangers, toils, and snares,

I have already come;

‘tis grace hath brought me safe thus far,

and grace will lead me home.

The Lord has promised good to me,

his word my hope secures;

he will my shield and portion be,

as long as life endures.

Yea, when this flesh and heart shall fail,

and mortal life shall cease,

I shall possess, within the veil,

a life of joy and peace.

When we’ve been there ten thousand years,

bright shining as the sun,

we’ve no less days to sing God’s praise

than when we first begun.

Only when we begin to see the “wretch” within will we catch a glimpse of just how amazing God’s grace really is.  We were hopelessly lost in sin and blind to it . . . until Jesus showed up.  God pursued us, rescued us, and is in the process of renewing us in Christ . . . and He won’t stop until grace has completed its work and leads us safely home.

What He began in grace He will complete in grace.  “He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ” (Philippians 1:6). The more we understand this overwhelming truth, the better we will walk in it with the freedom, joy, and faithfulness the Gospel has secured for us.

This is the Gospel.  This is grace for your race.  NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

The Leaning Tower of Pisa is considered one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World.  Why?  The foundation upon which it was built was not strong or solid enough to support the weight of the tower, causing it to tilt more than 17 feet off center over the centuries.

The same phenomenon can be true in the life of believers.  When the foundation is not strong or solid enough to support the weight of living the Christian life, it will be reflected in an off-kilter life that veers markedly away from biblical teaching.

So how do we know when we are leaning?  The answer is found in God’s plumb line—His inspired, inerrant, infallible Word.  In biblical times, when a builder wanted to determine whether or not something was perfectly vertical (upright), he used a plumb line (a weight of some sort attached to the bottom of a string or line).  When you want to determine whether or not someone is perfectly upright you use The Lord’s plumb line—the Bible—the unfailing standard of total Truth.

This is what he showed me: behold, the Lord was standing beside a wall built with a plumb line, with a plumb line in his hand.  And the Lord said to me, “Amos, what do you see?”  And I said, “A plumb line.”  Then the Lord said, “Behold, I am setting a plumb line in the midst of my people Israel; I will never again pass by them; the high places of Isaac shall be made desolate, and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste, and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword.”  (Amos 7:7-9)

Israel was judged against the perfect Word of God, and they were found wanting.  In the very same way, we were being judged against the perfect Word of God and found wanting . . . until Jesus showed up.

From womb to tomb, Jesus fulfilled the Law perfectly. “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets,” He said; “I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them” (Matthew 5:17).  The only One who could measure up to God’s Plumb Line was God Himself, in the person of Jesus Christ.  He went to Golgotha’s Hill as the perfect sacrifice to make full payment for all our sins. 

Here is an astounding truth: all those who, by faith, are in Christ are now like a straight wall—true to plumb.  When God looks at us, He sees only the perfection of His Son, in spite of all of our myriad imperfections!  Our lives can be so far out of whack that we make the Leaning Tower of Pisa look straight, but God only sees us upright in Christ.  “See, I have taken away your sin,” the Lord said to Joshua the high priest, “and I will put rich garments on you.” (Zechariah 3:4 NIV).

Herein lies the power of the Gospel to propel us into living the life God has called us to live.  Jesus came and lived the sinless life, perfectly fulfilling the law of God.  He turned aside the wrath of God by taking our sins upon Himself and nailing them to the cross.  “Therefore,” because of what Jesus has done for sinners, “there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1).  The Law was designed to drive us to Jesus, and in Him we are forever secured in our relationship with the Father regardless of how well or how poorly we are observing the precepts of the Law. 

We will always have two choices when it comes to building into the Kingdom of God.  We can build in our strength or we can build in His strength.  We can build by good works or we can build by His grace.  We can build on merit or we can build on His mercy.  To be sure, Jesus is the better builder, because He has never built anything crooked! 

Jesus is making straight everything that is crooked . . . and that includes you and me.  We know that a yawning chasm lies between us and God’s perfect plumb line because we are sinners—by birth, by nature, and by habit (Romans 3:10-12).  Yet Jesus was measured against God’s exacting standard, and He was not found wanting.  And because of Him you are will never again be found wanting.  You are forever plumb because of His perfection. 

This is the Gospel.  This is grace for your race.  NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

Today’s message is not about the popular Mission Impossible movies or the television series of the same name.  Instead, I’d like to focus your attention on the glorious truth of Luke 18:27—

“What is impossible with men is possible with God.”

If you are anything like me, you experience those dark nights of the soul when you feel like your mission in life is simply impossible to live out.  We are called by God to bring Him glory by preaching the Gospel with both our lips and our lives; I simply cannot tell you how many times I have missed that mark by a country mile!  I sometimes secretly imagine myself like Ethan Hunt—the star of the movie played by Tom Cruise, who is always given the option to accept or refuse his mission—and telling God that I am going to sit this one out:

• Loving my wife Kim as Christ loved the church . . . all the time!
• Training my children in the way they should go . . . even when they are rebellious
• Serving the members of our congregation . . . when ministry is too demanding 

In these moments of self-absorption and self-protection, God always reminds me—often through my wife, children, and fellow church members—that “What is impossible with men is possible with God.”  Where God calls, He also equips.  He equips me in my calling as a husband.  He equips me in my calling as a parent.  He equips me in my calling as a minister of the Gospel.  I need only take possession of His grace made available to me through my union with Jesus. 

What I mean by “take possession” is that we are to appropriate the grace of God through the means of grace He has given to us—spiritual disciplines like Bible study, prayer, fasting, Sabbath observance, etc.  Jerry Bridges writes in Transforming Grace, “God has provided four principal means of [appropriating His grace]: prayer, His Word, submission to His providential workings in our lives, and the ministry of others.”

To be sure, the Holy Spirit is always at work in our lives and operates sovereignly apart from anything we do.  Jesus promised His disciples that they would be “clothed with power from on high (Luke 24:49). Yet we are called to appropriate the grace of God by disciplining ourselves spiritually.  We are commanded to “put off [our] old self . . . and to put on the new self (Ephesians 4:22, 24), to “clothe [ourselves] with the Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 13:14), and to “put on the full armor of God” (Ephesians 6:12). Yes, “it is God who works in [us] to will and to act according to his good purpose” (Philippians 2:13), but we are to cooperate with the work of the Spirit and operate within His power, which we appropriate by faith.   

Prayerfully consider: what mission or missions you are facing today that seem impossible?  Are you trying to complete your mission in your strength or in His strength?  The answer, to an altogether unsuspecting extent, can be found in how consistently you are actively engaged in applying the “means” He has ordained to assist you in going from mission impossible to mission possible. 

This is the Gospel.  This is grace for your race.  NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

What comes to mind when you read the words “Sustained Supernaturally”?  Here are several examples from Scripture of those who were sustained supernaturally.

• Israelites walking through the Red Sea on dry ground . . . sustained supernaturally

(Exodus 14)

• Moses with the Lord forty days without food or drink on Mount Sinai . . . sustained supernaturally (Exodus 34)
• Israelites wandering in the desert 40 years . . . sustained supernaturally
• The woman of Zarephath with just enough food for a last meal for her and her son . . . sustained supernaturally (1 Kings 17)
• Ezekiel lying on his side for 40 days . . . sustained supernaturally (Ezekiel 4)
• Jonah three days in the belly of a great fish . . . sustained supernaturally (Jonah 1)
• Jesus without food for 40 days in His wilderness experience . . . sustained supernaturally  (Matthew 4)
• Jesus and Peter walking on the water . . . sustained supernaturally (Matthew 14)
• Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane sweating droplets of blood . . . sustained supernaturally  (Luke 22)
• Saul at his conversion without sight, food, or drink for three days . . . sustained supernaturally (Acts 9)

I am sure you can think of many other examples, but I don’t want to focus your attention on the more remarkable examples in the Scriptures, but rather the ordinary examples in all of life.  Every one of us is being sustained supernaturally right now.  Your next breath is a gift of God.  Your next heartbeat is a gift of God.  Your next moment in time is a gift of God.  You are being sustained supernaturally at this very moment, and that truth should land afresh on your heart today and change your perspective in life.   

If God is the reason behind all of life—and He is (see Acts 17:25)—then all of life should be living for God.  What is stunning about the human race is that we are the only life form that refuses to live for the glory of God.  It started with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden and it continues today.  We live for our glory and the expansion of our own kingdom, rather than the glory of God and the expansion of His kingdom.

But this is not for you!  The Lord cried out to His people through the prophet Isaiah:

You whom I have upheld since you were conceived, and have carried since your birth. Even to your old age and gray hairs I am he, I am he who will sustain you.  I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you.

                                                                                                (Isaiah 46:3-4 NIV) 

From conception to completion, and all points in between, God has, is, and will continue to sustain you.  God will sustain you in your self-centeredness.  God will sustain you in your self-righteousness.  God will sustain you in your self-focus.  God will sustain you in your self-absorption.  God will even sustain you in the area where you might think you don’t need it—in your success.  The sovereign love of the Great Sustainer will never fail, falter, or fall short in carrying you every step of the way until you get home.  Remember, His grace is sufficient to sustain you, no matter what you are facing today! 

This is the Gospel.  This is grace for your race.  NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

We are living in an age of “instant” insanity.  Everyone knows about instant coffee, instant oatmeal, instant replay, and instant messaging.  Have you heard about instant buttons?  If you lose a button all you have to do is take an instant button, peel off the backing, stick on the item of clothing and you have a quick and easy solution.  Of course, all of these “instant” products are designed to satisfy our insatiable need for instant gratification.

The age of “instant” insanity says, “I want it all and I want it now!”  Our grandparents and parents lived a lifetime of patient, faithful labor; what took them a lifetime to acquire, our children want right now.  And many of them believe they are entitled to it!  At 16 they expect to have a car of their own, or at the very least, at their disposal.  When they get their first job, they expect far more than minimum wage and starting at the bottom rung of the ladder.  For far too many young people, the benefits of hard work and waiting upon the Lord is as far from their thinking as the east is from the west.  Sadly, many of us never grow out of this adolescent stage of “instant” insanity. 

As a coach and personal trainer for nearly three decades, I helped people who wanted to change their bodies or increase their performance; they did it the old fashioned way—they watched your diet and exercised regularly—they worked for it!  Today we look for the latest “magic” bullet (pills, performance enhancement products, fat removal surgeries) that will do it for us, or at least greatly reduce the time period to get what we are looking for.

So what is the cure for “instant” insanity? 

Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.  Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.  (James 1:2-3)

James tells us that God has a purpose in perseverance; it must finish its work in us.  And what work is that?  To become more and more like Jesus.  Christlikeness and growing in grace was never designed to happen in a day . . . but daily.  It happens through difficulties.  It happens through trials.  It happens through suffering.  And it is designed to take a lifetime.  We will not be perfected until we pass into glory.  Along the way, we are to persevere and trust God even when we cannot trace Him. 

As he neared the conclusion of his epistle, James exhorted:

 Be patient, therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient about it, until it receives the early and the late rains. You also, be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand.  (James 5:7-8)

Instead of trying to quickly get to the other side of our desires, perhaps God would prefer that we spend some time reflecting on what He is doing in the middle of our times of waiting.

One word of caution: Paul had a strong word of warning for believers in Thessalonica who misunderstood the purposes of God in their waiting and decided to stop working while they waited (see 2 Thessalonians 3:6-13).  We are to work for the Lord while waiting on the Lord, and in so doing, we are being conformed into the image and likeness of Jesus. 

This is the Gospel.  This is grace for your race.  NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

Mahatma Gandhi once observed, “There’s more to life than increasing its speed.”  That one statement has done a lot to help keep my priorities straight.  There was a time when I found my identity in the pace of my performance.  I figured if a fast pace was good, ramming speed was better!  In reality, it was “better” for one thing, and that was driving me to continue doubting, denying, and dodging God’s love for me while I was doubling my efforts.   

When I am challenged, my default mode is to speed up.  And as I hurried along at my frenzied pace, my grumbling and complaining was no different than what I was hearing from those around me.  I’d groan that “My plate is so full I don’t have enough hours in the day to get it all done!”  My solution: step on the accelerator!  I was running in the rat race of life, never fully realizing that even if I crossed the finish line first . . . I was still a rat!

Does this resonate with you?  Let’s take a look at two sisters who paint a wonderful portrait of what to do and what not to do as it relates to increasing the speed of life.

As they went on their way, Jesus entered a village.  And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house.  And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to his teaching.  But Martha was distracted with much serving.  And she went up to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone?  Tell her than to help me.”  But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary.  Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.”  (Luke 10:38-42)

In other words, as Jesus explained to Martha, “There’s more to life than increasing its speed.”  Both sisters were doing “good” work.  They were both focused on serving their Lord.  But Mary knew when to stop serving and start sitting at the feet of Jesus.  Do you?  Martha’s “ramming speed” only produced anxiety and a troubled heart.  Mary’s sitting resulted in the “good” portion. 

God gives all of us work to do to expand the cause of His kingdom.  He uses all of our gifts, talents, and abilities and gives us the perfect amount of time to get it done.  If we continually find our plate to be overloaded, we can be sure it was not God ladled on too many labors!  If God knows the number of hairs on our head (Matthew 10:30), we can be sure He knows the number of hours we need to do what He has called us to do each day . . . both to serve Him and to sit at His feet.

This is the Gospel.  This is grace for your race.  NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

When you hear talk about idolatry what do you think about?  For many, a picture of a golden calf comes to mind, like the one Aaron childishly maintained had jumped out of the fire at the foot of Mount Sinai.  For others, it is a picture of something considered “sacred” by those who bow to a tree, a cow, or some form of graven image.  Many world religions encourage adherents to bow before statues, icons, and images, a practice expressly forbidden in the Word of God (Exodus 20:3-5). 

When idolatry is kept in this context, we can be fooled into thinking that we are immune to it.  Does anyone reading this blog right now bow down to a golden calf, graven image, sacred cow or a tree? Probably not.  However, we can also be fooled into believing these objects are indeed “idle” idols—that they have no power to obstruct or obliterate our worship of the God of the Bible.  The fact is, however, that every one of us is greatly affected by the sin of idolatry, and our idols are by no means idle!

Idolatry defined: the worship of anything that takes the place of the one, true, living God and it is not limited to the worship of images.  It is misplaced trust in the created thing rather than the Creator and at its core is the god of self. 

Most of us are far too sophisticated to bow down to a graven image.  But we have replaced the golden calf with idols that are subtle and powerfully seductive—treacherous idols like materialism, pride, selfish ambition, obsession with career advancement, self-centeredness, greed, lust, and a hoard of others things.  Pulpits across the country propagate idolatry through the preaching of the health, wealth, and prosperity gospel, which is built upon the idol of the self.  These idols will ultimately rule our hearts and shape our lives.  And because idolatry is a matter of the heart, there are NO “idle” idols, because our heart is in a never-ending pursuit to worship something! 

The more we focus on satisfying self, the less we focus on serving God and others.  Self-indulgence—not self-sacrifice—defines the condition of many in the church today.   As John Calvin once rightly observed, “Man’s nature, so to speak, is a perpetual factory of idols.”  By nature we are all prone to substitute self for the Savior, having been enticed by the same five words Satan used in tempting Adam and Eve: “You will be like God” (Genesis 3:5).  This desire for self-rule has defined the desires of the heart of every man and woman ever since that dreadful day.

All that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.  (1 John 2:16)

John makes it clear that there are no idle idols.  The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life control our minds, seduce our hearts, and bend our wills.  Our only way to escape from our natural tendency to idolatry is the Gospel.  Only when God is at the center of our lives (Matthew 22:37) will idolatry be rooted out of our hearts and replaced with the only One who deserves to be there: Jesus.

This is the Gospel.  This is grace for your race.  NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

I spend a lot of time speaking with Christians who are crushed under the weight of crippling conclusions.  Take a look and see if any of these resonate with you:

• What’s the use in being obedient? The disobedient are prospering!
• God must be angry with me; look at all the problems I’m facing today!
• With a thought life like mine, God can’t really love me!
• This disease must be payback from God for all the stuff I did when I was young!
• If I put more money in the collection plate, God will put more money in my paycheck!

The list of crippling conclusions is virtually endless.  Each one represents an overwhelming obstacle to our walk with Christ.  They obstruct our view of God’s omnipotent holiness, goodness, and kindness and make Him out to be a monster, exacting His pound of flesh from us every time we mess up, cross the line, or miss the mark.  And that, my friend, is the most crippling conclusion a Christian could ever have. 

Please understand: God is not angry with you, because God is no longer your Judge.  He judged Jesus in your place on the cross and nailed all of your sins to that dirty tree.  To think that any of the circumstances in your life are a result of “pay-back” from God is a notion that smells like smoke and comes from the pit of hell.  Satan would love for you to believe such things!  They bind your mind, blacken your spirit, and break your heart.  These conclusions shackle you in a prison of your own making.  Crippling conclusions are the currency of the crippled Christian; but this is not for you!

As we have continually discussed in this blog, God is not blessing or cursing you because of what you are doing.  Jesus took your curse upon Himself, and every blessing you receive is now a result of your union with Him.  We cannot earn God’s favor and we cannot forfeit His blessings.  If we could it would cease to be grace.  As Paul explained, “If it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace (Romans 11:6).  Grace is a gift from beginning to end and it is always at work in the life of the Christian . . . from conception to completion.

One final point about crippling conclusions: many Christians mistake an open door of opportunity as God’s providential care.  Not every open door is a door God wants you to walk through!  Remember Jonah, who was rebelling and running from God; he happened upon a boat that was ready to set sail in the opposite direction God was calling.  Was that ticket to Tarshish an open door from God?  Hardly!  It was an opportunity for Jonah to have his faith tested and he failed the test miserably.  Yet even in Jonah’s failure he found a faithful God.

“I went down to the land whose bars closed upon me forever,” Jonah exulted; “yet you brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God” (Jonah 2:6). In Jonah’s rebellion we catch a glimpse of a God who would pursue a rebel on the run and rescue him from himself.  He does this each day for all of us.       

This is the Gospel.  This is grace for your race.  NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN! 

Have you ever wondered why God delayed the deliverance of His people Israel for so long after He sent Moses to deliver them?  The primary reason is clearly outlined in Exodus 7:5.

The Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord, when I stretch out my hand against Egypt and bring out the people of Israel from among them.

 Not only would the Israelites know who God was, but the Egyptians would know who God was too!  This reminds me of one of my all-time favorite lines from the movie The Ten Commandments.  Pharaoh (played by Yul Brynner) was speaking about the God of Moses after being hammered by the ten plagues and watching the Israelites walk through the Red Sea on dry ground while his own army, chariots, and horses were swallowed up by the Red sea. “His God,” Pharaoh/Brynner gloomed, “IS God!”

 God was making it clear for all the world to see that the deliverance of His people came as a result of His power to deliver them—not the power or will of any man.  As we read in Romans 9:17, “The Scripture says to Pharaoh, ‘For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.’”

 Yet I believe there was another reason for the delay; the delayed deliverance of Israel was also designed to deliver Moses from himself.  Self-reliance was in his sinful DNA—just as it is in yours and mine—and it had to be completely removed.  As the Bible tells us, it took some time to accomplish this!

 You will remember that Moses tried to take matters into his own hands when he struck down the Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew slave (Exodus 2:11).  Apparently he believed that the plan for freeing the Israelites would come from his hand, by his strength, and not God’s.  So God sent Him to the back side of the desert for 40 years of preparation.  And yet, even after 40 years of physical and spiritual “boot camp” in the wilderness, self-reliance was still seducing Moses to trust in his own strength. 

Moses cried out to God that he could not speak well, that neither the Israelites nor Pharaoh would listen to him.  “If the Israelites will not listen to me,” Moses objected, “why would Pharaoh listen to me, since I speak with faltering lips?” (Exodus 6:12).  You see, Moses was still relying on Moses, and God had to deliver Moses from himself before He would use Moses to deliver His people from bondage.   

So . . . where in your life right now is God using a divine delay to deliver you from yourself: career advancement . . . financial increase . . . new relationship . . . loan qualification . . . increased responsibilities in your church?  Sometimes God delays so that His glory will be increased when deliverance finally comes.  And sometimes God delays so that we can be delivered from ourselves.  Either way, when God delays deliverance it is for two reasons: His glory and our good!

 This is the Gospel.  This is grace for your race.  NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!

Have you ever said this to someone else?  If you’ve not said it out loud, you probably thought it on more than one occasion.  Now, it’s one thing to say this to another person; it is another thing altogether to say this to the Creator and Sustainer of the universe, who sought you, bought you, and caught you with the blood of His precious Son.

If you were to say, “If You really loved me, You would . . . ” to God, how would you finish the sentence?  The answer we give to that question will go a long way in uncovering what matters most to us in life.  The primary problem with a statement like that is the fact that it shouts to Omniscience that we are the ultimate authority of defining what love is.  How utterly ridiculous—especially in light of the clear, complete definition of love given in Scripture:  

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude.  It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.  Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  Love never ends.  (1 Corinthians 13:4-7)

Based on the biblical definition of love, it’s easy to see just how absurd a statement like “If You really loved me” really is when directed to God.  As remarkable as the Corinthians passage on love is, the most striking portion is found in the last three words: “love never ends.”  Regardless of the circumstances you are experiencing in life right now, GOD’S LOVE FOR YOU NEVER ENDS!  Marinate in that truth for just a moment as you consider the Corinthians passage above.

• When you are impatient . . . God’s love for you never ends
• When you are unkind . . . God’s love for you never ends
• When you are envious and rude . . . God’s love for you never ends
• When you are arrogant and boastful . . . God’s love for you never ends
• When you insist on getting your own way . . . God’s love for you never ends
• When you are irritable and resentful . . . God’s love for you never ends
• When you rejoice in wrongdoing rather than in truth . . . God’s love for you never ends
• When you fail to bear, believe, hope, and endure all things . . . God’s love for you never ends!

It’s hard to believe, isn’t it?  No matter what you do, no matter what you fail to do, God’s love for you never ends!  And remember, all of the attitudes and actions listed above are sins; and yet, in spite of our sin, we are still loved by God.  I know these are not the spectacular, fall-from-the-sky, crash-and-burn kind of sins, but they are sins nonetheless.  God hates sin with an implacable, holy hatred, but He still loves the sinner so much to have sent His precious Son to the cross to pay for every sin of commission and omission.  True love expresses itself in the face of being wronged, hurt, inconvenienced, let down, betrayed . . . and even sinned against.  

Because of what Jesus has done for you, the love of God is forever yours.  Next time you think of saying to God, “If You really loved me, You would,” remember that He does love you with an eternal and everlasting love, regardless of what your circumstances in life say to you.