We run our website the way we wished the whole internet worked: we provide high quality original content with no ads. We are funded solely by your direct support. Please consider supporting this project.

abstract

What “God Loves You” Actually Means

From the beginning, God chose to have a people who would be the object of his eternal love, just as Christ is the object of his eternal love. God sought to acquire a “bride” for Christ who would receive and reflect the love of the triune community (Eph 5:25-32). And the only qualification for being incorporated into this radiant bride, and thus for being loved by God with the same love he has for Christ, is simply that one is willing to let God do this!

The very same love that the Father has for the Son is now given to us, for we are, as a matter of fact, in the Son. The point is made perfectly clear in John 17 when Jesus prayed that his disciples, and thus all the world, would know that the Father has “loved them even as you have loved me” (John 17:23, emphasis added). Then a few sentences later, he said to the Father, “I made your name [character] known to them … so that the [very same] love which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them (John 17:26, emphasis added).

The perfect love that defines God throughout eternity—the ultimate, worth-affirming, mutually submissive love that eternally unites the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—is now directed toward every person who is “in Christ.”

This means that as you read this sentence you could not be more loved than you are right now! The love that God eternally is burns toward you with the same unimprovable, passionate intensity that the three divine persons have for each other. The perfect love that God eternally is is directed toward you, right here and right now. It is not a secondary, compromised, watered down, or derivative love. It is the one and the same love that is shared by the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In the very act of loving Christ, the Father loves you.

The goal of creation is for people to participate in the eternal love of the triune God. We do not do this by performing good deeds, successfully conquering certain sins, or holding all of the right theological positions. These may be by-products of the change in reality that takes place in us, but they are not the cause of the change. We participate in the eternal love of the triune fellowship by allowing ourselves to be placed in Christ by faith. We receive it. It is simply a matter of saying yes to God’s desire to relate to us in the process of relating to the triune community.

This was achieved when Christ came—which we celebrate during this Advent season—crossing the infinite gulf that distinguishes and separates God from fallen humanity. Through the incarnation and the eventual crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, the Father incorporates all who say yes into the Son. Thus the Trinity opens up the perfect, triune love and allows undeserving sinners to share in the dance of God’s eternal love and glory.

—Adapted from Repenting of Religion, pages 37-39

Image by Kaleb Nimz via Unsplash

Category:
Tags: , , ,

Related Reading

What Kind of God Did Jesus Reveal?

The ReKnew Manifesto exists to encourage believers and skeptics alike to re-think things they thought they already knew – hence our name, Re-Knew. I am currently working through the theology of the Manifesto in a series of posts that began a couple of months ago. Over the last few posts, we have been looking at the…

God’s Kind of Holy War

This is part three of a series on Revelation. You can find part one here and part two here. While there will come a day when the sacrificial victory of the Lamb and of his people will be apparent to all (5:13; 15:4; 21: 23-4), only to those who embrace the perspective of the heavenly…

Which of the Miracles of Jesus Can Humans Do? (podcast)

Greg is asked about the miracles of Jesus, specifically which miracles do we have the potential to perform. He also gives a nod to the band Theocracy.  Episode 74 http://traffic.libsyn.com/askgregboyd/Episode_0074.mp3

Jesus: True Myth and True History

Though the Jesus story gives us every reason to believe it is substantially rooted in history, it has a curious, and fascinating, relationship with myth and legend. The story of God coming to earth, being born of a virgin, manifesting a heroic, counter-cultural love toward outcasts, dying for the people who crucified him and then…

One Hope

When Jesus was crucified by his enemies instead of conquering his enemies, the hope of Jesus’ disciples came crashing down in utter despair. They had hoped that Jesus would establish the kingdom of God in the same way that other kingdoms were established. However, the resurrection reveals that the kingdom of God is not like…

Why Did It Take SO Long for God to Reveal Himself in Jesus?

Greg talks about why it took God so long to reveal himself in Jesus. http://traffic.libsyn.com/askgregboyd/Episode_0048b.mp3