Make no mistake, no matter how much good we do, we really don’t deserve God’s love.
I know some of you are frowning right about now, however at first glance, such a statement may appear discouraging. But in truth, this should be the most freeing and liberating declaration you’ve heard all day, maybe all year, or perhaps in your entire life.
Undoubtedly, the Bible clearly teaches that God’s love is undeserved. If I still have your attention, I asked that you consider Romans 5:8, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
Did you catch that 5 word phrase “while we were still sinners”? God sacrificially perfected His love for us while we were still His very enemies.
Ephesians 2:4-5 says, “But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved).”
My brothers and sisters, we were dead in our sins and there’s absolutely nothing we can ever do to earn God’s love, “But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love…” saved us. Read that again. God saved us because He loves us, He doesn’t love us because we are saved or sanctified. He loves us because according to I John 4:8, He is the very “essence of love”.
Simply put, we can’t earn His love because we already have it. And we can’t lose His love because we don’t deserve it in the first place. The quest to attempt to earn God’s love is utterly futile, and its only accomplishment is turning those who undertake it into self-righteous hypocrites or self-loathing failures, neither of which exemplify the Christ-like servant God calls us to be.
At the end of the day and top of the morning (as Noel would say), we can fully and wholeheartedly believe that God’s love is faithful, committed, unchanging, wholly unconditionally, and justifiably undeserved.
4GIVEN 