God, the Creator of all the Universe, is the All-Wise, All-Knowing Father. He is love, the Bible tells us in 1 John 4:8: “for God is love. [He is the originator (or source) of love, and it is (the) enduring attribute of His nature.]” God designed us with a deep hunger for the perfect love that flows from Him. He designed us to relate to Him and to feed on or be dependent on Him as our source of love. No human relationship, not marriage or close friendship or the parent-child bond, can fill the heart of man at its core as God’s agape love can. Humans need intimate fellowship with their Maker.
What is God’s love like? It is totally giving and unselfish, unlike the largely self-seeking hearts of people. A pastor in Fort Mill, Dennis Clark, uses the term “God emotions” to describe the fruit or issue of the life that comes from the Holy Spirit. [My definitions of the fruit below bear the Clarks’ influence.] God’s desire for us is that we be filled with Himself through the new birth explained in John Chapter 3. [God is three-in-one: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.]
Joy is love rejoicing (finding deep pleasure in God’s presence).
Jesus walked the earth nourished by the Father’s love. We are invited into this same experience or communion.
The born again church is nourished and cherished by Jesus.
Peace is love resting (having an assurance that everything is in God’s hands).
Every hair of our head is numbered.
The Lord is our Shepherd; He leads.
Patience is love enduring (willing to wait for God’s timing).
Jesus ever submitted Himself to the Father’s will. He only said and did what He saw the Father doing. We receive Him as Savior and Lord (Master). His will is good, acceptable, and perfect.
Kindness is love giving (serving others with mercy).
We position ourselves to receive His kindness and ongoing ministry to us. (Ephesians 2:7 AMP) “in the ages to come He might [clearly] show the immeasurable and unsurpassed riches of His grace in [His] kindness toward us in Christ Jesus [by providing for our redemption].” Jesus sanctifies us.
Goodness is love motivating ([with God’s pure motives of] love and holiness).
(Matthew 19:17 AMP) There is only One Who is good [perfectly and essentially]—God.
(1 Peter 1:16 AMP) For it is written, You shall be holy, for I am holy. (Galatians 3:5 AMP) He Who supplies you with His marvelous [Holy] Spirit …
Faith is love trusting (we can believe God and others can believe us [as we are in alignment with God’s truth, His Holy Bible]).
(Hebrews 11:1 AMP) Now faith is the assurance (title deed, confirmation) of things hoped for (divinely guaranteed), and the evidence of things not seen [the conviction of their reality—faith comprehends as fact what cannot be experienced by the physical senses].
Gentleness is love esteeming (esteeming others as better than yourself).
God is humble. And He values us in an absolutely selfless way. (Philippians 2:7 AMP) (Jesus) assuming the form of a bond-servant, …
Self-control is love restraining (power under control).
God employs His power and wisdom and other attributes to express His very nature which is love.
God is pure. There is no darkness in Him. (1 John 1:4-5 AMP) We are writing these things to you so that our joy [in seeing you included] may be made complete [by having you share in the joy of salvation]. This is the message [of God’s promised revelation] which we have heard from Him and now announce to you, that God is Light [He is holy, His message is truthful, He is perfect in righteousness], and in Him there is no darkness at all [no sin, no wickedness, no imperfection].
What else can we see of the nature of this extraordinary love? The Bible tells of the great lengths God went to in order to save us:
(Romans 5:7-8 AMPC)7 Now it is an extraordinary thing for one to give his life even for an upright man, though perhaps for a noble and lovable and generous benefactor someone might even dare to die.8 But God shows and clearly proves His [own] love for us by the fact that while we were still sinners [proud, full of self, and going our own way living in independence from God—in a word, rebellious], Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One) died for us.
(John 3:16-18 AMPC) For God so greatly loved and dearly prized the world that He [even] gave up His only begotten (unique) Son, so that whoever believes in (trusts in, clings to, relies on) Him shall not perish (come to destruction, be lost) but have eternal (everlasting) life. For God did not send the Son into the world in order to judge (to reject, to condemn, to pass sentence on) the world, but that the world might find salvation and be made safe and sound through Him. He who believes in Him [who clings to, trusts in, relies on Him] is not judged [he who trusts in Him never comes up for judgment; for him there is no rejection, no condemnation—he incurs no damnation]; but he who does not believe (cleave to, rely on, trust in Him) is judged already [he has already been convicted and has already received his sentence] because he has not believed in and trusted in the name of the only begotten Son of God. [He is condemned for refusing to let his trust rest in Christ’s name.]
And very worthy of deep meditation is the revelation that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit love the redeemed to the same degree and intensity that they love each other. We are invited to come so, so close to God’s heart. We are invited to walk the earth in union and communion with the Godhead. King David wrote (in Psalm 73:28 TLB), “But as for me, I get as close to him as I can! I have chosen him, and I will tell everyone about the wonderful ways he rescues me.”
(John 15:9 AMPC) I {Jesus} have loved you, [just] as the Father has loved Me; abide in My love [continue in His love with Me]. (John 17:23, 26 AMPC) I {Jesus} in them and You {the Father} in Me, in order that they may become one and perfectly united, that the world may know and [definitely] recognize that You sent Me and that You have loved them [even] as You have loved Me…. I have made Your Name {the Father} known to them and revealed Your character and Your very Self, and I will continue to make [You] known, that the love which You {the Father} have bestowed upon Me may be in them [felt in their hearts] and that I [Myself] {Jesus} may be in them.
God desires that we be receivers of His great love. We are to drink this supernatural life of God ’til it flows out of our innermost man. We are to feed on the Person of Jesus until His life [the bread of Heaven] becomes our life. In so doing, we come to love God back by and through God’s love and accept and love ourselves in God’s grace (in the way He sees and feels about us). Thus, it’s out of the overflow of this agape love that we fulfill the royal law to love others as we love ourselves.
We fulfill the whole New Testament through receiving Jesus’ love and yielding to His loving others through us. (John 13:34-35 AMPC) I give you a new commandment: that you should love one another. Just as I have loved you, so you too should love one another. By this shall all [men] know that you are My disciples, if you love one another [if you keep on showing love among yourselves].
In 1 Corinthians 13, Paul outlines what our demonstration of love to others looks like. And his words describe the very way God treats us. It’s essential that we go deep into the way God thinks and feels and acts toward us because as we receive, that’s how we’ll love. If we are on a performance basis with God, trying to measure up and earn His love in any way, we will judge others as to their performance. Only if we know and receive unconditional love from God, will we then be able to show mercy and (by the Lord’s grace) love others with God’s love.
(1 John 4:19-20 PHILLIPS) Yes, we love Him {and this love equates to obeying Him by loving others} because he first loved us. If a man says, “I love God” and hates his brother, he is a liar. For if he does not love the brother before his eyes how can he love the one beyond his sight? And in any case, it is his explicit command that the one who loves God must love his brother too.
We can read Paul in his love chapter with God as the actor. To gain agape love is to gain God. To know agape love is to know God. (1 Corinthians 13:1-14 AMPC) If I [can] speak in the tongues of men and [even] of angels, but have not love (that reasoning, intentional, spiritual devotion such as is inspired by God’s love for and in us), I am only a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers (the gift of interpreting the divine will and purpose), and understand all the secret truths and mysteries and possess all knowledge, and if I have [sufficient] faith so that I can remove mountains, but have not love (God’s love in me) I am nothing (a useless nobody). Even if I dole out all that I have [to the poor in providing] food, and if I surrender my body to be burned or in order that I may glory, but have not love (God’s love in me), I gain nothing.. [GOD] Love endures long and is patient and kind; [GOD] love never is envious nor boils over with jealousy, [GOD] is not boastful or vainglorious, [GOD} does not display [HIM]self haughtily.[GOD] is not conceited (arrogant and inflated with pride); [GOD] is not rude (unmannerly) and [GOD] does not act unbecomingly. Love (God’s love in us) does not insist on its own rights or its own way, for [GOD] is not self-seeking; [GOD] is not touchy or fretful or resentful; [GOD] takes no account of the evil done to it. [[GOD] pays no attention to a suffered wrong]. GOD] does not rejoice at injustice and unrighteousness, but [GOD] rejoices when right and truth prevail.[GOD] Love bears up under anything and everything that comes, [GOD] is ever ready to believe the best of every person, [GOD’S] hopes are fadeless under all circumstances, and [GOD] endures everything [without weakening]. [GOD’s} love never fails [never fades out or becomes obsolete or comes to an end]. As for prophecy (the gift of interpreting the divine will and purpose), it will be fulfilled and pass away; as for tongues, they will be destroyed and cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away [it will lose its value and be superseded by truth]. For our knowledge is fragmentary (incomplete and imperfect), and our prophecy (our teaching) is fragmentary (incomplete and imperfect). But when the complete and perfect (total) comes, the incomplete and imperfect will vanish away (become antiquated, void, and superseded).When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; now that I have become a man, I am done with childish ways and have put them aside.For now, we are looking in a mirror that gives only a dim (blurred) reflection [of reality as in a riddle or enigma], but then [when perfection comes] we shall see in reality and face to face! Now I know in part (imperfectly), but then I shall know and understand fully and clearly, even in the same manner as I have been fully and clearly known and understood [by God].And so, faith, hope, love abide [faith—conviction and belief respecting man’s relation to God and divine things; hope—joyful and confident expectation of eternal salvation; love—true affection for God and man, growing out of God’s love for and in us], these three; but the greatest of these is love.
14:1 Eagerly pursue and seek to acquire [this] love [make it your aim, your great quest].
We will never be fulfilled without God’s love. We are created for love.
Sources:
Learning to Love by David Alsobrook.
The transcripts of the series, Abiding in Love: Experiencing the Heart of God by Mike Bickle. (mikebickle.org)
Intimacy with the Trinity in John 15 by Mike Bickle: sermon notes “Awestruck by the Ocean of God’s Love John 15:9”
Self-Deliverance Made Simple, Keys to Closing Every Door to the Enemy in Your Life by Dennis and Dr. Jen Clark.
If this blog blessed you, and you’d like to support my writing labors, please consider donating via PayPal or Venmo (@Katherine-Bell-micro.)
Blessings in return—
love lessons 