To Be Still and Know...God Loves You Pt. 1

Most of us at some point in our lives have heard "God loves you."  As Christians we throw that phrase around all the time.  God loves you.  But right now I want to begin a series on what "God loves you" really means.  What you can learn about God loving you from taking time to be still and understand.  
God created the world because he wanted someone to love and have a relationship with. After Adam and Eve chose to sin and therefore bring separation between God and man, God still made a way for us to have a relationship with him.  A way that none of us as parents could possibly fathom.  He loved us so much that he chose to send his only son Jesus to earth through the virgin Mary and have Him live 33 years on this earth going through all the same kinds of trials we have to face just to be accused wrongly, severely beaten and sentenced to death taking our place on a cruel painful cross.
"For God loved the world so much, that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life." John 3:16 NLT
Being a mom to three children, 2 of which are boys, I CANNOT imagine that sacrifice, nor would I make that sacrifice. God loved all of humanity so much that even though they had chosen to sin and turn their backs on Him and go their own way and worship whatever they chose He still wanted to make a way for everyone who ever lives to be able to have a relationship with Him and have a home in Heaven.  Why couldn't there be another way?  Why did someone have to die? The answer is right in God's Word.  "...For without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sin."  Hebrews 9:22b
"...All glory to Him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by shedding his blood for us." Revelation 1:5b
God could have chosen to just wipe out all of creation and start over with a different design but he didn't.  He loved us before he created us and was willing to make the sacrifice of His son dying on the cross in order for us to be able to be made righteous. 
 "Why would a loving God send people to hell?"  This is an age old question.  Here is the true simple answer.  God does NOT send people to hell.  People CHOOSE to go because they reject Jesus. They reject Him and salvation.  Even after Adam and Eve chose to sin which brought sin into the world and separated us from God, He made a way for us to still have fellowship with Him and be in Heaven with Him, through the death of His son Jesus. Salvation isn't difficult to understand, but sometimes the simplest things people have the hardest time grasping.  Salvation is simply us coming to the realization that we are indeed sinful and that sin has separated us from God and we cannot of our own accord get to Heaven.  We need a Savior, which our loving God provided in His own Son.  Then we accept what Jesus did on that cross, taking our place and accept Him into our own lives as our personal Savior.  We put our trust in what He did for us and ask forgiveness for our sins. That's it!  Nothing else saves a person.  It is a matter of the heart.  Nothing we can do outwardly, not even baptism, will save our souls.  It's the internal heart matter of acknowledgement and acceptance.  Baptism is an outward show to others of what our hearts have already done.  And it doesn't matter how many good things a person does because there is still sin to be dealt with.  Every single person sins and it's that sin that separates us from God.  Doing good things after you have accepted Jesus as Savior is an outpouring of gratitude and love of what He's done for you.  
To be still and know that God loves you this much.  That you were created to be loved by God and to love Him in return. That He could have chosen to not send His son and just let us die in our sins and rejection of Him but that he did NOT do that and instead did make a way for everyone who will just believe. This is how much He loves you. And that's just the tip of the iceberg!  He didn't just make a way for us to be with Him in Heaven, He also cares about every part of our day to day lives.  And that my friends will be part 2!
"I love all who love me.  Those who search will surely find me."  Proverbs 8:17

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Contentment: Learning to Want Less Will Lead to More

Do you need more peace in your life?  Do you need more joy?  Do you feel like you never have quite enough of ( fill in the blank )?  Do you ever feel like you, yourself, aren't quite enough?  There is one thing you do need more of and that is contentment .    "Not that I was ever in need, for I have learned how to be content with whatever I have." Philippians 4:11 Every day we are inundated with the misconception that we must have the latest and greatest of everything.  The latest iPhone, tablet, smart tv, laptop, upgrades to software, newest style trends, hairstyles, shoes, home decor trend, vehicle, etc and so on.  The list is endless in ways we are told we need to buy more, do more, have more, and be more. I remember one time when I had worked so hard to lose 70 lbs and was feeling really good about myself, I went to my doctor and instead of a really enthusiastic good job, I got "That's good, but you still need to lose 5 more pounds to be within your recomme
Read more

Learning to Love Myself

This blog post will be different than my previous ones and takes a lot of courage on my part to write as it gives those of you reading an inside view of one of my most personal lifelong struggles. I am a firm believer in being genuine with people and while not sharing everything with everyone, still allowing people to see the real parts of me.  The flawed parts, the parts that make me very much human and very much in need of my precious Savior Jesus Christ. People need to see both the triumphs AND the struggles.  This particular struggle runs deep and began during my young elementary school years.  I don't have an exact answer as to why this began when it did.  All I know is it has been a lifelong  battle, something I have to go to my Lord about so very often and now I feel, for some reason unbeknownst to me, that I am supposed to share this here.  Maybe it will help someone reading it know that they are not alone.  Maybe it will be the encouragement someone is desperately needing
Read more

The Invisible Burden of Anxiety

I am going to let you in on a little secret of mine.  It's something I have lived with for as long as I can remember but I didn't know exactly what it was called until five or so years ago.  I discovered that the feelings I carried around since I was a child had a name and that I wasn't alone in these feelings. That secret is ANXIETY.  I live every day of my life with general anxiety.  It's not just worrying or fretting about situational things as many people tend to think when they hear this word.  No, it goes so much deeper and influences every thought, feeling, action and reaction.  I read somewhere recently, and try as I may I cannot remember where I read this, that anxiety is the backdrop to every emotion you have, when you struggle with anxiousness.  How very deeply this resonated with me.  No matter how happy I am, or how good things are going in my life, there is always, ALWAYS, anxiety in some corner of my mind worrying about this or that, or what could come ne
Read more