Love Turned the Page (1 John 4:19)
“We love because he first loved us.” (1 John 4:19)
Has so much ever been communicated in so few words? Everything in the Christian life, from heaven to earth, from salvation to sanctification, from a heavenly Father to earthly friends is covered in these few words. Our life began when God loved us. “In love He predestined us for adoption as sons.” (Eph. 1:4) “God so loved that He sent His Son.” (John 3:16) Love was the hand that turned the pages of eternity. Love was the hand that formed the first man of clay. Love was the hand that guided Israel of old. Love was the hand nailed upon that tree. Love was the hand that prepared our place in heaven. From everlasting to everlasting, love was the gear which turned the hands of time. All that we have and all that we are is not because we have been deemed worthy; rather, we have been loved. As Augustine says, “God’s love is incomprehensible and unchangeable. For it was not after we were reconciled to him through the blood of his Son that he began to love us. Rather, he has loved us before the world was created, that we also might become sons along with his only begotten Son - before we became anything at all.”
Love caused your incarnation,
love brought you down to me;
your thirst for m salvation
procured my liberty.
O love beyond all telling,
that led you to embrace,
in love all love excelling,
our lost and fallen race!
Now Jesus says to us, “Just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.” (John 13:34) Jesus loved us with a love unsought, unwanted, and unmerited. Jesus “loved us freely.” (Hos. 14:4) The love to which Christians are called is to be likewise. We have been provided with both the source and the sample of love. Our love no longer stems from the self-serving tendencies of a fallen world; instead, Christians are called to love freely because He first loved us. No longer must we use one another to fill a nagging void within our heart, for God’s love has filled us altogether. Because God has loved us, we can love the unlovely with a love unsought, unwanted, and unmerited. The question remaining is this: what does our love look like? Is our love one of which we aim to benefit or of which we aim to benefit others? Is our love one which must be earned or is it free? Do we love as He first loved us?
