I have to confess something before we go any further. When I try to speak about the love of God, I feel a little like the Apostle Paul, who was once caught up into an experience of God so overwhelming that he said he heard things he could not lawfully put into words. That is exactly where I find myself. I do not have the vocabulary for this. I have only received it. I walk in it. But I cannot fully describe it, and I do not believe any of us has a mind wide enough to take it all in.
What I can tell you is what happened the first time the reality of God's love actually broke through into my heart. I cried for three days. It was as though the presence of God was washing over me again and again, dissolving a false image of myself I had carried for years, an image built up by wounds and failure and the voice of the enemy. The love of God does that. It washes away the lies.
In John 3, Jesus says, "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved." Take the word world out of that verse for a moment and put your own name in its place. Sit with that. Let it settle into you, not just into your ears, but into your heart.
In 1 John 4, the Scripture says, "In this the love of God was manifested towards us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." Not that we loved God. Not that we were seeking Him. He was seeking us. That is the whole point of that passage.
I remember walking a beat as a police officer years ago when thoughts about God began pressing into my mind. I did not want them there. I told myself that church was for other people, people who needed that kind of thing. My world was different. I did not fit there. And yet I could not shake those thoughts. That was not me reaching up toward God. That was God reaching down toward me, whispering through the noise of my life because of the love that was in His heart.
I walked into a church building that day, sat down in the back, and took off my hat because something told me I should. I was the only one there. I said out loud, "If you are real, I would not mind knowing who you are." He answered that prayer. Not because I loved Him, but because He loved me. He had been following me everywhere I went, never washing His hands of me, never getting fed up, never stopping.
Years later, I had the privilege of speaking at the border of Kosovo right after the war ended there. We had built a bridge for a community of eight thousand people, nearly all of them Muslim, so they could reach their fields. I had shaken hands with the mayor on one condition — that he would allow me to come back and preach the gospel. He agreed. When I returned, the audience gathered in front of the stage was made up almost entirely of soldiers who had fought in that war, some of whom had committed terrible crimes. I stood before them and said, "Why did we build you this bridge? You know we are Christians and you are Muslims. We built you a bridge because God loves you. He has allowed His love to be shed abroad in our hearts, and so we love you."
As I spoke about the love of God, those soldiers began to weep. One by one, men were wiping tears from their faces because they had never heard of a God who loved them. But more than hearing it, they were experiencing it — the searching, seeking love of God reaching for their souls. I could see it in their faces. How could God love me after what I have done? That was the question every one of them was silently carrying.
I once walked around the block in New York City with a man who kept asking me the same thing. Why would God want me? After everything I have done, after all the people I have hurt, why would God want me? I threw every scripture I knew at him. Finally I said, "He wants you just because He does." There is no explanation deeper than that. He sees you. He loves you. He went to a cross and allowed Himself to be beaten and mocked and falsely condemned and put to death — because He loves you. That is the only reason.
You may be thinking right now, but what about me? What if I am weak, resourceless, addicted, broken, seemingly beyond repair? What if I have lost hope and cannot see a way forward? What if I have done things I am ashamed of and I cannot imagine why God would want any part of my life? I want you to hear what Jesus said about exactly that.
He stepped into a synagogue when He was thirty years old, was handed the scroll of the prophet Isaiah, and found the place where it is written, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord." He closed the scroll, handed it back, and sat down. Every eye in the room followed Him. No one had ever heard those words read quite like that. Then He said, "Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing." Not tomorrow. Not next month. Today.
He said He was anointed to preach the gospel to the poor — to those who have no strength, no resource, no way to reach God on their own. He came to heal the brokenhearted and to set the captives free, free from addiction, free from the words someone should never have spoken over your life, free from the prison of your past. He came to give sight to those who cannot see a way forward, and to release those whose minds have been dominated by the voice that says you are nobody, you are nothing, you will never amount to anything. Jesus said the Spirit of God is upon Him to come and get you out of that prison.
God could have folded up the world the moment Adam and Eve sinned in the garden. He could have started over with two new people and a clean slate. But He did not, because He already knew your name. He already saw you. He foreknew you would be here, and He so loved you that He could not bring it to an end. That is how deep this goes. That is how personal this is.
I know this love casts out fear because I lived under fear for nine years, gripped by panic attacks, afraid of more things than I can name. But when I opened my heart to the love of God, fear had to go. The Scripture does not say love helps manage fear. It says, "Perfect love casts out fear." That is what God's love does when you actually let it in.
You cannot earn what He is offering you. You cannot pray enough or read enough or do enough to deserve it. The Scripture says it is not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saves us. God so loved you. That is the ground we stand on. That is the only ground there is.
Would you open your heart to Him right now? Not because you have cleaned yourself up, but exactly as you are. He already knows what is in your cupboard. He already knows the mess in your life and in your family. He knows, and He still loves you. He came to heal your broken heart, open your prison door, restore your sight, and set you free from every oppressive thought that has had a grip on your mind. And He is not asking you to wait until you feel ready. He is saying today. Right now. This is the acceptable time.
Pray these words with me and mean them from the deepest place you have. Lord Jesus Christ, thank you for loving me. Thank you for coming to get me. I ask you to come into my heart. I give you my life because you gave me yours. I believe you died in my place so that I could have life. Tonight I confess you as my Lord and my Savior. From this day forward, you are my God and I am your child. I love you, Jesus. Thank you for loving me. Amen.
If you have prayed that prayer, or if you have been living under a performance-driven faith that has made it hard to simply receive God's love, I want to invite you to stop striving right now. Just let Him embrace you. Let Him cover you. Let Him wash away every false word that was ever spoken over your life and replace it with the only word that has ever truly defined you — loved.