Understanding of God’s love for us!

Understanding of God’s love for us is an incredible comfort that is only found in the revelation of His Son in our hearts. A very difficult truth grasped in any other way.

Upon our physical birth the nature of sin forbids us to comprehend the supernatural truths about God and in it is hidden the greatest need we all have and that is to understand the depth of His love which is called the Agape or the unconditional love of God. Our sin and shamed based nature due to the Adamic rebellion has its own fallen understanding about love, but God’s love remains a mystery until it is revealed in us through His Son’s sacrificial death upon the cross of Calvary.

God’s unconditional and everlasting love in the Greek language is called Agape and it is verbally explained in the 13^th chapter of letter of 1^st Corinthians and it is so foreign to the depraved human understanding that it is not even comprehendible through mere human reasoning. Human reason says you are accepted when you do good, so does the word of God say, but what good can any lost sinner do to be worthy of God’s love and care? This is the real question. If we have all sinned and had fallen short of the glory of our Savior, then what good are we talking about?

Here is where the eternal reality of His love steps in to interrupt our human depraved understanding of love with no strings attached to it.

Man has this understanding that if you show me love and care and good, then sure I too will love you on these terms and conditions. This is human love at its best. However God’s love says I love you in this that when you were in enmity with Me I died for you. This means My love goes beyond human fallen nature of sin. In My love God says I saw “The Cross” which meant for the worst of men I am ready to die in exchange for them. Paul the apostle of Jesus finds this incredible truth a profound mystery grasped only through direct revelation from Him. In His epistle to the Roman Church he describes this truth as a mystery to the human disposition of sin. He says it in this way in Romans chapter 5:7 “Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die.” This argument used by Apostle Paul is to establish a truth unknown to the Jewish concept of man’s acceptance with God, since this was what they based God’s acceptance of man. The Jewish mindset was seeing men either good or bad in their response to God’s Law of Righteousness and a sinner could not be awarded by God’s love by this standards. The Jews divide men, as to their moral character, into four classes:

First class, Those who say, “what is mine, is my own; and what is Yours, is Your own.” These may be considered the just, who render to every man his due; or rather, they who neither give nor take. The second class is made up of those who say, “what is mine is Yours; and what is Yours, is mine.” These are they who accommodate each other, who borrow and lend. The third class is composed of those who say, “What is mine, is Yours; and what is Yours, let it be Yours.” These are the pious, or good, who give up all for the benefit of their neighbor. The fourth class is those who say, “What is mine, is mine; and what is Yours, shall be mine.” These are the impious, who take all, and give nothing. Now, for one of the first class, who would die? There is nothing amiable in his life or conduct that would so endear him to any man, as to induce him to risk his life to save such a person.

For a good man some would even dare to die – This is for one of the third class, who gives all he has for the good of others. This is the truly benevolent man, whose life is devoted to the public good: for such a person, some who have had their lives perhaps preserved by his bounty, would even dare to die: but such cases may be considered merely as very rare: they exist, it is true, in romance; and we find a few rare instances of friends exposing themselves to death for their friends. Our Lord says in, John 15:13 : Greater love has no man than this that a man lay down his life for his friends. This is the utmost we can expect among men. When Paul said for scarcely for a righteous man will one die, The design of this, and the following verse, is to show that Christ’s dying for ungodly persons is an instance of kindness that is matchless and unparalleled to system of good works Paul the apostle probably seating in midst of bunch of Italian Jews in Rome is illustrating the great love of God by comparing it to a  man who was willing to die for a good friend in this way. “It is an unusual occurrence, an event which is all that we can hope for from the highest human benevolence and the purest friendship that one would be willing to die for a good man. But there are none who would be willing to die for a man who was seeking to do us injury, to destroy our character, to destroy our happiness or our property. But Christ was willing to die for His bitter foes. “Yes in this Apostle Paul is trying to show all men how great and deep and different is God’s love comparing to ours, which is based on merits of men’s good works towards God and other men.

Here Paul teaches His hearers the unfathomable mercies of God in Christ. This is where we stand completely amazed.

Here is where human measurement does not fit the depth of God’s own standard of righteousness. Here is where we come absolutely short and in need of such a higher standard of righteousness received only by faith in Christ Jesus. We the gentile bride of Christ when comparing ourselves to the ungodly sinners we see ourselves better than them, but here is where we have already fallen from the understanding of true grace. Grace was grace for us when we were yet sinners, but now that God justifies others we are coming short. Many times we can only receive mercy and grace for us, but are not willing to extend them or offer them to the worst sinners among us. The words of Apostle John says in 1John 4:9 that “We love because He first loved us”. We are so isolated from the understanding of God’s love that we fall even short in our own hearts to retain its truth let alone expressing it to others. This amazing system of justice has kept us even in awe.

Paul being a Roman citizen and having been exposed to the Roman justice system was  probably more amazed in this that even the most modern cultures of the west were found coming short when they were weighed by the measuring rod of the Lord’s justice system. In all probability that is why he quotes the following Biblical truth in his letter to the Romans saying “Now when a man works, his wages are not credited to him as a gift, but as an obligation. However, to the man who does not work but trusts God who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited as righteousness.” (Rom. 5:5) I have always liked the second half of this verse which says “Righteousness is accounted to all those who trust God through faith in justifying the wicked.” This is the most profound mystery of being counted righteous before God. Meaning just by believing in the justification of wicked you are counted righteous yourself. OOH!

 Did you catch me on this folks?

It does not matter who you are. Ofcource Paul always says to the Jew first, but it matters to both us and the Jews that righteousness is by believing God’s righteousness in forgiving the worst sinners and justifying them in His own eyes. This is the greatness of the measure of God unfathomable love.

God justifies the ungodly

So, Christianity is not for good people. Most of the world, and quite a lot of the church, seems to think that Christianity is about moral reformation, about trying hard to be better people. But Paul tells us that that is entirely and completely wrong. Most people seem to think that the message of Christianity is “Be good, be good, and God will be pleased with you!” But Paul tells us that the message of Christianity is “God justifies the ungodly”. (“Ungodly” is a better translation than “wicked” in verse 5.)

Amen? Does this sound kosher to you?

If you have never come before God and confessed to him your deep and hopeless ungodliness then you can never be right with him. If you are relying on being a good person and hoping God will be pleased with you, then you are lost. You’ve never understood the Christian faith at all. Jesus told a parable that makes the same point that Paul is making here. He described a Pharisee and a tax collector praying in the temple. The Pharisee gave a catalogue of his good works. “I don’t behave badly like other people,” he said, “I fast twice a week and I give away a tenth of all I get”. In other words, “Look at how hard I’m trying, God. Now pay me what you owe me!”

The tax collector simply cried out, “God have mercy on me, a sinner”. He knew his badness, and he did the only thing possible: he trusted God for his forgiveness. This is the one that Jesus says went away justified before God.

That’s exactly what Paul says about God in Romans 4 verse 5: he is a God who justifies the ungodly.

This is the best news in the world, because it means that anyone can come to him. If the only qualification for coming to God is that you are ungodly, then any of us can come! It doesn’t depend on your family or your birth. Paul makes this point clearly with the example of Abraham. The Jews thought that only they had access to God, because they were the only people to whom God had given the sign of circumcision and the privilege of the law. But Abraham was made right with God long before either of these things. So, Paul says, anyone can get right with God: it doesn’t depend on your birth or privilege.

It doesn’t depend on how good you are. You cannot earn the favor of God, so it’s futile to try. There is no point at which you can say, I’ve done enough, now God will accept me. So stop trying to make yourself right with him, and start trusting his gift of love for you in Christ.