We love Him because He first loved us. 1 John 4:19 (NKJV)
LOVE SERIES – PART 8
The love FOR God always begins with the love FROM God.
To be completely transparent, I am a massive coffee snob. I’m not into chain coffee (no judgement if you are haha!) but the boutique stuff – specialty roasters and the like. There’s one particular brand I absolutely love and if you know me, you know which one I’m talking about!
That coffee loved me first! “What do you mean?” I hear you asking… I mean that the coffee brand loved me first by being amazing before I ever discovered it. Love, passion and artistry went into the roasting process long before I ever loved it… and because all of those were sown into the coffee, whenever I taste a cup I realise again how much I love it.
Ps 34:8 says “Taste and see that the Lord is good.” It’s not until you taste of God’s love that you then realise you are in love. That’s why many secular people are bewildered by Christians. They think we’re all cray-cray! Because they’ve never tasted the love of Jesus, they don’t have a reason to love Him.
Right before the key verse of this devotion it says in verse 18 in the NLT that “…perfect love casts out all fear. If we afraid, it is fear of punishment…” Everyone I know that doesn’t love God thinks that His motivation is to punish people… and them in particular. They have a crazy, mixed up framework of thinking about what His love would be like because they’ve never tasted. It doesn’t change the fact that He first loved them and once you taste you realise that punishment is not God’s agenda, but love is!
And more than the coffee beans I so love, there is so much passion, delight and thought that goes into the love He has for you. His love started long before you ever knew Him or knew about Him and will continue into eternity!
If you’re feeling unloved, you only have to take a quick look into the gospels to discover you are the recipient of the greatest love history knows!
You are blessed… have the best day ever!
