THE GREATNESS OF GOD'S LOVE
“But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet
sinners, Christ died for us”
(Romans 5:8)
<>It is
humbling to know that Christ died for us, not because
we were worthy or deserving that He would do so, but “while
we were YET sinners”! Any concept that we might have of
ourselves that would merit God’s love and Christ dying for us is to
deny the
TOTAL freeness of God’s Love and the Benefits of Christ’s Death on the
Cross
for sinners. We have to understand that God was not, and is not,
obligated to
love anyone of us, much less, to give His Son to die for us. Why should
He,
especially since we are the ones who have turned our backs on Him and
are “haters of God” (Romans 1:30); and yes,
if we were left to ourselves we would continually say to Him in our
wickedness:
“Depart from us; for we desire not the
knowledge of thy ways. What is the Almighty, that we should serve him?
and what
profit should we have, if we pray unto him?” (Job 21:14, 15). In
fact, in
our sin we would not “seek after God” (Romans
3:11); and what is worse, if perhaps we become religious, we would do
as Cain
and bring ”of the fruit of the ground an
offering unto the LORD” (Genesis 4:3), i.e. our own works, which in
essence
is to despise God’s Free and Sovereign Grace in salvation.
<>
“But God stood His love together to us because we yet being
sinful, Christ died over us” (Literally). Can you see the wonderful
truth of
out text? First, that God brought
ALL of His love together to stand before us to exhibit the greatness of
how
much He loved us! Oh, the immensity of His love: yes, “the
breadth, and length, and depth, and height” of it, “which
passeth knowledge” (Ephesians
3:18, 19) with which He loves us! Secondly,
note that He loved us while yet being sinful, or sinners! He didn’t
love
because we made ourselves sinless or holy. No! While still being in our
depravity and ugliness of our sin, He loved us. It can be said of us as
it was
of Jerusalem of old: “When I passed by
thee, and looked upon thee, behold, thy time was the time of love; and
I spread
my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness: yea, I sware unto thee,
and
entered into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord GOD, and thou
becamest mine” (Ezekiel
16:8). Then, thirdly, the greatness
of His love is that “Christ died for
(or over) us”. In other words,
beloved, because God “loved (us) with an
everlasting love” (Jeremiah 31:3), and the promise is that
absolutely
nothing “shall be able to separate us
from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans
8:39), He
gave His beloved Son so that everyone that believes in Him will not
perish but
have eternal life. Truly there is no greater love than this then to
know that “the Son of God…loved me, and
gave himself for me”
(Galatians 2:20). Hallelujah!