A statement made got me thinking about our way of love verses God’s ideal love. The preacher, talking about the fact that many of us feel “It’s hard for anyone to love me profoundly” made the point that God, our Heavenly Father, loves us profoundly.

Scripture says that God loves us so much so that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us – trading places with us: our deserved punishment for His righteous reward. God gave His only begotten Son to take our eternal death for us so we may have His eternal life.

As I listened to his words, this truth flowed through my mind: we, in our fleshly ways, too often see love as something given to those who deserve it, thus love is earned or owed. However, God loves because of who He is, not who we are or what we do. We cannot earn His love, nor do we lose His love. His love reaches out even to all who refuse Him and His ways, choosing to remain in their death of eternal separation from Him. God’s love is freely given even when we don’t deserve it; a gift of salvation through Christ available and ready for receipt with the name of everyone born to this life. But a gift is not fully ours until we receive it and fully possess it as our own.

God has chosen to love us because He is love. And He expects us to love in likeness to Him, who gives us the power of His Spirit, making us as He is. When we learn to be love, and to love as He does, then we will know love. When we know love and give it out of who we are, as God does, then we are ready for God’s use in loving each other, especially the children God blesses us to raise up to know Him.

The best gift we can give our kids is to know they are loved even when they don’t do anything to deserve it. When they understand that true love is not dependent on their do but on the nature of God, living and active in our love actions, then they are ready to receive God’s love, with hope of giving love in likeness to Him.

Truly looking like God, in godliness and Christlike fervor, requires being as He is from the inside out, which is the work and proof of His Spirit in us. Anything less is a whitewashed façade.

May our love flow from the heart of who we are in Christ. And may those benefitted by it know the love of God for themselves.