And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us
Loving God is but letting God love us
1.
All men living in sin repel or draw back from the love of God, and will not let it come in upon them. We do not say “go thy way,” but we go our own way, and that means just the same thing. Doubtless it is good in God to be tendering Himself in such love, and a certain sensibility is moved by it, still there is a revulsion felt, and no fit answer of returning love is made; where, as we can see, the true account of the matter is, that the love is unwelcome, because there is no want of it, or consentingness of mind towards it; which is the same as to say that the man does not let God love him. As if the artist at his camera were to put in nothing but a plate of glass, prepared by no chemical susceptibility, saying to the light, “Shine on if you will, and make what picture you can.” He really does not let the light make any picture at all, but even disallows the opportunity.
2. Observe how constantly the Scripture word looks to the love of God, for the ingeneration of love in men, and so for their salvation. The radical, everywhere present idea is, that the new love wanting in them is to be itself only a revealment of the love of God to them, or upon them. Thus the newborn life is to be “the love of God, shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Ghost.” “Love is of God, for everyone that loveth is born of God.” “If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and His love is perfected in us.” “We love Him because He first loved us.” “In this was manifested the love of God toward us.” The plan is to beget love by love, and nothing is left us to do in the matter, but simply to allow the love, and offer ourselves to it. There is no conception anywhere that we are to make a new love ourselves; we have only to let the love of God be upon us, and have its immortal working in us. That will transform, that will new create, in that we shall live.
3. What tremendous powers of motion and commotion, what dissolving, recomposing forces come upon, or into a soul, when it suffers the love of God. For it is such kind of love as ought to create, and must, a deep, all-revolutionising ferment, in the moral nature. It is the silent artillery of God, a salvation that wins by a dreadful pungency; raising up conviction of sin, to look on Him whom it hath pierced, moving agitations deep, stirring up all mires. So that when the love gets welcome, it has dissolved everything, and the newborn peace is the man new composed in God’s living order. Letting God love us with such love, is adequate remedy therefore and complete, and is no mere nerveless quietism, as some might hastily judge. Or if any doubt on this point may remain, I proceed--
4. To ask what more A sinner of mankind, doing the utmost possible, can be expected or required to do. Can he tear himself away from sin by pulling at his own shoulder? Can he starve out his sins by fasting, or wear them out by a pilgrimage, or whip them out by penances, or give them away in alms? No! All that he can do to beget a new spirit in his fallen nature, is to offer up himself to the love of God, and let God love him. As he can see only by allowing the daylight to stream into his eyes, so he can expel the internal disorder and darkness of his soul, only by letting the light of God’s love fall into it. Furthermore, as he cannot see a whir more clearly than the light enables him, by straining his will into his eyes, so he can do no more in the way of clearing his bad mind than to open it, as perfectly as possible, to the love of God. And now it remains to say--
5. That when we come to accurately understand what is meant by faith, which is the universally accepted condition of salvation, we only give, in fact, another version of it, when we say that the just letting God love us, amounts to precisely the same thing. For if a man but offers himself up trustfully and clear of all hindrance to the love of God in Jesus Christ, saying, though it be in silence, “Be it upon me; let it come and do its sweet will in me”; plainly that is but letting God love him, and yet what is it but faith? In proposing it then as a saving condition, that we let God love us; we do not dispense with faith. We only say “believe” with a different pronunciation. (H. Bushnell, D. D.)
A psalm of remembrance
It is very pleasant to read descriptions of the Holy Land from observant travellers, who in glowing language have depicted its interesting scenes. How much more delightful must it be to journey there one’s self, to stand on the very spot where Jesus preached and prayed, and to kneel upon that blood-stained garden of Gethsemane, in which He sweat that sacred sweat of blood. Now, this law of nature I would transfer to matters of grace. Let me tell you this day what I may concerning the acts of God’s goodness in the souls of His people, my description will be dulness itself compared with the glorious reality. Let me add another figure to render this truth yet more apparent. Suppose an eloquent foreigner, from a sunny clime, should endeavour to make you appreciate the fruits of his nation. He depicts them to you. He describes their luscious flavour, their cooling juice, their delicious sweetness; but how power less will be his oration, compared with your vivid remembrance, if you have yourself partaken of the dainties of his land. It is even so with the good things of God; describe them as we may, we cannot awaken in you the joy and delight that is felt by the man who lives upon them, who makes them his daily food, his manna from heaven, and his water from the rock.
I. The abstract of Christian experience.
1. Sometimes the Christian knows the love of God to him. I will mention two or three particular ways in which he knows it. Sometimes he knows it by seeing it. He goes to his house and he finds it stored with plenty--“his bread is given him, and his water is sure.” He is like Job; the Lord hath set a hedge about him, and all that he possesseth. Now, truly, he can say, “I know the love of God to me, for I can see it. I can see a gracious providence pouring forth out of the cornucopia of providence--an abundance of all that my soul can desire.” This, however, might not completely convince him of God’s love if it were not that he has also a consciousness that these things are not given him as husks are cast to swine, but they are bestowed on him as love tokens from a tender God. His ways please the Lord, and therefore He maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him. Another time in which he knows his Father’s love is, when he sees it after coming out of affliction. In the hour of languishing he cried to the Lord for deliverance; and at last he felt the young blood leaping through his veins anew. New health was restored to him, “The Lord hath heard my cry, like Hezekiah, and has lengthened my days. Now I know the love which God hath to me.” There are other ways in which God’s children know their Father’s love. Besides what they see there is something which they feel. Bitter though we sometimes think that our lives have been, yet have there been periods in them akin to heaven, when we could say, “If this is not glory it is next door to it. If I am not on the other side Jordan, at least my master is on this side of it.” Then could he say, “Now I know the love that God hath towards me.”
2. But times there are of thick darkness, when neither sun nor moon appear for many days; when the tempest rages exceedingly, and two seas meet in dread collision. At such a time, noble is the Christian who can say, “Now it may be I do not know the love that God hath to me, but I believe it.” The first position, that of knowing God’s love, is the sweetest, but that of believing God’s love, is the grandest. To feel God’s love is very precious, but to believe it when you do not feel it, is the noblest.
3. And now, do not these two states make up a summary of Christian experience? “We know and believe the love that God hath to us.” “Ah,” says one, “we have sometimes doubted it.” No, I will leave that. You may insert it in your confession, but I will not put it into my song. Confess your doubts, but write them not in this our psalm of praise. I am sure, in looking back, you will say, “Oh, how foolish I was ever to doubt a faithful and unchanging God!”
II. A summary of the believer’s testimony. Every Christian is to be a testifier. He is to be a witness with heart and lips. All the other creatures speak not with words. They may sing as they shine, but they cannot sing vocally. It is the believer’s part in the great chorus to lift up voice and heart at once, and as an intelligent, living, loving, learning witness, to testify to God.
1. In the first place we have known that God’s love to us is undeserved.
2. Another thing we can bear testimony to, is this--that the love of God is unconquerable. We strove against God’s love, but it conquered us.
3. We can say concerning His love that it has never been diminished by all the sins we have ever committed since we believed. We have often revolted, but we have never found Him unwilling to forgive.
4. We have known and we have believed the love of God to us to be perfectly immutable.
5. I will make but one other remark here, and that is, we can bear our willing witness that the love of God to us has been an unfailing support in all our trials.
III. This great truth is the groundwork of Christian encouragement. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Love
Love is the most essential and the most characteristic of Christian virtues. He who lacks this scarcely deserves the name of Christian at all, while he who possesses this is on the way to possess all. When we ask why such stress is laid upon the importance of possessing this virtue above all others, more than one answer suggests itself to our minds. First, we may observe that some explanation is given in the words of this text. A loveless soul can never be a God like soul; for “God is love.” On the other hand, when we dwell in love, when it is, as it were, the element in which we live and move and have our being, we cannot remain altogether dissimilar to God, just because God is love. For love is one, whether it exists in Him or in us; and wherever it reigns it must needs produce similarity to Him who is its Divine Source. Yet another explanation of the importance assigned to love in the Christian economy is to be found in the fact that love is designed to supply the motive power in all truly Christian conduct and experience. For Christ looks at the quality even more than at the quantity of the work that we do for Him. A little offered as a love offering to Him is worth a great deal done merely because we think we ought to do it, or just because it is expected of us. Nay, we may go further. We may be moved by a feeling of interest in the work for its own sake; and yet there shall be little or no pleasure occasioned to the heart of God, just because the true motive has been wanting. When we ask why faith, not love, should be the condition of salvation, it is not difficult to give a reasonable answer, as we contemplate the two side by side, and notice the difference between them. Love, we observe, is a condition of our emotional nature, a state of passive consciousness, or a moral habit formed within the soul. Faith, on the other hand, is a definite moral attitude, voluntarily assumed towards a definite object as the result of our intellectual apprehension of the characteristics of that object. It follows from this that love cannot be directly induced by an act of our will, and that we are therefore only indirectly responsible for its possession. But it may occur to some to object: if we cannot directly produce love, how can we be responsible for having it? and how can God find fault with us, as He seems to do, if we have it not? If we cannot make ourselves love ore’ fellow man by trying, how can we force ourselves to love God? To this it may be replied, love is not so capricious as at first sight it might appear to be. It springs from a combination of causes, which, however, it frequently happens that we never think of stopping to analyse. When, however, we carefully look into the matter, we soon find that our love has owed its existence either to some definite cause, or, as is more frequently the case, to some combination of causes. Now these causes may be, to a consider able extent, under our control; we may either avoid their influence, or put ourselves in the way of being influenced by them; and here, of course, moral responsibility comes in. Admiration either of appearances, or of physical or intellectual or moral qualities, frequently has much to do with the genesis of love, and this admiration may extend to the smallest things; indeed, I believe that it is more frequently by little things than by great that it is usually elicited. Intimacy again may have much to do with the genesis of love. Gratitude, too, frequently induces affection. We love because we owe so much, and love seems the only way of repaying what we owe. There are, no doubt, many other causes which may contribute to produce love; such as sympathy, affinity of tastes, or disposition, or unity of interest; but, after all, nothing is so likely to cause love as love itself discovered to be pre-existent on the part of another. How often do we love because we find we are loved! How often does love, already supreme in our human heart, exert a species of irresistible fascination on the heart of another! Now it is clear that most of these various causes of love as existing amongst us men in our relations with each other, and as contributing to the genesis of a reciprocal affection, either exist in a much greater degree in the Divine Object than in any human being, or may be brought into existence as between us and Him. If we desire the Holy Spirit to work upon us efficiently in this respect, our wisdom lies in surrendering ourselves to His influence; and when we do He will always lead us up to the contemplation of those facts about the Divine Object and His relation to us, or to the apprehension of those experiences which tend to generate love. No gardener in the world can produce fruit; only the life within does that; yet how much does the fruit tree depend for its fruitfulness upon human skill! Man must see to it that the tree shall be planted where the sunshine can fall upon it, and the dew and the rain can water it. He must take care that it is not exposed to unduly trying conditions. And even so love, being a fruit of the Spirit of God, can only be produced by His presence and mighty operations within our nature; but though we cannot produce or manufacture it, still we are indirectly responsible for its production. The tree cannot cultivate itself, and here the figure fails us. Man, on the other hand, is a free agent, and therefore responsible for his own culture. It is not for us to attempt directly to induce this all-important fruit of the Spirit, but it is for us to see to it that we comply with the conditions of fruitfulness. Let us expose ourselves to the spiritual sunshine; let us live in the presence of God; let us see to it that we do not strike our roots down into earth, lest the cold clay of worldly mindedness check all our higher aspirations; let us guard against self-seeking and self-assertion; let us avoid exposing ourselves voluntarily to unfavourable influences as some Christians do, thinking more of worldly profit than of their spiritual interests; and let us cleanse off carefully the blight of impure thoughts and unholy desires, and then the Spirit of Love will be able to induce the fruit of love within our hearts. (W. H. M. H. Aitken, M. A.)
God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him--
True love
How then did Christ love us?
1. It is, as opposed to mere natural love, an all-embracing love, not swayed by feelings or emotions or preferences, but loving all who can be loved, all who may become such as can be loved, or in order that they may be loved.
2. True love must be a self-denying love.
3. True love, like the love of God, “seeks not its own.”
4. True love, like the love of God, must be ceaseless. That passing, capricious love, love and unlove, ebbing and flowing, laid dry because it has just seemed full, loving one and not another, grudging fresh acts of love because it has just shown what it thinks such, soon “wearied of well-doing,” such is not the love which reflects the love of God. (E. B. Pusey, D. D.)
The love of God, as displayed in the economies of providence and grace
I. In the cares of his universal providence. In the exercise of the love of benevolence He has not only conferred existence on a great variety and number of creatures, but He has bestowed on them countless properties and advantages, to minister to their utility and their welfare. For us, the sun shines, the rain falls, the air breathes, the seasons change, the harvests ripen, and all nature seems put in requisition to minister to our well-being. This love is impartial; for our heavenly Father makes His sun to rise on the righteous and the wicked, the rain to descend on the just and unjust, and is kind to the unthankful and the evil. It is constant. “His mercies are new every morning and every evening,” and He crowns successive years with His goodness. It is universal. The bounties which flow from its exercise are dispensed to the beasts of the field, the fowls of the air, the fishes which pass through the paths of the seas, and to the smallest insect which floats in the breeze, and the meanest reptile which creeps on the face of the earth. It will be perpetual. For we are assured that the ordinances of heaven and earth shall stand fast so long as the earth continues. “While the earth remaineth, seed time and harvest.”
II. Is the merciful provisions of His grace. And this is the love of compassion. Look at this “love” in the gradual preparatives for the full development of its displays. See it in the first promise, which raised the prostrated hopes of our sinful pro genitors; in the numerous and expressive types which were to usher in the bright day of discovery; in the accurate and splendid predictions of that long line of holymen “who testified beforehand of the sufferings of Christ and the glory which should follow.” At length the predicted time arrived for the full disclosures of the love of God to man. Does this close the exhibition of this scene of love? Did God give His Son to die the just for the unjust, to restore to us the favour which we had lost? Are we left to shift for ourselves as we passed through the wilderness of this world? “He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?” What innumerable blessings flow down to us, from the exaltation and the advocacy of the Saviour! How rich are the results of the communication of the Holy Spirit, with His gifts and graces! And what shall we say of Divine ordinances, which are the mediums, the organs of conveyance of all spiritual good, to the souls of men?
III. In the processes of His afflictive discipline.
1. The most painful trials of life have often proved the means of conversion.
2. The procedures of His disciplinary providence have contributed to sanctification. They have proved the means of repressing or of extirpating corruption from the heart. They have quickened in your bosom the spirit of prayer.
IV. In that home of rest and joy, which He has prepared for the reception of the family of His redeemed (Ecc_12:3-5). Happy, thrice happy they, who fall asleep in Jesus! (John Clayton.)
General and particular manifestation of the love of God
I. The declaration made concerning God himself, “God is love.” The Greek philosopher Aristotle defines love in this way, “The desire of anyone for whatsoever things a person supposes Co be good for his friend’s sake, but not for his own, and the procuring of those things for the person beloved according to one’s power.” This he conceives to be love. The theory is fine, as unquestionably were many of the notions found in the schools of philosophers, and in the shades of academical retirement; but a grand question meets us at the threshold of the inquiry, Where is to be found the individual who is the subject of this love? It is easy to give the definition, but where, in our fallen race, shall we discover an individual with his heart thus disinterestedly affectionate? But that which is not in man by nature, is found in God--“God is love.” He is the fountain from which love must have flowed wheresoever it is found. The very imposition of labour is a proof that God is love. A world of men and women unemployed, and with hearts so depraved, and characters altogether so alienated from the life of God as ours naturally are, would really be a hell upon earth, since men would have nothing to do except to torment one another. And what shall we say of the mystery of redemption--eternal redemption?
II. The peculiar cause why the redeemed of the earth, in particular, can bear witness to this truth, that God is love. What reason have we to believe, that instead of perishing with the majority, we shall be in the minority of those who are saved? No general declaration of God’s love will answer this purpose. We have known the love which God hath to us--it is not a matter of conjecture, but of demonstration: “We have known, we have believed the love that God hath to us.”
III. The specimen introduced of the character of those who have found God to be love. “He that dwelleth in love, dwelleth in God, and God in him.” And what do we behold in this declaration? First of all, the certain continuance of that spirit of love, whereby the Lord’s people are called. There is no fear of this love waxing cold and being dried up in the redeemed, when we know that they live in God by a life of faith, and that God by His Spirit lives in them. But farther, what do we behold in this declaration, “He that dwelleth in love, dwelleth in God, and God in him”? Why, the security of those souls who are thus distinguished by the love of God, and by being the temples of the Holy Ghost. They dwell in God, and God dwells in them. (W. Borrows, M. A.)
God embodied and manifested in infinite love to man
Did we only give credit to the text--did we but view God as “love”--there would be the translation into another character--there would instantly emerge a new heart and a new nature. For let us attend in the first place, to the original conception of humanity, constituted and placed as it now is, in reference to that great and invisible Being revealed unto us in the Scriptures. There are two reasons why we should conceive God to be so actuated as to inspire us with terror, or at least with distrust, instead of conceiving Him to be actuated by that love which the text ascribes to Him, and which were no sooner believed than it would set us at ease, and inspire us with delightful confidence in Him. The first of these reasons may be shortly stated thus: When ever we are placed within the reach of any being of imagined power, but withal of unknown purposes, that being is an object of dismay to us. If such, then, be the effect on human feelings of a power that is known, associated with purposes that are unknown, we are not to wonder that the great and invisible God is invested, in our eyes, with the imagery of terror. It is verily because He is great and at the same time invisible, that we so invest Him. It is precisely because the Being who has all the energies of nature at command is at the same time shrouded in mystery impenetrable, that we view Him as tremendous. But in what way could more palpable exhibition have been made of Him, than when the eternal Son, enshrined in humanity, stepped forth on the platform of visible things on the proclaimed errand “to seek and to save” us? But there is still another reason, and many may think, perhaps, a more substantial reason than the former, why, instead of viewing God as love, we should apprehend Him to be a God of severity and displeasure. It is not conjured up by fancy from a distant land of shadows, but drawn from the inferences of man’s own consciousness. The truth is, that by the constitution of humanity there is a law of right and wrong in every heart, which each possessor of that heart knows himself to have habitually violated. But more than this, along with the felt certainty of such a law there is the resistless apprehension of a lawgiver--of a God offended by the disobedience of His creatures, and because of which we are disquieted with the thought of a reckoning and a vengeance yet to come. Now as, in counteraction to our first reason for viewing God with apprehension, and thus, losing sight of Him as a God of love, we adduced one particular doctrine of Christianity, so, in counteraction to our second reason, we now adduce another peculiar doctrine of Christianity, and that by far the noblest and most precious of its articles. The one was the doctrine of the incarnation; the other is the doctrine of the atonement. By the former--the doctrine of the incarnation--a conquest has been made over the imaginations of ignorance; by the latter--the doctrine of the atonement--a conquest has been made over, not the imaginations, but the solid and well-grounded fears of guilt. By the one, or through the means of a Divine incarnation, we are told of Deity embodied, and thus the love of God has been made the subject, as it were, of ocular demonstration; by the other, or through the means of a Divine sacrifice, we are told of the Deity propitiated; and thus the love of God has been made to shine forth in the midst of the law’s sustained and vindicated honours. The gospel of Jesus Christ is a halo of all the attributes of God, and yet the preeminent manifestation there is of God as love; for it is love, not only rejoicing over all His works, but enshrined in full concentration, when shedding enhanced lustre over all, and amidst all, the perfections of the Divine nature. Before I leave this part of the subject, I should like, in as plain a way as possible, to meet a question which I consider of very great practical importance in Christianity. You may make out the demonstration that “God is love;” you may make that out as a general attribute; but then the question, in which each of us is personally interested, is to be asked still--How are we to be satisfied that this love of God is directed personally and individually to ourselves? Christ is set forth as “a propitiation for the sins of the world!” and “God so loved the world, as to send His Son into it.” Let me, therefore, who, beyond all doubt, am in “the world,” take the comfort of these gracious promulgations: for it is only if out of the world, or away from the world, that they do not belong to me. The blessings of the gospel are as accessible to all who will, as the water, or the air, or any of the cheap and common bounties of nature. The element of heavenly love is in as universal diffusion among the dwellings of men as the atmosphere which they breathe, and which solicits admittance at every door. This brings me to the third head of discourse. If we could only work this apprehension of God into your minds--if we could only prevail on you to believe that “God is love,” then it would have this effect on your feelings towards Him--the effect, in fact, of giving you altogether a different feeling with regard to God. It would be the instrument of completely regenerating you: by its giving you a different view of God you would acquire a different feeling with regard to Him; and it would, in fact, throw within the constitution of your soul the great master principle of all morality; and thus it is that it would be the elemental principle of what is called in the Bible regeneration. Faith would work by love. You would love the God who first loved you, and this low would yield all manner of obedience. In the first place, the way to call into your heart the love of God, and to keep it there, is to think on the love of God as manifested in the gospel, and to dwell upon the thought. It is only by thinking rightly, or believing rightly, that you can be made to feel rightly; and could we only prevail on you to dwell habitually, and with confidence, on God’s love to you, then should we feel ourselves on the sure highway to the result of your habitually loving Him back again. But, secondly and lastly, you will perceive from this the mighty importance of a free gospel, and of your so understanding it that you may embark upon it, each individual for himself, all your hopes and all your dependence. (T. Chalmers, D. D.)
Divine beneficence defended
A part from revelation there are, I conceive, two main evidences of the goodness of God. The one is to be found in the material universe, the other in the nature and capabilities of man. When man first begins to observe and reflect on the vast universe of which he forms a part, he can hardly fail to be struck with its order, its beauty, and its sublimity. But hardly has man formed to himself this grand conception of the unbounded power and the universal goodness of his Creator, before another aspect of the phenomena forces itself upon his attention. If on one side there is the fertile field or the smiling valley, on the other there is the howling wilderness or the raging sea. If here we find a man rejoicing in health and strength and prosperity, the happy peasant who has no wants which he cannot satisfy, the successful warrior, the gifted statesman, or the powerful monarch; there we find a man bowed down with disease, or sunk in misfortune, the captive in the hands of his enemies, the father bereft of his children, the beggar seeking his bread. How to account for this double aspect of nature and of human life has ever been one of the great problems which the curious intellect of man has set itself to solve. Is God really good, or is He a capricious Being, at one time dealing good and at another evil, selecting arbitrarily His friends and enemies, while He showers blessings on the one and inflicts vengeance on the other? “The wilder Bedouins,” says an Eastern traveller, “will inquire where Allah is to be found.” When asked the object of the question they will reply, “If the Eesa could but catch Him they would spear Him upon the spot,--who but He lays waste their houses, and kills their cattle and wives?” Others, in order to solve the difficulty, have imagined a coordinate, or almost coordinate Being, the author of evil, as God is the author of good; others, like the Platonists, believe that there are material obstacles which God can only partially overcome; whilst others, again, have supposed that God permits the existence of a subordinate but powerful spirit, who is engaged in marring the work which, as being of Divine origin, would otherwise be absolutely perfect. It may be of service to those who, amidst all the perplexities of modern speculation, would fain retain their hold on this fundamental principle of religious faith, the supreme goodness of God, if I attempt to point out certain considerations suggested to us by the study of nature and of human life which, amidst all our darkness and ignorance, may be regarded as, at least, indications of its truth. The question, then, is not whether evil is to be found in this world, for we cannot even conceive its absence, but whether, on a general survey of nature and life, good would seem to be, as it were, the rule, and evil the exception, or evil the rule and good the exception. Suppose, for a moment, the present constitution of things to be fixed, and let it be granted that the world proceeds from an omnipotent and intelligent Creator; the argument, as stated by Paley and others, that this omnipotent and intelligent Being is also a Being of infinite goodness, if not absolutely convincing, is, at least, one of very considerable force. There is much evil in the world. Granted; but good can only be understood by contrast with evil, and the good in the world, so far as we can make out, far counterbalances the evil. Those who, to the outside observer, seem to be subjected to the most cheerless and most sordid conditions, without, apparently, a ray of hope or of comfort, often, it is a matter of common remark, appear to cling to life with greater tenacity than those whom we deem the most prosperous. Even for them, therefore, life has its charms, and, whether they believe in a future world or not, at all events they are unwilling to quit this. Truly man has a marvellous power of adapting himself to the circumstances in which he is placed. Transport yourself, if it were possible, for a few hours, into the most unpromising position in human life, and you would probably find that it has its compensating advantages. A certain amount of happiness, in fact, seems invariably to result from the adaptation of the organism to the medium, whatever the organism and whatever the medium may be. Not only, therefore, do we probably vastly overestimate the amount of misery which there is in the world, but we are apt altogether to overlook the educating influences of pain. Let anyone think within himself of what a vast amount of enjoyment he would be deprived if his pleasures came unsought, if they supervened on no previous desire, want, or pain. Let him think, too, what he would have been in character and attainments if he had never had any obstacles to overcome, any difficulties to grapple with, or wants to gratify. Self-denial, temperance, patience, industry--where would these be if we had been created beings without wants, without the capacity of pain, without the necessity of effort? Sympathy, compassion, forgiveness, tenderness, all these finer traits of our nature, where would they be if there were no sufferings to be compassionated, no pains to be alleviated? Morality and intelligence alike, at least as they exist in man, seem to be the result of a long struggle with the powers of nature, of an unceasing effort to accommodate himself to the exigencies of his condition. But after all, it may be said, this is only a roseate view of human life and of the causes which determine it, a theory which prosperous men have not unnaturally framed in order to account for their own prosperity. Go into the stifling alleys of a crowded city, pass through the sordid dwellings, look at the haggard forms famishing for want of food, and then say whether you can believe in a moral government of the universe, in the existence of a God of love from whom all these men and women have their being, from whose original disposition of events the circumstances in which they are now placed have proceeded! Is it not a cruel mockery to tell such as these of the love of their Creator? If they believe in a God, will they not turn round and curse Him? No! Amongst the oppressed, the suffering, and the afflicted are often found those who have the most intense faith in the love of God. It is in their prosperity rather than their adversity that men forget their Maker. And do these men, as I have said before, cling to life with less tenacity than we do? For them too, then, life has some secret charm; they, too, have a power of adapting themselves to circumstances, and their existence is not all that dreary, cheerless waste which to us it seems to be. But, before we blame God for this mass of human suffering, and consider it an argument against His beneficence and love, shall we not do well to look more closely into its causes, to ask how far it is unavoidable and how far avoidable, how far it is due to the actions of laws of nature, whose effects we cannot escape, and how far to the wickedness, the carelessness, or the ignorance of man? That man should be able to determine his own actions and to influence his fellows is surely not a defect but an excellence in the constitution of human nature. But we, at least, in the present constitution of our faculties, cannot see how we can have this power without the possibility of exercising it for evil as well as for good. Here, then, we encounter the same difficulty as before. As in the individual it would seem as if there must be alternations of pleasure and pain, so in society it will seem as if there must be a mixture of good and evil, of suffering and enjoyment, of prosperity and adversity. But part of this evil and suffering we have said is avoidable, and part unavoidables--that is to say, part is due to man himself, and part to the inexorable forces of nature. Now, so far as man’s lot admits of being modified by himself, we find, if we take a sufficiently wide retrospect, that the improvement in his condition has been almost incalculable; in comfort and security, even in refinement and intelligence. The laws which govern the evolution of society seem, with some few exceptions not difficult to be accounted for, to have an invariable tendency to improve man’s condition. And if this has been the effect of advancing civilisation in the past, is there any reason to suppose that the process will be arrested in the future? May we not hope that, as the sympathies of men expand and their knowledge increases, many of the more glaring inequalities which now exist between man and man will be gradually removed? Of all the characters which God has stamped upon His creation, physical and human, none is more patent to our observation than the capacity of progress. Man has undoubtedly even still much evil to contend with, but this evil he has an almost indefinite power of diminishing, and by struggling with it his faculties are enlarged, his character is strengthened, and he is being gradually prepared (so by an irrepressible instinct we divine) for a sphere far transcending this in dignity, in freedom, in knowledge, and in love. (Prof. T. Fowler.)
God is love
God’s world might teach us hope--God’s Word alone can give us the immoveable certainty that He is love.
I. “God is love”--a truth unknown to the wisdom of the world.
1. One cause of the failure must be sought for in the spirituality and elevation of the idea itself.
2. In the scale of reason the question of God’s love must often seem a balanced one. Whatever love in God is, it is not a love which cannot both do and look upon things which are very terrible; it is not a love which is regardless of law; it is not a love which cannot punish.
3. The workings of an evil conscience.
II. God is love--a truth revealed and certified in Christ.
1. It is a love not out of harmony with the sterner aspects of God’s government, as seen in the world around us. There was a certain granitic sternness in the character of Christ, as well as soft and gentle words and smiles. And as for pain, think of the bitter Cross, and of God not sparing His own Son there.
2. The place to which the gospel raises love in the character of God. It identifies love with God’s essence, with the very root of His character and life. A pagan said, “When God was about to make the world He transformed Himself into love.” But the Christian gospel goes beyond this, and declares that God eternally is love.
3. The gospel is preeminently a revelation of God’s love to sinners. (J. Orr, B. D.)
God is love
“The idea which men have of God,” said a thoughtful writer, “is the most important of all influences on their religious character and tone of mind. They become as what they worship. If justice, Jews; if goodness, Christians. When men think of God chiefly as the Supreme Mind, they are philosophic; when chiefly as the Supreme Will, they are superstitious; regarding Him as a Sovereign, they strive to be His servants; as a Father, His sons.” We can feel the truth of this view.
I. It is inevitable that our main thought of God should colour our religious life, and through it our ordinary life among men. The quality of our service will differ with the relationship we bear to those we serve. If we are afraid of them, we shall be timid, scrupulous in all work which comes under their eye, and along with our dread we shall cherish a subtle dislike. If we expect to win something from them, we shall be ostentatious in little acts of exaggerated service, and we shall catch ourselves acting as though we were challenging attention to the quality or quantity of our service. If we love them, all timidity and artifice will pass away. Simplicity of feeling will help forward single mindedness of conduct. We shall serve with zeal, completeness, and trustworthiness because we love. It is true that love exercises a purifying influence over service. It is, therefore, no small influence for good upon the human character when the relationship between God and man is that of love. We do not render service to a taskmaster. We do not seek to be good out of fear, which means that we have no real love for good. We do not seek to be good for the sake of reward, for love’s service is given for love’s sake, and not for fee or gain. To know, therefore, that God is Love is to have in possession a thought and truth which, if we give it full play, tends to purify the dispositions, desires, and motives of our nature. The same thought may reach us in another way. God is love. God therefore desires for us the very best that can be. “Love worketh no ill to its neighbour,” said St. Paul. And Love worketh no ill to its children. Therefore God can only seek man’s highest good, and man’s highest good is in character. Wealth is only good in seeming, knowledge is only good in transition; but character abides. And this abiding good, called character, is the good which God desires for His children. Thus we reach the same thought--God who is Love seeks the purifying and elevation of our characters. To understand that God is Love, and to realise that His love seeks and must seek our highest good, and that this good is in our spiritual resemblance to God our Father, is to take hold of a principle which enlightens our eyes as we look out on life.
II. The enlightenment of life through love. It need not be denied that there are many enigmas in life. There are dark vicissitudes whose meaning we seek to penetrate. Who can understand why pain falls on the innocent, and, as it sometimes seems, the heaviest penalty on those who have not sinned the most? Who can explain why disease should descend from generation to generation? Two things need to be remembered, which, if they do not give answers to these hard questions, yet lift somewhat their burden.
1. Love must seek the highest good. The highest good is greatness, purity, goodness of character. The highest good is therefore spiritual, not physical, not intellectual. Now, the bulk of the difficult questions touch physical or intellectual problems. The ills that flesh is heir to and the mental perplexities awakened by strange questions press heaviest upon us. But meanwhile the opportunities of goodness, kindness, and truth lie at our door. It is not possible to escape the boundaries of the flesh or to break the bars of thought; but it is possible to cherish good and loving thoughts. Body and mind may complain that their scope is limited, but love’s hour is always present. Now, love’s scope is best seen in hours of trial and pain. Then the capricious and wayward woman becomes a ministering angel. Similarly the nobler qualities of character reveal themselves in hours of emergency and danger. Courage asserts itself in the hour of peril--on the battlefield and on the sinking deck; humanity and presence of mind in the midst of panic and risk--in the outbreaking of the fire or in the hospital ward. Does it not seem as though the finer aspects of character would have had little scope except in a world where pain and peril existed? Now these finer qualities do not appear only in moments of sudden heroism. They are sometimes and more often seen in the quiet fidelity and prolonged patience of love, in the ministry of devoted and self-denying lives. Lifelong tests are more severe, though perhaps not so brilliant, as momentary tests. And it is on fields like these that tenderness and pity and such high qualities have shown themselves. As stars on the background of the midnight sky, the higher qualities of human nature have been seen among the dark mysteries of life. When we remember, then, that dark things not only reveal but call forth the better and higher dispositions of man, may we not see that the burden of some perplexing problems is somewhat lightened? Love seeks the highest good, and therefore love sets out the field of life in such a sort that the best qualities of life may be called forth.
2. Love seeks the freest good. God, who loves freely, wants our love as freely in return. He therefore will not enforce our love or compel our faith. The possession of freedom is a responsibility which plays a part in human education. But freedom is not the same as immunity from conditions. When we play the game, we are free to play our own game, but according to the rules. Life is like a game of chess. We may move our pieces where we please, but each piece has its assigned move. Out of the combination of our freedom and the fixed powers of the men come our discipline and skill in playing the game. The laws of life are like the rules of the game. Break the chess rules and we only provoke disappointment. Break the laws of life and we only meet grief. It is no part of true love, therefore, to relax laws or alter rules in order to please our fancy. The character could not ripen save under clear and well-defined conditions which gave scope to freedom and yet checked caprice. Love which is weak and foolish tries to spare its children pain. Love which is wise and strong knows that experience must play a large, perhaps the largest, share in education. To check the education by experience is often to tamper with the freedom. The fulness of life’s lesson is not otherwise learned. And God, who is Love, leaves His children to learn through experience. His laws safeguard much and yet provide the sphere of education. It needs, however, an eye akin with God’s to perceive His will and His way. Then, when we perceive how love is at the back of all life’s discipline and pain, we are like those who have hold of the silver thread which leads through the labyrinth. We may not understand all, but we know that the thread of which we have hold will lead us to the heart of the mystery. We know that all things work together for good to them that love God. (Bp. Boyd Carpenter)
God is love
I. By what right of reason do we say “god is love”? One only caution we must bear in mind, that in the very necessity of the case the terms we use are inadequate; they convey considerably less than the reality for which they stand. When we speak of the mind, will, or heart of God, we know all the while that the terms “mind,” “will,” and “heart” are to be understood in a sense infinitely higher than that in which we speak of the mind, will, and heart of man. With this caution, let us proceed at once to the consideration of the question, By what right of reason do we say that God is love? This is the last step of a climax of sound reasoning of which the following is an outline. Having granted the existence of a God, we infer some of His attributes from objects which we perceive, and which we call His “works.” These, for convenience, may be divided into two classes--the phenomena of the outer world and the phenomena of human nature. Both must be observed in order to form any approximately true conception of Him who is the cause of both. The observation of the outer world by itself, e.g., would furnish little if any conception of the moral attributes of God. All it teaches is the presence and activity of vast forces acting not in an irregular and chaotic, but in an orderly and steadfast manner according to fixed principles or laws. The recognition of these laws compels us to call their author intelligent, and to attribute to Him mind or reason. But how do we know anything about mind or reason except through the previous observation of a part of our own human nature? We first feel and know what reason, mind, or intelligence is in ourselves, and then we recognise it on a grander scale in the production, preservation, and control of the outer world. Thus we get hold of the first attribute of God--intelligence. Next we find in ourselves what we call the moral sense. This must not be confounded, as it too often is, with the list of duties to be done and of evil things to be not done. The conscience is the sense of being bound to do what we know or believe to be right, and not to do what we know to be wrong. This moral sense has been universally associated with the idea that our Creator or Divine Ruler is on the side of our consciences. Thus we arrive at once at the second attribute of God, viz., His righteousness. But here again we no more dream of limiting His righteousness to our small conceptions and experience of it than of limiting His intelligence to our small conceptions and experience of mind. If man is intelligent and moral, a fortiori God must be intelligent. The foregoing argument leads at once to the consideration of another and nobler feature in man’s nature, viz., his love. That this is a higher and nobler faculty than the reason, and even higher than the conscience, is universally admitted. Love is conscience in an ecstacy; it is a perfect enthusiasm of goodness, because it does not stop to reason with itself and to balance the pros and cons of right and wrong, but with eager bound rushes to its goal--the slave of inspiration. Conscience says, “Do this because it is right”; love says, “I will do this for you.” Among the faculties of man love holds the highest place. It is the instinct of doing the best possible good. While reason is our guide to what our duty is, and conscience is our authority for doing it, love leaps into the act without needing any sanction at all. I have, then, only to urge that as man is the noblest product known to us in the universe, and as love is the noblest part of man, so we must infer that God must be at least as loving as the most loving of men. Thus we reach a third attribute and say “God is love.” He may be, and to our adoring eyes of faith He surely is, far and high exalted above His noblest creature: but less than that He cannot be.
II. On what ground of experience have we any right to assume that there is any community of nature between our highest selves and God? The first and most obvious ground is the knowledge gained by experience that we are possessed of a two-fold nature, one the material, and the other, which, for want of a better term, we call the spiritual. Under the spiritual are of course included thought, conscience, and emotion. Possessing this spiritual nature as human beings we naturally believe in its likeness to, if not identity with, the nature of Him who is the Author and cause of all. The highest outcome of theological speculation is “God is a Spirit,” by which we mean emphatically to deny that He is matter and has dimensions and can be located in space; and emphatically to affirm that, like thought itself, He is distinct from matter and does not share its properties or limitations. God is Spirit and we are spirit too. But our ground of experience is wider and deeper still when we view the obvious purpose for which the spiritual part of our nature is given. That purpose includes the attainments of all kinds of knowledge--knowledge of the world outside of us, and knowledge of ourselves, and as a fruit of our honest search, a knowledge of God. We cannot avoid the conclusion that the faculty by which it is possible to perceive and understand a given law must be similar to the faculty by which the law was ordained. So by experience of scientific knowledge we prove some degree of community of nature between ourselves and the Author of the world around us. Much more do we discern this, when we go higher still in the range of our spiritual nature. I will not expatiate on the functions of conscience and of love which are spiritual faculties bestowed for the moral government of ourselves and of the race and for the supreme and noblest kind of happiness attainable on earth. In these regions of experience we discern the moral nature of Him who endowed us with a moral nature; and still more clearly and blissfully do we discern the Divine love, full of compassion and mercy, in the human love wherewith He has blest our own hearts. If we may with any reason ascribe to Him the faculty of knowledge, with much greater reason may we assure ourselves that He is infinite goodness and infinite love. (C. Voysey.)
The revealed Deity
There is a manner of Divinity in such a saying as this! It prepossesses the mind in favour of its supernal origin. And happy is it for us if such a statement as this--the very identification of the Godhead--fully agrees with our most fixed sentiments and easily coalesces with our most intimate feelings. For it is averse from all that man, left to his mere reason and arguing upon his naked information, ever entertained. Enter the Pagan temple, olden or extant. How merciless, how vindictive, how greedy of victims, how defiled with blood stains, are the idols of all! These are but the speculations we have formed of the Almighty Being who has made us. Our mind hates its own creations, but cannot paint them in any fairer hues. In opposition to these conjectures of an unconscious negligence and of a sanguinary malignity, God is love. And do you not feel the tender distinctiveness of this designation? It is not an appellative, it is not an epithet, it is not a quality. It is not only His name and His memorial. It is His nature! It is His being! It is Himself!
I. Love may be considered to subsist in the Divine nature under the following modifications.
1. Goodness. This is the disposition to communicate happiness. It displays its earliest effect in creating objects for itself. It calls into existence all whom it wills to bless. It adapts them to the means of enjoyment provided for them.
2. Complacency. This is the disposition which dwells in the mind of the Framer of all things to delight in whatever He has done. His works are great, and reflect back upon Him, in proportion to their kind and purpose, all His different perfections.
3. This Love not only includes goodness and complacency, but, as it now exists, and is now revealed, it takes the form of “the kindness and philanthropy of God our Saviour.” This supposes certain dispositions of favour towards sinful men.
(1) Forbearance. This is not security from punishment--it still is imminent and due--but such delay that, if it be improved, the punishment may be wholly averted.
(2) Grace. This opposes every idea of claim or worth in them to whom it is extended, regarding only their total demerit.
(3) Mercy. This contemplates simply moral obnoxiousness and liability, or guilt, meeting it with acts which may remove it, as also by influences that may subdue the depravity from which that exposure to punishment or that guilt could alone arise.
(4) Compassion. This concerns itself with the misery and ruin which sin entails, and furnishes, in the room of these evil consequences, peace and joy and hope, everlasting consolation and eternal life.
II. In dwelling upon Divine love in this order of its particular affections and operations, some important doctrines of Scripture must be maintained.
1. God is love, contemplated in Trinity. “Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us!” “Ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.” “The love of the Spirit.” “He that sitteth on the throne.” “The Lamb in the midst of the throne.” “The seven-fold Spirit before the throne.”
2. God is love, regarded in Covenant. A purpose is revealed as reigning in the Uncreated Mind which supposes engagements and stipulations. The Father seals the Mediator. Jesus is sent. The Holy Ghost is given. There is inauguration into office. There is subordination of trust.
3. God is love, engaged in special redeeming acts. To save the sinner He has not only to will. An immense arrangement must be contrived and established to give that will efficiency. The redemption of the soul is most precious and most difficult. It can be saved, but merely because with God all things are possible. He only can save it by means absolutely infinite.
III. A necessary conception of Divine love is, that it is the love of God primarily to himself.
1. The original law illustrates this truth by presuming that He is love. For if this be “the first and great commandment, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart,” then those qualities are to be found in Him which should be thus esteemed.
2. All the Divine perfections resolve themselves into love. If God were not faithful, righteous, holy, He could not be love: for that cannot be love which must only provoke whatever is contrary to itself. We, therefore, knowing that God is love because tie is most holy, cry to Him, “How excellent is Thy loving kindness!” “How great is His goodness, and how great is His beauty!”
3. If God be love, He cannot introduce, nor act upon, any opposite principle. He is love in being the adversary of all that interrupts its exercise and diffusion.
4. The love of God cannot, therefore, be justly disputed if He leave unremitted the consequences of sin. To carry out a benevolent plan must be as benevolent as the plan itself. Any act of mercy, being extra-judicial, being of a different order from the case supposed, cannot enter into our present vindication of essential love.
IV. Let us now attempt to refute certain objections which are commonly raised against the theme of the text.
1. God was pleased to create man an intelligent and reasonable being.
2. God could not endow a creature with such mental gifts without including in them natural liberty.
3. God must, in the event of such a creation, hold the subject of it responsible for the exercise of his liberty.
4. God must, in rendering the creature accountable, promulgate a law.
5. God has so constituted us that we must always feel that we are free.
6. God can only treat the individual creature in agreement with the general welfare.
7. God has intimated to us that our planet dwelling does not include all His intelligent family, and that His system towards us is very imperfectly developed.
8. God may not be blamed for the consequences which He has forewarned, which are wilfully incurred, and which He has given His creatures the fullest liberty, and urged them by the strongest remonstrance, to avoid.
V. Let us now exhibit the monuments and demonstrations of this love. The love of God in the gift, the humanity, and the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, stands not apart from efficient results. There is no scheme of good but it avails to uphold and operates to secure. (R. W. Hamilton, D. D.)
The heart of God
The nearest approach to a definition of the Deity is found in the sayings, “God is Spirit,” “God is Light,” “God is Love.” The last saying declares to us that, considered in relation to moral beings, God’s essential nature is love--that the Eternal has a heart, and is not without sensibilities and emotions. Thus God meets the deep yearnings of our hearts for a personal love to respond to our own. We must have “something to love, to clasp affection’s tendrils round.” If there were nothing in God to which our hearts could appeal, we should retire within ourselves and become encased in icy selfishness. A biting frost would wither our affections, and each soul would become like a barren tree, having but a starved existence in solitude and shade. Now, that we may know that in this case the wish is not father to the thought, let us listen while reason, Scripture, and experience utter their joint protest against the notion that God is without feeling. Reason compels us to conclude that all the love in the universe is Divine in its origin, and that He who is the source of love must Himself possess it. We are forced to think that, as the sap in branch and leaf has all flowed up from the roots, so all those streams of beautiful affection which redeem human life from barrenness have gushed warm from the heart of God. As the sea is the source from which every blade of grass gets its own drop of dew, and the thirsty earth gets refreshment through gentle rains, so all kindliness, generous impulses, beneficent ministries that gladden the parched and weary hearts of men, have their origin in that “ocean of love without bottom or shore,” which lies in the depths of the nature of God. As every ray of light that warms the atmosphere and makes the day beams from the face of the sun, so all the glow and beauty that are felt and seen in filial affection and the amenity of family life, in leal-hearted friendship and goodwill amongst men, are the reflection of the light of love that streams from our God in the sky. Some may, however, object that it is profane to speak of God’s love as a passion. But the text loses its charm if the word “love” does not mean in it what it means when applied to ourselves. Besides, let it be remembered that the passions are not in themselves sinful; it is the use they are put to, and the objects upon which they are expended, that determines whether or not they should be called sinful. Scripture shows that in God is a love which not only lives while it is reciprocated, but survives rebuffs, and it is not quenched by ingratitude. His is a love that “suffereth long and is kind, is not easily provoked, beareth all things, and never faileth.” Experience unites with reason and Scripture to emphasise the text. We have had many proofs that God is interested in our welfare, and feels intensely for us. There have been times when we have felt the rapture of living, and there were lyric poems within us struggling for expression. In such seasons the truth has been borne in upon us that our creation was an act of pure benevolence--an expression of the Creator’s love. And when the sunshine gave place to shade, and rapture to pain, our God caused us to nestle in His arms, and charmed our griefs to rest. (James T. East.)
The love of God revealed by Jesus Christ
There was a day in history when a man of genius discovered the law of attraction which connects the worlds. Through the unlimited course of ages that law had always existed, ever the same, ever
