Choose Love

“Also for Adam and his wife the LORD God made tunics of skin, and clothed them.”

Genesis 3:21



It’s been well said we are never more like Jesus than when we forgive as its forgiveness that is the purest form and expression of love. Jesus reminded His followers that even the world loves if they are satisfied with what they receive in return. What that means is much of the worlds population loves as long as they benefit from what it is they claim to love. God’s love however is so much deeper because God’s love is based on a choice, an act of His will not contingent upon the behavior of the object of His love. That is due to the fact that God is love, His nature, His character and everything He does He does in love for God is love.

The beauty of God’s love is best evidenced in the initiative it takes to express itself. God not only risks it all for love, but gives His all both for and in love. Thats the message of the Cross we find in John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” God doesn’t wait to be loved, He always takes the first step. That truth is self evident but if one needed proof its right there in the very beginning in the Garden of Eden where we see the fallout of mans disobedience and God’s response. God’s justice is clear from His judgment and yet it’s His next move that reveals His love. We read in the New Testament that “love covers a multitude of sin” and yet it was all the way back in Genesis chapter 3 where we first see it in action when we read, “And God sowed tunics to cover Adams sin” demonstrating that the power of forgiveness isn’t that it’s received. The power of forgiveness is that it’s offered.

Keep that in mind today, loved one, “For God so loved the world that He gave…” God didn’t wait for us to make things right with Him for the simple fact, we couldn’t. We owed a debt we could not pay and Jesus paid a debt He did not owe. There is the beauty of love. Keep that in mind the next time you are offended, when someone sins against you or hurts your feelings. You can withhold your love as a form of punishment or you can offer your love as a form of healing. The Bible makes clear, “the kindness of God is what leads a man to repentance” and not His wrath. Don’t forget, we are never more like the devil when we don’t forgive and we never more like Jesus when we do. The choice is ours!

“We love Him because He first loved us”

1 John 4:19


I LOVE YOU!