We've been learning about God through the images Jesus
showed; but what do we know about God? The Psalmist (Psalm 100) tells us that the LORD is God;
the ruler of the Universe. He made us, and we are His; His people and the sheep
of His pasture. He tells us something else that we should never forget: The
Lord is Good, His love endures forever. And not just as mushy emotion: His
faithfulness continues through all generations. This included generations and
centuries of the people forgetting an rejecting and repenting and coming back
and falling away; it wasn't that they didn't know (most of the time) but they
didn't pay attention well. We see the judgment of God and the patience of God
interacting.
Finally the time came for God to do more than talk and
rescue and nag and promise. It was time to put life to the promises: For God so
loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him
shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16) This one sentence says several
things about God, Love, and His Son, all wrapped up in one package. Again, the
first thing it says is that God only loves the world He created, but loves it
to the point of involving His Son, His connection with this world. He gave
Jesus first to teach us that God is the Lord of the Universe and King of
everything; and then to gather everything He had said about repentance and
sacrifice and restoration into one life and death and life experience, so that
those who accept and understand can follow Him not only throughout this life
but forever.
Jesus, as the climax was coming, told not only His
followers but those who and has placed everything in his hands. Whoever
believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see
life, for God’s wrath remains on them. (John 3:35-36) Jesus' prayed, with the
disciples in the Upper Room on that last evening: I in them and you in me—so
that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you
sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. He had told them more:
the Father himself loves you because you have loved me and have believed that I
came from God, and a last command: This is my command: Love each other. (John 17:23; 16:27; 15:17).
We see God loving His people; the Father loving the Son;
the Father loving His followers as they love and believe Jesus, we loving each
other. and at the beginning, the oldest of the commandments: And now, Israel,
what does the Lord your God ask of you but to fear the Lord your God, to walk
in obedience to him, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your
heart and with all your soul, and to observe the Lord’s commands and decrees
that I am giving you today for your own good? (Deuteronomy 10:12-13) I see it as one giant circle of love and
commitment that will become a never-ending community of mutual love!
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