Weekly Devotional 4-24-17 God’s Love of Man
Over the past four weeks we have considered Adam’s (Adam being the representative of man) Garden experience, his fall, his fallen nature becoming the nature of his offspring, and God’s provision. Today we close this short series of considerations with God’s love of Adam and all mankind. When we consider God’s love of man we are limited in our understanding of it. We define love by human perception. Some have said that it is an emotional feeling. Some have connected it with liking someone or some-thing and others say it is how I feel about my parents, my brother or sister, a special friend or even how I feel about my pet dog, cat, etc. It is certainly right to love or have feelings for one’s parents, or for one’s brother or sister. It’s also good to love or have feelings about one’s pet(s). Webster’s Ninth Collegiate Dictionary defines love as “a strong affection for another arising out of kinship or personal ties (maternal ~ for a child).” But what about God’s love for man, does He love us in the way we love others or is there something more to? It is a good question!
The Bible says that “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son” (John 3:16a NKJV). Thinking about that, my mind began traveling through various Scriptures that might explain the depth of His love. I don’t remember in which order my thoughts came to me, but one of the passages was 1st Corinthians 13:4-8a which says, “4Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; 5does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; 6does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; 7bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 8Love never fails” (NKJV). Certainly, we each should recognize that we don’t naturally love in this way. We love in response to the actions or affections of the object of our love, be it our parents, our brothers or sisters. We even love our pets in response to their affection for us. God, however, loves His special creation, mankind. Not in response to man’s affection for Him, but even when no affection for Him existed or is shown.
Another passage that came to mind was John 15:13 “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends” (NKJV). These words were spoken by Jesus to His disciples on the way to the garden of Gethsemane while he knew that shortly he would be arrested and killed.
As we look back to Adam we find God’s love for Him on immediate display. He covered Adam’s physical and spiritual nakedness in order that God would not destroy man which His holiness demanded. God had ordained that upon the very day, the very instant, that Adam disobeyed Him and took of the forbidden fruit he would die and be spiritually separated from Him (Genesis 2:16-17). However, God didn’t want this. He loved Adam and mankind and desired an eternal relationship with him. Alas, what to do? God made provision for the payment of man’s sin long before He created the world. The apostle John, by revelation, writes that the Lamb of God (Revelation 13:8b) was slain from the foundation of the world. This same John in the Gospel that bears his name, identified Jesus as that Lamb (John 1:36). In the Garden, Adam and Eve tried to cover or hide their sin by their own device, but their attempt had no value. God slew an animal (shed the blood of an animal) in order to provide skins to cover them. There was no value in the skins, nor in the blood of the slain animal, but in God’s mind the animal’s blood was representative of the blood of Jesus who would be slain some 4,000 years later. The apostle Paul, by inspiration of the Holy Spirit, wrote about this in his letter to the Colossians. Concerning Jesus he wrote; “13He [God] has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, 14in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins. 15He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. 16For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. 17And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. 18And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence. 19For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, 20and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross. 21And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled 22in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight” (Colossians 11:3-22 NKJV).
What a blessing, what a joy must have been Adam and Eve’s when they were told by God that their sin was paid for and that sins would never separate them from His love. While they would not hear Paul’s inspired words of Romans 8:35, 38-39, they innately knew within themselves the truth of his words. To wit, “35Who shall separate us from the love of Christ Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword….. 38For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, 39nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (NKJV). This blessing is ours also. That is, we who have believed God and turned to Him for the forgiveness of our sin and for restored fellowship. Turning back to an earlier statement of Paul, we read; “1There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit” (Romans 81-16 NKJV).
What greater love for man could there possibly be? God could not tolerate Adam’s sin, nor can He tolerate man’s sin (including our sins, yours and mine). But He sacrificed Himself as payment for sin and for restoration of fellowship. This is only true however of those who turn to Him in trust and commitment.
“18He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 19And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 20For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. 21But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God” (John 3:18-21 NKJV).
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Transforming Power; The Work of God on Behalf of Man
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