How Do You Measure the Love of God?
“And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ and to know this love that surpasses knowledge that you may be filled to the measure of all of the fullness of God.” Ephesians 3:17-19
Remember when our kids were little and we’d tuck them into bed at night? The routine usually included a story and maybe a song, and prayers. Then, before we left them to fall asleep, we’d tuck them in and give them a good night kiss and remind them of how much we love them. Little sayings like “I love you to the moon and back!” or “I love you to the end of counting” would be the affirmations we would give. As our children grew, they would add their own affirmations back again. We just wanted them to know how much we loved them…and still do. What a sweet time of encouraging the hearts of our little ones.! It set the foundation for our relationship with them and gave them a small glimpse of how our Heavenly Father loves us.
When God tells us He loves us, He gives us affirmations, too. But in our limited human capacity, it can be hard to grasp and understand, mostly because we base our understanding of love on our own experience and the love we’ve received ourselves. So, our concept of love can be skewed, limited, and broken. God knew we would struggle with this, so He provided some strong word pictures to help our limited minds understand His limitless love.
First, God’s love flows from His glorious riches. His treasury of love is abundant- there is enough for every person from the dawn of time through eternity. That’s a lot of love!! It won’t ever run out- it’s abundant and free-flowing from the Father.
Next, to understand and fully enjoy the love of God, we have to be in a relationship with Him. God loves everyone, it’s true. But not everyone loves God. Unless you have a relationship with Him, you cannot begin to grasp the magnitude of His love for us and what it accomplishes on our behalf. When we enter into a relationship with God, we gain a foundation on which God builds us up in Him. We are ‘rooted’ and ‘established’. We become fixed, firm and founded in God. We have a ‘place’ and a ‘purpose’ and God’s love dwells in us.
Romans 5:5 “…God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.”
But here’s the best part…the dimensions of God’s love. When we try to figure out if something will fit into a space, we ask for the dimensions. How wide? How high? How deep? When we understand the dimensions of the item, we can gain an understanding of the ‘fit’. Friends, God’s love exceeds every dimension!! We can’t make it fit, we can’t limit it, yet it can fill us, follow us and consume us all the days of our earthly lives and follow us into eternity. The Psalmist tried to put it into words we can understand:
“For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His love for those who fear Him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us. … But from everlasting to everlasting the Lord’s love is with those who fear Him, and His righteousness with their children’s children–with those who keep His covenant and remember to obey His precepts.” Psalm 103:11-12, 17-18
“As high as the heavens are above the earth” Have you ever seen pictures of the expanses of space? Telescopes give us a glimpse of the vastness of the heavens…they go on and on… and galaxies beyond our own are so expansive, we just cannot comprehend how far they stretch. And the love of God stretches even farther.
“As far as the east is from the west” East and west will never meet- they expand away from one another. These cardinal directions will never meet, but will continually stretch endlessly. It’s another mind-blowing example of God’s love and His abundant forgiveness of our sin.
“From everlasting to everlasting” Forever. Always. Without beginning or end. God’s love has no origin and no finality. It always was, is and will be. It is an attribute of His character and nature and cannot fail. Read that again, friends…. God’s love can and will never fail!
“The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end;” Lamentations 3:22
”Give thanks to the Lord for he is good, his love endures forever.” 1 Chronicles 16:34
As we begin this new year, let’s pray that our sons and daughters spiritual eyes are opened to see the magnitude of God’s love around, in and through them. Pray that they have confidence in the perfect love of God and that they don’t judge His love based on the flawed human examples or their own less-than-perfect experiences. God’s love toward us doesn’t cool, it doesn’t grow weary, it doesn’t dry up. It is steadfast and enduring, plentiful and perfect.
We need this next generation to know, firmly and without question, that God’s love is sufficient and abundant and it is readily available to them, designed for them, and freely given. We need them to be compelled to share His love, with conviction, to others who need to know the Lord. Time is short. Jesus’ return is near. This world needs to know there is a God who loves them desperately and dearly and who gave His Son for them so they could live rooted firmly in the love of God. Let’s pray with and for one another today and for our sons and daughters.
Why not share with someone today how they can experience God’s love too!
Pray without ceasing!