Have you ever stopped to wonder why it is that we’re capable of love?
If we’re merely animals, surviving by instinct and wit, love seems unnecessary. And the idea of sacrificial love seems pretty much an impossibility.
Yet we love. And the Bible tells us why.
“We love because he first loved us.” —1 John 4:19
First of all, we’re made by God in his own image. You reflect something about God to the world around you even if you don’t know it. Every time you show love, you show off the signature of the Artist who designed you.
And while showing love for other people is a special feature of our humanity, even more amazing is our ability to love God, whom we cannot see.
How is that even possible? I believe it’s a gift from the One who loves us first.
God loves you, and his love for you awakens and enables your love for him. And in this love, our relationship with God comes alive and thrives.
Our love for God motivates our obedience to his command and to his voice. It draws us into an ever-deepening relationship with him. And it helps us to recognize his love. We love because he loved us first, and because we can both receive and give love to God and others we can also understand what love is when we see it.
And on the cross, we saw love. In the stories of Jesus in the gospels, we see love.
When we see God show up today in miraculous outpourings and events, we see love.
Every time we see the chains of addiction and sin broken for another newborn believer, we see love.
When we witness the church in action, being the hands and feet of Jesus to a hungry and thirsty world, we see love on display.
So keep receiving God’s love. Keep giving it away. As the song says, his love never fails, never gives up, never runs out on us.
This article originally appeared on BrandonACox.com and is reposted here by permission.