CHAPTER 1
God's Love for Man
CHAPTER 1
NATURE and revelation alike testify of God's
love. Our Father in heaven is the source of life, of wisdom, and of
joy. Look at the wonderful and beautiful things of nature. Think of
their marvelous adaptation to the needs and happiness, not only of man,
but of all living creatures. The sunshine and the rain, that gladden
and refresh the earth, the hills and seas and plains, all speak to us
of the Creator's love. It is God who supplies the daily needs of all
His creatures. In the beautiful words of the psalmist--
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"The eyes of all wait upon Thee; And Thou givest them their meat in due season. Thou openest Thine hand, And satisfiest the desire of every living thing." -Psalm 145:15, 16.
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God made man perfectly holy and happy; and the fair earth, as it
came from the Creator's hand, bore no blight of decay or shadow of the
curse. It is transgression of God's law--the law of love--that has
brought woe and death. Yet even amid the suffering that results from
sin, God's love is revealed. It is written that God cursed the ground
for man's sake. Genesis 3:17. The thorn and the thistle--the
difficulties and trials that make his life one of toil and care--were
appointed for his good as a part of the training needful in God's plan
for his uplifting from the ruin and degradation that sin has
wrought. The world, though fallen, is not all sorrow and misery. In
nature itself are messages of hope and comfort. There are flowers upon
the thistles, and the thorns are covered with roses.
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"God is love" is written upon every opening bud, upon every spire of
springing grass. The lovely birds making the air vocal with their happy
songs, the delicately tinted flowers in their perfection perfuming the
air, the lofty trees of the forest with their rich foliage of living
green -- all testify to the tender, fatherly care of our God and to His
desire to make His children happy.
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The word of God reveals His character. He Himself has declared His
infinite love and pity. When Moses prayed, "Show me Thy glory," the
Lord answered, "I will make all My goodness pass before thee." Exodus
33:18, 19. This is His glory. The Lord passed before Moses, and
proclaimed, "The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious,
long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for
thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin." Exodus 34:6,
7. He is "slow to anger, and of great kindness," "because He delighteth
in mercy." Jonah 4:2; Micah 7:18.
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God has bound our hearts to Him by unnumbered tokens in heaven and
in earth. Through the things of nature, and the deepest and tenderest
earthly ties that human hearts can know, He has sought to reveal
Himself to us. Yet these but imperfectly represent His love. Though all
these evidences have been given, the enemy of good blinded the minds of
men, so that they looked upon God with fear; they thought of Him as
severe and unforgiving. Satan led men to conceive of God as a being
whose chief attribute is stern justice,--one who is a severe judge, a
harsh, exacting creditor. He pictured the Creator as a being who is
watching with jealous eye to discern the errors and mistakes of men,
that He may visit judgments upon them. It was to remove this dark
shadow, by revealing to the world the infinite love of God, that Jesus
came to live among men.
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The Son of God came from heaven to make manifest the Father. "No man
hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom
of the Father, He hath declared Him." John 1:18. "Neither knoweth any
man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal
Him." Matthew 11:27. When one of the disciples made the request, "Show
us the Father," Jesus answered, "Have I been so long time with you, and
yet hast thou not known Me, Philip? He that hath seen Me hath seen the
Father; and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father?" John 14:8, 9.
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In describing His earthly mission, Jesus said, The Lord "hath
anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He hath sent Me to heal
the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and
recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are
bruised." Luke 4:18. This was His work. He went about doing good and
healing all that were oppressed by Satan. There were whole villages
where there was not a moan of sickness in any house, for He had passed
through them and healed all their sick. His work gave evidence of His
divine anointing. Love, mercy, and compassion were revealed in every
act of His life; His heart went out in tender sympathy to the children
of men. He took man's nature, that He might reach man's wants. The
poorest and humblest were not afraid to approach Him. Even little
children were attracted to Him. They loved to climb upon His knees and
gaze into the pensive face, benignant with love.
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Jesus did not suppress one word of truth, but He uttered it always
in love. He exercised the greatest tact and thoughtful, kind attention
in His intercourse with the people. He was never rude, never needlessly
spoke a severe word, never gave needless pain to a sensitive soul. He
did not censure human weakness. He spoke the truth, but always in
love. He denounced hypocrisy, unbelief, and iniquity; but tears were in
His voice as He uttered His scathing rebukes. He wept over Jerusalem,
the city He loved, which refused to receive Him, the way, the truth,
and the life. They had rejected Him, the Saviour, but He regarded them
with pitying tenderness. His life was one of self-denial and thoughtful
care for others. Every soul was precious in His eyes. While He ever
bore Himself with divine dignity, He bowed with the tenderest regard to
every member of the family of God. In all men He saw fallen souls whom
it was His mission to save.
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Such is the character of Christ as revealed in His life. This is the
character of God. It is from the Father's heart that the streams of
divine compassion, manifest in Christ, flow out to the children of
men. Jesus, the tender, pitying Saviour, was God "manifest in the
flesh." 1 Timothy 3:16.
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It was to redeem us that Jesus lived and suffered and died. He
became "a Man of Sorrows," that we might be made partakers of
everlasting joy. God permitted His beloved Son, full of grace and
truth, to come from a world of indescribable glory, to a world marred
and blighted with sin, darkened with the shadow of death and the
curse. He permitted Him to leave the bosom of His love, the adoration
of the angels, to suffer shame, insult, humiliation, hatred, and
death. "The chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His
stripes we are healed." Isaiah 53:5. Behold Him in the wilderness, in
Gethsemane, upon the cross! The spotless Son of God took upon Himself
the burden of sin. He who had been one with God, felt in His soul the
awful separation that sin makes between God and man. This wrung from
His lips the anguished cry, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken
Me?" Matthew 27:46. It was the burden of sin, the sense of its terrible
enormity, of its separation of the soul from God--it was this that
broke the heart of the Son of God.
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But this great sacrifice was not made in order to create in the
Father's heart a love for man, not to make Him willing to save. No,
no! "God so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son." John
3:16. The Father loves us, not because of the great propitiation, but
He provided the propitiation because He loves us. Christ was the medium
through which He could pour out His infinite love upon a fallen
world. "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself." 2
Corinthians 5:19. God suffered with His Son. In the agony of
Gethsemane, the death of Calvary, the heart of Infinite Love paid the
price of our redemption.
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Jesus said, "Therefore doth My Father love Me, because I lay down My
life, that I might take it again." John 10:17. That is, "My Father has
so loved you that He even loves Me more for giving My life to redeem
you. In becoming your Substitute and Surety, by surrendering My life,
by taking your liabilities, your transgressions, I am endeared to My
Father; for by My sacrifice, God can be just, and yet the Justifier of
him who believeth in Jesus."
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None but the Son of God could accomplish our redemption; for only He
who was in the bosom of the Father could declare Him. Only He who knew
the height and depth of the love of God could make it manifest. Nothing
less than the infinite sacrifice made by Christ in behalf of fallen man
could express the Father's love to lost humanity.
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"God so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son." He
gave Him not only to live among men, to bear their sins, and die their
sacrifice. He gave Him to the fallen race. Christ was to identify
Himself with the interests and needs of humanity. He who was one with
God has linked Himself with the children of men by ties that are never
to be broken. Jesus is "not ashamed to call them brethren" (Hebrews
2:11); He is our Sacrifice, our Advocate, our Brother, bearing our
human form before the Father's throne, and through eternal ages one
with the race He has redeemed--the Son of man. And all this that man
might be uplifted from the ruin and degradation of sin that he might
reflect the love of God and share the joy of holiness.
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The price paid for our redemption, the infinite sacrifice of our
heavenly Father in giving His Son to die for us, should give us exalted
conceptions of what we may become through Christ. As the inspired
apostle John beheld the height, the depth, the breadth of the Father's
love toward the perishing race, he was filled with adoration and
reverence; and, failing to find suitable language in which to express
the greatness and tenderness of this love, he called upon the world to
behold it. "Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon
us, that we should be called the sons of God." 1 John 3:1. What a value
this places upon man! Through transgression the sons of man become
subjects of Satan. Through faith in the atoning sacrifice of Christ the
sons of Adam may become the sons of God. By assuming human nature,
Christ elevates humanity. Fallen men are placed where, through
connection with Christ, they may indeed become worthy of the name "sons
of God."
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Such love is without a parallel. Children of the heavenly
King! Precious promise! Theme for the most profound meditation! The
matchless love of God for a world that did not love Him! The thought
has a subduing power upon the soul and brings the mind in to captivity
to the will of God. The more we study the divine character in the light
of the cross, the more we see mercy, tenderness, and forgiveness
blended with equity and justice, and the more clearly we discern
innumerable evidences of a love that is infinite and a tender pity
surpassing a mother's yearning sympathy for her wayward child.
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