We must answer the question that everyone eventually asks. This question is central to our peace and joy, and the answer will define who we are. Does God really love me? The simple answer is yes, but in order to believe it and let the truth of God's love transform us, here are eight of the countless reasons that you can know God loves you.
1. God tells you to call him Father. Just like the names Mr., Mrs., or Sweetheart, we give each other. These often shed light on the nature of our relationships. Jesus refers to God as our Father throughout the Sermon on the Mount. And throughout the New Testament, this title reveals how God has liberated, forgiven, and adopted us into His family in a fatherless generation. Many of us have grown up without a loving early father. If that's your case, try not to project your earthly father's imperfect love on our Heavenly Father. God is the Father, and He loves you. If we ended on that statement alone, it would be enough, but that's only one reason.
2. God created you, and you're the only you that He made! He made you together in your mother's womb and knows the number of hairs on your head. You are His masterpiece, and He loves you. Psalm: 139:1-18
3. God grants us great power and responsibility. He made us in His image and trusted us to care for His entire creation. He also loved us so much that He gave us the power to reject Him, which we did. But that's ok. He still loves us.
4. God calls us His Bride. Hosea was a prophet in the Old Testament who God commanded to marry a prostitute. She cheated on him, abandoned him, and sold herself into slavery. But God commanded Hosea to love her just as the Lord loved the Israelites, even though they worshipped other gods. And Hosea bought back his wife to restore their marriage and keep his promise to her. This is how God loves us.
5. God tells you when we're being unwise, he is a righteous judge, so He will not let evil go unpunished. But Christ has given us His Spirit, which is God, to live inside of us, empower us, and remind us how to live well.
6. God let you kill His son to save yourself, but seven…
7. God forgives you and wants to spend eternity with You. Because of the Lord's great love, we are not destroyed. His compassion never fails; they are new every morning. Lamentations 3:22-23
8. God knows everything about us yet still loves us! Everything you've read in #1-7 is true! In Romans 8:34-39, Paul writes that Christ Jesus died for us, was raised to life, and is sitting in the place of honor at God's right hand pleading for us. Can anything separate us from Christ's love? Does it mean that He no longer loves us if we have trouble, calamity, are persecuted, hungry, destitute, in danger, or even threatened? Despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. And I am convinced that nothing can separate us from God's love, neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor worries about tomorrow. Not even the powers of hell can separate us from God's love.
Nothing motivates our thoughts and actions more than identity. So let's begin to define ourselves as deeply loved by God. These are only a few of the many reasons why God loves you. Can you think of more examples in your life of proof of God's love for you?