Does God love me?

Every week, I encounter people who want to know if God loves them. Sometimes I wonder about that myself. Does God love me, really? The truth is that, yes, God loves you dearly. Your life is important. God has plans for you. God can bless the world through you. Here’s proof…

One of the greatest evidences of God’s great love for us is the fact that He welcomes us to know Him. When, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth and all that is in them, He pronounced that everything was very good. God created us in His image and in His likeness, and He created us to be in relationship with Him. But we sinned, and we thereby severed our relationship with God and separated ourselves from Him. He did not turn away from us; we turned away from Him.

But God moved first to initiate reconciliation with us. He wants us to know Him. What a gift! Through the prophet Jeremiah, God said, “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the Lord” (Jeremiah 9:23-24).

God has revealed Himself in three primary ways. First, He has revealed Himself to us through nature. The Apostle Paul writes to the church at Rome that people are without excuse when failing to honor God as God, “for what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For His invisible attributes, namely, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made” (Romans 1:19-20). That’s why we marvel when we look upon natural wonders, for truly “the heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims His handiwork” (Psalm 19:1).

God didn’t stop with nature, though. God has been gracious enough to reveal Himself to us through His Word – the Bible – whereby He clarifies to us things about Himself that nature cannot reveal or that we, in our sinfulness, willfully or carelessly misinterpret about nature’s revelation of God. Only by way of God’s Word can we rightly understand nature’s testimony about God. God has been very clear about Himself through His Word.

Most astonishingly, God didn’t conclude His self-revelation simply after He revealed truths about Himself. He doesn’t just want us to know about Him; He wants us to know Him. Therefore, God revealed Himself in the most precious way of all – through the Word made flesh, His perfect, only-begotten Son. Through the Son, God the Father invites us to intimate relationship with Himself. In Jesus’ prayer just before leaving the Upper Room the night He was betrayed, He prayed to the Father, “…this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent” (John 17:3). Jesus elsewhere said, “…no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him” (Matthew 11:27).

God has chosen to reveal Himself to you, and He desires to be in everlasting relationship with you. Why? Because He loves you!

You are loved. Your life is important. God has plans for you. God can bless the world through you. But to embrace God’s love, you must embrace the fullest expression of His love by receiving Jesus Christ as your Lord. Jesus said, “…this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent” (John 17:3). Have you received God’s gift of eternal life by coming to know Him through Jesus Christ? If you’d like to know more, e-mail us at connect@firstbaptistbg.org. We’ll be glad to help!

-by Dr. Jeff Reynolds

First Baptist Church