The preachers quoted here describe God's love as unsought and undeserved, as unchanging as his own nature, and as a love that does not let go when a person fails. They call it a refuge, and say it is poured into the heart by the Holy Spirit.
John makes the largest statement in two words: "God is love" (1 John 4:8). The New Testament word is agape.1 Love is not only something God does but what he is, and it existed in God before there was a world to love: the Father loved the Son "before the foundation of the world" (John 17:24).
Scripture points to one event as its measure. "God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son" (John 3:16). "God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8). "Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins" (1 John 4:10).
It is not drawn out by anything in its objects. Moses told Israel that the LORD did not set his love on them because they were more in number than other peoples, but because he loved them (Deuteronomy 7:7-8). It is lasting: "I have loved thee with an everlasting love" (Jeremiah 31:3). And nothing in creation "shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:39).
God's love is holy, and Scripture does not set it against his judgment. "Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth" (Hebrews 12:6). The Bible speaks of God's love in several distinct ways, including his love within the Trinity, his care for all he has made, his saving stance toward a fallen world, and his particular love for his own, and confusion follows when one is taken for the whole.
This love is known by experience as well as by statement. "The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us" (Romans 5:5). It produces love in return: "We love him, because he first loved us" (1 John 4:19), and "if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another" (4:11). Bernard of Clairvaux wrote, "the reason for loving God is God Himself; and the measure of love due to Him is immeasurable love."2
Paul prays that believers may know "the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge" (Ephesians 3:19). The love of God is his free, unchanging, holy goodwill toward the undeserving, proved at the cross and given to be known.
- Strong's Greek 26, agápē: "love, i.e. affection or benevolence; specially (plural) a love-feast".
- Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, On Loving God, "Chapter I: Why we should love God and the measure of that love".
In their own words
Each line below is quoted exactly from a sermon on this site. Follow the link to hear or read it where it was said.
God's love is unsought, undeserved, and unconditional.
Chuck Smith
in Keep Yourself in the Love of God
Read in context
God's love is invariably the same, as his nature and essence are.
John Gill
in The Love of God, Considered.
Read in context
The love of God is not changed when I make mistakes; the love of God does not let me go when I make mistakes.
T. Austin-Sparks
in Our Anchorage - the Love of God in Christ Jesus
Read in context
The love of God is a wonderful refuge to those who hide away in it.
J.R. Miller
in Finding the Way - Part 2
Read in context
The love of God is shed abroad by the Holy Spirit.
Peter Brandon
in The Perfect Love of God
Listen to the sermon
Where they differ
Preachers describe the same love from different sides. Alongside those who stress that it is unconditional, Finney insisted that it is a holy love that cannot be indifferent to wickedness.
The love of God is of such a kind as to demand that he should abhor the wickedness of man and man on account of it.
Charles Finney
in Faith in Its Relations to the Love of God
Read in context
What Scripture says
- 1 John 4:8-10 God is love, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins
- John 3:16 God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son
- Romans 5:8 while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us
- Romans 8:38-39 nothing shall separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus
- Jeremiah 31:3 I have loved thee with an everlasting love
How this page is made: the quotes are taken word for word from sermons on SermonIndex and checked against them by program before the page is published. The transcripts of audio and video sermons are machine-made, so follow the link to hear the words as they were spoken. The answer above the quotes is an overview with its sources listed; it is not a statement of doctrine by SermonIndex.