One Bright Corner: First Love

6.12.2012

First Love

My love for God is selfish, shallow, and without merit.

I continually find myself before the Lord, throwing myself upon His mercy and forgiveness once again. Sins that have come between Him and me—idolatrous choices that take advantage of His grace—these things seem never to end, and the command to be perfect like my Heavenly Father seems impossible.

And when I do love Him, it is with a love that has been tainted by the love of other things.

When I am my most dedicated to God, it is only because I remembered with a start the sacrifice He has made for me.

I am selfish, idolatrous, shallow, fickle, and dishonorable, and out of that soul comes that love—attempting to wrap around an Omnipotent, Perfect, Sovereign God like a centipede spanning a giant California redwood tree. I love God, not because my soul is beautiful and strong and spiritual, but because it isn’t. I love Him for one reason: because He loved me first.

“In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son [to be] the propitiation for our sins.” ~ I John 4:10

G.K. Chesterton once said, “love means to love that which is unlovable; or it is no virtue at all.” How embarrassing is it that my love ebbs and flows when it is for the God of Love and Virtue Himself?

“In respect of agapao as used of God, it expresses the deep and constant ‘love’ and interest of a perfect Being towards entirely unworthy objects, producing and fostering a reverential ‘love’ in them towards the Giver, and a practical ‘love’ towards those who are partakers of the same, and a desire to help others to seek the Giver[i].”

That agape love with which God loves me so completely—that is how He commands me to love Him. How could He use the same precious word for His love to describe my love? How could His gift and my shrapnel ever be found side by side in a thesaurus, let alone a dictionary? Me, love God the way He loves me?

The answer is in Luke 7:47. "Therefore I say to you, her sins, which [are] many, are forgiven, for she loved much. But to whom little is forgiven, [the same] loves little." I have many sins, but I go to God for forgiveness and love. I am forgiven and loved, and because of that, I love much.