Integrity- People of God

Love Comes To Redeem And To Save

Everything God does is motivated by Love, it is Who He is, Agape love. God’s love story continues even after the rebellion and fall of mankind. God continues to express unconditional love, good will and wellbeing for mankind. God shows His love, commitment and faithfulness as a choice of His Divine will to restore mankind to his created purpose. Agape love is not shallow feelings of romance, it gives of itself to help and advance another. This is the love God has shown when He sent His Son to redeem us from the path we had chosen. God never lost sight of who we were created to be. He paid a price we were unable to pay so we could return to our original image and value in Him.

Every good love story has one who loves and one who is the beloved. Every good love story follows the example Jesus Himself set for His beloved bride and the love God showed for the whole world. Though mankind had turned their backs on God and rebelled against Him, His love for mankind was not changed. Love always allows the beloved a choice to come and accept him or depart and reject. Even in this God provides a way to deliver and rescue His beloved, Jesus, who loved us more than His own life on earth.

Mankind was in bondage and a slave to sin with no power or ability to free themselves from the condemnation and sin they were in. God had given all dominion to mankind and man gave this dominion and authority to God’s enemy. God would not violate His own principles so it would take a man to restore all mankind and this world to its original state. Jesus being God, set aside His rights of Divinity to become a man so that He could restore the rights of mankind to their original value and purpose, which is to look like and act like, God their Father.

What a love story! A Man gives up all He possesses to obtain His bride. Though she has been unfaithful and defiled herself, His love for her is greater than the state she had fallen into. Jesus became poor that we may receive His riches, Jesus was beaten and wounded that we could be healed, and Jesus was raised from the dead that we may have life eternal. Jesus paid it all and He lived this life on earth as a person, just as we are with the power of the Holy Spirit. We too have access and authority to and through the Holy Spirit. A love so deep and strong that it looks past our faults and sees our needs and provides for every need even at the cost of one’s own life.

God is a just God and sin cannot go unpunished. God does not wink at sin and look the other way. Sin cannot stand in the presence of the Holiness of God. The wrath and justice of God will consume sinful man who would try to come into the presence of God. Mankind had a debt that was impossible for him to pay. God’s love, His Agape love, would not leave us in our depraved state. Only God could pay the debt and man had to be punished for the rebellion, disobedience and sin. Jesus did not come because we were no good sinners. He came to take the sin off of us so we could become who we were created to be, children of God reproducing His love in the world.

God’s love is so deep, so profound, so everlasting He chose to bring us back to Himself. Though we fell from being His highest creation, God restored us to an even greater glory, to be children of God. What manner of love is this that we should be called sons of God? The world may call us many derogatory names, because they cannot see who we are in His Spirit and because they do not know Him or His love.

I John 3:1 Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God! Therefore the world does not know us, because it did not know Him.

God’s love is Holy and just, He punishes sin and becomes the justifier as He pays the debt owed. God’s love is always looking for the good will and wellbeing of all mankind. God shows His love, commitment and faithfulness in the love of Jesus. Jesus loved His bride and gave Himself for her, to bring her back to Himself.

Reflect on the Love that came to redeem, deliver and restore His beloved. Love came to set us free from the power of sin and death. Love came to reestablish us into the family of God, to provide for us as part of His royal family and to protect us from evil. Again, God’s love is unconditional love; He loves us regardless of our choices.

What Is The Gospel? God’s Love Story!

The gospel is a love story about God’s love for mankind and all His creation. This story begins with the Eternal God Jehovah; the Almighty God Who is Love, Holy and Who never changes. The Eternal and Infinite God is personified in the three; God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. He is a triune God as we are triune beings, body, soul and spirit.

God’s love story begins with the Triune God’s love overflowing from Himself to Himself; God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, all in perfect union, perfect love and perfect harmony. God in perfect love flowing from His Character of love reproduced Himself in the creation of mankind as another avenue to express Who He is, love. God said let us make man in our image and likeness. God made mankind in perfect love, for the purpose of displaying God’s love in this created natural world and universe, as He is the perfect love in the spirit and heavenly realm. Love overflowed from God to His creation the godman on the earth.

God the eternal, self-sufficient, Self-sustaining God, Who needs nothing outside of Himself, did not create man because He needed someone to love or worship Him. God was not on some ego trip to make mankind to have someone rule and serve Him, because God is without lack. God in His perfect love that flowed from Himself spilled over into mankind who was created in His image, to look like Him, act like Him and love like Him in this natural world. God created a tangible finite place within the spiritual infinite and eternal world for mankind to live and have dominion.

God’s love for us was established before He laid the foundation of the world. Each and every one of us was in the heart and mind of God even before He started creating the world. True love provides for the people they love. God began creating a world with water, food, shelter and provided for every need of those He created.

God created mankind in His image. The Eternal Loving God created for mankind a perfect life and a perfect world to be the expression of His love on the earth. This is why all mankind has a deep sense of true value and importance because we were created majestic, regal and royal with an eternal and ultimate purpose to look like God and express the love of God, agape love, in this world.

Every human being has a deep sense of dignity, value and purpose. Even those who were never taught about God in the natural sense know in their spirit they were created for a greater purpose; to worship, love and serve their Creator and not to just exist. All of nature is dependent on mankind as the crowning glory of God’s creation. Reflecting His image has a special dependence on our Creator to know Him that we may know ourselves.

When God created this world and everything that was in it, it was created good. This world was in perfect unity with God, its creator and this creation existed in harmony, perfect peace and wholeness. This is the love that flows from God, perfect and in oneness with itself. God is love and He loves all He created but to mankind God gave the ability to be like God. God’s love gave mankind sovereignty over his own will and the ability to choose life or reject it. God does not demand our love or our loyalty. God’s love for us allows all mankind the ability to choose to love Him or reject Him. True love does not enslave, it allows freedom of choice and is always ready to help, provide and protect those that call on Him.

This perfect world and perfect creation went into rebellion against God‘s love and chose to live under the authority of God’s enemy. The highest of God’s creation, who He loves and created to look like Him, turned from God and defected to become like the enemy of God, Satan. This rebellion threw the whole world into a state of darkness, chaos, hatred and sin. Mankind no longer looked like or acted like their Creator but became slaves to sin and death.

In one rebellious act all mankind became sinners by choice and by their natural bloodline. Adam took on the nature and attributes of God’s enemy and all born of Adam have that same nature. Everyone born is born with a sin disposition, character, personality and outlook. It is an inherited nature of sin that is displayed in the pride, self-centeredness with independence or rebellion against God’s truth.

Always remember God is love and God’s love is agape love, which is the expression of unconditional good will and wellbeing of another. Agape love is a commitment of faithfulness which is an act of the will not of feelings or romance. Agape love gives of itself for the benefit and advancement of another and that is the kind of Love God loves us with. God so loved the world He gave His Only Begotten Son for the betterment and improvement of all mankind from his fallen state of sin.