The first thing we’ll look at is His
love. His love is that attribute that adorns all the others – that
makes them all beautiful. One thing you need to understand about God
is that His attributes aren’t parts of Him – each of them
describes His whole being: John doesn’t say that God loves, but God
is love. The thing that’s unique about this attribute is that all
of His other moral excellencies flow from this one: His
righteousness, or love for what is right, His justice, or love for
what is just, His faithfulness, or His love in following through on
His commitments. And all the rest. His love also adorns all His
natural attributes. His limitless strength, His all comprehensive
knowledge, The fact that He always has been and always will be, That
He doesn’t depend on anyone or anything for anything, That He is
everywhere at once. The fact that His whole Being is saturated with
love makes Him infinitely lovely. And so what is this love? It really
boils down to holiness. If He didn’t have this, all of His power
and knowledge would make Him infinitely dangerous, but not lovely.
Edwards writes, “Strength and knowledge don’t render any being
lovely, without holiness; but more hateful: though they render them
more lovely, when joined with holiness.” Lions and gorillas are
very powerful creatures. So are the devil and his angels. But why
wouldn’t you want to be in the same room with them? Because of
their natures – they aren’t holy, they aren’t loving. If God
wasn’t holy, you certainly wouldn’t want to be in the same room
with Him. What is holiness? Again, Edwards writes that it is the
“excellency and beauty of God’s nature whereby his heart is
disposed and delights in everything that is morally good and
excellent.” It’s also His infinite hatred of sin because that is
the opposite of what He loves. His holiness is His love and the
reason why you can love Him. The last thing you could love is a god
that delighted in evil. You would never be able to trust what He
said. You would never know if He was waiting to stab you in the back.
An evil god might bring you to heaven, but then cast you into hell
for no other reason than He wanted to. You could only love a good
God, a loving God, a holy God. One who will be faithful to do the
right thing forever without changing. One who would do what is best
for you at all times. One who would never go back on His Word. One
who could never do anything wrong. This doesn’t exhaust
what it means that God is love, but it
is a beginning. We’ll start here and begin to work our way through
all the expressions of His love, to see just how lovely He is. But
begin thinking about what you’ve seen – would you change this
attribute of God? Would you have Him to be something else? Can you
love this God? Do you love Him? If so, you have His grace in your
hearts.
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