How is Your Love for God?
Love to God must be pure and genuine. He must be loved chiefly for Himself. We must love God, not only for His benefits, but for those intrinsic excellencies with which He is crowned. We must love God not only for the good which flows from Him, but for the good which is in Him. If we love God for His benefits only, for then it is not love of God, but self-love.
Love to God must be with all the heart. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart.” Mark 12:30. We must not love God a little, give Him a drop or two of our love; but the main stream must flow to Him. The mind must think of God, the will choose Him, and the affections pant after Him. To love coldly is the same as not to love.
He who loves God desires His presence. A soul deeply in love with God desires the enjoyment of Him in His ordinances, in word, and in prayer. He who loves God, does not love sin. Every sin loved, strikes at the being of God; but he who loves God, has an antipathy against sin.
He who loves God is not much in love with anything else. His love is very cool to worldly things. His love for God moves very swiftly; to the world it moves slowly. The love of the world eats out the heart of true fellowship with Christ. The world may engage the Christian, but Jesus delights and satisfies him.
So, he who loves God cannot live without Him. He who loves Jesus will be at any pains to get Him. The one who loves Christ, prefers Him before estate, livelihood and life. When we love God we love His favorites; be it other Christians, the Lord’s Day, or His Word.
To sum it up, if we love Jesus Christ, we cannot but be fearful of dishonoring Him, as the more a child loves his father the more he is afraid to displease him, and we weep and mourn when we have offended Him.
Let us be lovers of God. All the joy we hope for in heaven is in God; and shall not He who will be our joy then, be our love now?
Current Conditions:
