It’s hard to explain to someone that has believed the lie that their sins are too great, or the person who has consistently fallen in and out of natural love, that there is a love FOR THEM that goes beyond anything they’ve ever known.
I was the first person. I came from a home where love abounded toward me at every turn, yet my lack of judgment, which led to regrettable sins, bought me a one-way ticket to self-hate. I was so embarrassed of the girl in my mirror. Maybe partly because she was so loved by her family. I subconsciously thought, “If they only knew… would they still love me?”
So when I discovered forgiveness through salvation, it was bittersweet. I desperately wanted the forgiveness part of what Jesus was offering me if I would make Him my Savior. But the love? I heard ministers talk about it but I believed it was too late for me –just give me a back row seat in Heaven and I’ll be forever thankful.
But the Bible has a whole different perspective on salvation than I had in my former years. “Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you” (Jeremiah 31:3). In other words, it was because I was a fallen creature that God loved me to begin with. This was so backwards to me (and what the world portrayed).
Reason #2 (why we should help others): You Are Very Loved
But backwards or not, once I accepted this outstanding, immeasurable love of God for myself, it became another reason why I wanted others to know who they are in Christ.
I am literally drawn to hug someone that I sense doesn’t understand the depth of God’s love for them. There have been countless times in a prayer line that I felt compelled to simply hold someone as I prayed for them. When the world, their own thoughts, or their own mirror, has repeatedly beaten them down, sometimes a tangible expression of God’s arms around them breaks every barrier.
“But God shows and clearly proves His [own] love for us by the fact that while we were still sinners, Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One) died for us” (Romans 5:8). No matter how many times you hear this, when your focus is on the “sinner” part, you miss the amazing love part. This is why a hug, a prayer, a sincere look in someone’s eyes, is often the very ammunition God uses to crush the wall of lies the enemy has held over them.
And then as the Holy Spirit does His work in their heart (as He did mine), revelation of God’s love becomes greater. In other words, the LOVE of God that came to make our heart His home begins to fill that same heart with a deep knowing that no matter what they’ve done (past, present, or future), God’s love is still greater. And the result is a heart that says: “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me” (Galatians 2:20).
It took awhile for me to accept this truth, but love really does cover a multitude of sins (1 Peter 4:8). And this my friend, is a perfect reason why we should keep telling others how greatly loved they really are.
