The Love of God (Part 1) The Introduction

The Love of God (PART 1) The Introduction

The Love of God was not particularly something I was planning or even thinking about writing about. I wanted a good jumping off point to start my series of blogs on this journey about reformed theology and its implications on daily and of course eternal life. They are written as if it was a sermon being preached, (maybe with a few pictures and maybe even a video to accompany it. But hey, it's a different world now and not your typical ministry in a church and good little church goers sitting in the pews. I carefully considered several different starting points, some of them being; the Doctrine of Election (are some chosen and other not chosen?), Predestination (along a similar line of thinking) the Sovereignty of God, or maybe the Doctrine of Regeneration (being Born Again) and of course, also the Love of God. 

At some point we will go over each of these, as well as begin going verse by verse through entire books. But as you can tell, ultimately, for this blog post "The Love of God won out.  It's a serious doctrine and a serious topic that really touches on so many aspects of our lives. It really is a deep topic that ranges from thinking about Jesus with simple warm and fuzzy feelings, all the way to severe, gut wrenching pain; the kind of pain we experience from deep hurt and tragic loss. Honestly, the more I approached it, the more nervous I became, fearing I wouldn't do it justice, afraid I would fall short of the mark. There's a lot to fear here. 

First we have God's word that tells us that those that preach or teach will be held to a high standard of accountability: "Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness." (James 3:1, ESV)

So there's that. Quite honestly is a fearful thing, and scares the snot out of me, and rightfully so. Sorry for that little word picture just there, but that’s what you get with me.

It was not more than a week ago now, when I was reminded of my passion for the hurting. My passion for people who, like I once was, was lost and didn’t even know that I needed the Love of God. So it was no surprise that I settled on it. The reminder came to me in the form of an old man. He’s in his upper 80’s and a really sweet old man. I have the opportunity to see him fairly frequently. He has told me on more than one occasion that he feels alone. That he is waiting to die. He has mentioned that his children do not contact him or if they do it’s not something pleasant for him. In the course of our conversation, he mentioned he felt they were ready for him to die, and that I alone was the only person who talks to him, it broke my heart for him. He told me only his seven parakeets keep him company at home.

He’s talks about the Gastopo quite a bit. He survived a concentration camp in Poland when he was a little boy. He has witnessed several, probably dozens or hundreds of deaths, in these camps, but here he is. I immediately thought maybe he still has family there, so I asked him. “Do you have any family in Poland? Maybe you could see them or talk to someone back home.” “No,” he shook his head, “No one. Not even back in Chicago. That’s where my children live.” He added.

My mind thought to other options, maybe he was religious and Israel might be a place he could go to find people of his heritage. I thought of other Jews in history who found a home in Jesus, like the Apostle John, he used to write, “the disciple whom Jesus loved.” So, I said as much, and asked him about going to Israel and he seemed to not hear it, but instead offered a question, “Sometimes I see all the world, how it is going and think, Why is God let this happen?”, he said in his broken English. As I walked with him on his way out, we made small talk and he poured a little more praise on me and thanked me for being kind to him.

As I turned after watching him leave, it occurred to me what he needed, he needed this topic. He needed to know about Jesus. That he is the reason why I need to set my personal fears aside, and do my diligent research, and preach the word that God calls me to preach; the word He calls all of us as believers to preach, to teach each other, to grow each other spiritually. Maybe I’ll present it to him as a gift, and lucky you, you get to read it too. You’re welcome.