Jesus Loves You

One of our simplest messages is that Jesus loves you. It's so simple we teach it to our kids. "Jesus loves you; this I know, for the Bible tells me so." It's true. And it's important. And since it's important, I think we ought to get it right.

"Get it right?" I can hear already. Yes, and you know what I'm talking about if you've read this blog much. Here's how it works. We have a concept, an idea, a principle, and then we turn it into words to communicate it. Those words become the concept. And then someone takes that word and nudges it. Maybe even shoves it. And now we're using a word that means "the concept" to us and something else to everyone else. You know, like "love." In principle it meant a devotion to the best interest of the loved one, but we've shifted now to "warm affection" and, quite often, "sex." Now, take that shifted term, "love," and feed that back into "Jesus loves you" and you can see that it is not the same concept. For instance, we know today that "love" does not include causing pain but Scripture says, "The Lord disciplines the one He loves, and chastises every son whom He receives" (Heb 12:6), which doesn't fit at all with our current culture's version of "love."

So, what if we feed the previous version of "love" back into "Jesus loves you"? What if the version we intend is "the kind of love that seeks your best even if it causes you pain"? How does that change the idea of "Jesus loves you"? Because I hear a lot of people who say, "God loves you just the way you are" and I think, "Is that true?" It is true if we're saying that God does not predicate His love for us on our correctness, our righteousness, our perfection. Good thing, because we have none of that. But the "warm affection" version would require that "God loves you just the way you are" means "Don't ever change; He doesn't want you to change at all." That is, if by "He loves you just as you are" we intend to express "There is no need to change," that simply flies in the face of Scripture.

Christianity is definitely about God loving us. Christianity is absolutely about God's love not being conditioned on us. (We refer to it as unconditional love for a reason.) Christianity is all about the amazing concept that the Creator of the Universe, the Sovereign of All, would care about a creation of His. Like David, we ask, "When I look at Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have set in place, what is man that You are mindful of him, and the son of man that You care for him?" (Psa 8:3-4). And He does. But that must not be construed to suggest "Whatever you are is good." That must not be taken to mean "Don't ever change." Because Christianity is all about justification and sanctification. The first is the process by which we are declared right before God and the second is the process by which we are formed into what we have been declared to be. The call is for perfection (Matt 5:48). The ultimate end will be perfection. But even today we are born again to new life, "created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them" (Eph 2:10). And God's constant work on the believer is "to be conformed to the image of His Son" (Rom 8:29). Does He love you as you are? He does, but He loves you enough to not leave you as you are. That's real love.