Now Available on Kindle Living The Life!: Daily Reflections

On The Upper Room Discourse Re-Release For Lent 2024

THIS I KNOW – GOD LOVES ME LIKE HE LOVES JESUS

Righteous Father, the world does not know you, but I know you; and these know that you have sent me. I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.
John 17:25-26

I smile remembering our ritual while tucking our boys into bed. “I love you boys more than the last number in the whole world.” To that, the little guys would feign protest: “But daddy, there is no last number in the whole world.” That was my cue: “I know there is no last number in the whole world, but that’s how much I love you!”

In today’s scripture, Jesus prays that we might know how much His Father loves us. On the night before Jesus gives His life for us, He prays that His Father’s name and love for us be known so that “the love with which you [God] have loved me [Jesus] may be in them [us].” I like the way the Amplified Bible translates this: “so that the love with which You have loved Me may be in them {overwhelming their heart}…”

Here are heights and depths of love too staggering to grasp or take in: that the Father loves us as He loves His beloved Son Jesus! We would think this sacrilegious to even think or say, except that it is our Lord Jesus praying it for us. John Calvin delights that 

“the love with which God loves is none other than that with which he loved his Son from the beginning…that we might be made partakers of the same love and might enjoy it forever.”

(John Calvin, Commentary on John’s Gospel)

This is more love than I can imagine. No wonder the apostle Paul prayed that believers might know a love beyond all knowing, a love “that surpasses knowledge” (Ephesians 3:19). But thankfully God sent His Holy Spirit into our hearts to help us live in God’s love and boldly pray “Abba! Father!” (Romans 8:15; Galatians 4:6). Here is something I know for sure: God loves me like He loves Jesus. God looks at me and says what He said of Jesus: “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased” (Mark 1:11).

PLANT A THOUGHT… Repeat, Tell, Write, Create

A Fellow Traveler,
Tim

recent posts

join our list

Sign up and receive our weekly devotionals, Selah podcast episodes, info on seasonal devotionals, and announcements.