WE LOVE YOU
“He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.”
Isaiah 53: 3 - 5
King James Version
Jesus, the Saviour of the world, had never sinned and He did not deserve to die such a horrifying and cruel death when He was crucified on the cross of Calvary for us. Yet out of His heart of mercy, unconditional love and compassion for us, He allowed them to beat Him beyond recognition. He paid an agonizing price for our salvation. It is only because of His unconditional love for us that we have the privilege of being saved through His precious atoning blood.
There is no greater love than the love of our Heavenly Father and the love of our precious Saviour. Our families and our friends love us, however no one loves us like our Heavenly Father and Jesus loves us. We only have just a fingernail’s grasp of how much they love us. Just think, Jesus willingly left Heaven to come to earth as a missionary to die for us.
What love and what compassion our precious Saviour and our loving Heavenly Father have for us! One day, our Heavenly Father looked down on us and saw that we desperately needed a Saviour. His heart was moved with compassion for us. Out of His tender heart of mercy, grace and unconditional love for us, He sent His own beloved Son into the world so that we may be saved.
He knew that His Son was going to be crucified on a cross of horror and suffer excruciating pain and it was breaking His heart. However, He loves us so much that He wants us to spend eternity with Him and He wants us to be happy and live a victorious life. He knew that it was impossible for us to pay the debt that we owed Him so He sent Jesus to pay the debt for us.
Our dear wonderful Heavenly Father opened His heart of unconditional love and gave us all that He could give us, His own beloved Son. Jesus gave us all that He could give us, His life and His blood that He shed for us on the cross for the forgiveness of our sins. They have proven to us without a shadow of a doubt that they love us and that they will always love us.
I think the question we need to ask ourselves is “Do we love them and if so, what are we doing to prove to them that we love them?” We sing a song “O how I love Jesus” but do we really love Him? Are we giving Him all of our time, all of our talents and everything that we have? Do we love Him enough to get out of our comfort zones and keep serving Him even when our families and friends say harsh criticizing words to us and ridicule us and reject us because we are serving Him?
Jesus endured more ridicule, more scorn and more rejection day after day for us that you and I will never experience. Again, we say that we love Him but do we really love Him? Examine your heart and see if you have given all of your life and heart to Him. He paid an agonizing price for the right to our lives and to our hearts. Jesus, please help us to love You in our actions as well as in our words.
Joanne Lowe
September 14, 2008
