FINDING TRUE LOVE
It may sometimes seem impossible, but we can find true love, real love. The problem is we are looking for love in all the wrong places. God loves us so much that even in our rejection of him, He is in constant pursuit of us. How can we experience that kind of love?
Although a huge gap was created to cause a separation between us and God, God, in his great love and mercy, did not give up on us. He refused to be separated from us. Therefore, he devised a plan to reunite us with him. In this series of lessons, we will look at the love of God and his plan (his mission) to bridge the gap between us and him and bring us back into a relationship with him.
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Let Us Inviting God’s Presence:
God Almighty, thank you for loving us. Help us accept your love and love you back. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Before creating this world, God is so loving that He devised a plan to bring us back into a relationship with him. In His love and mercy, He gave us the option to accept or reject his love.
The Old Testament lays out before us how our Creator implemented his plan after our fore-parent Adam and Eve rejected his love. He chose the Israelites, the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to represent his love and purpose to the world. It was his desire that the Israelites teach everyone about God’s love and His mission. So, everything God did for and through the Israelites was part of His mission for us sinners to bring us back into a loving relationship with Him.
For instance, God, through Isaiah, the prophet, a special messenger sent by God, told his people, the Israelites, “ ‘I am God, and there is no one like Me, declaring the end from the beginning, . . He told them, “My purpose will be established, and I will accomplish all My good pleasure”’ ” (Isaiah 46:9, 10).
Furthermore, at the very entrance of sin into our world in Genesis 3:15, God immediately shared His plan with Adam and Eve.
15 And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, And you shall bruise His heel.” (Genesis 3:15)
At that time, in the Garden of Eden, God’s plan was only a promise. In the New Testament, God’s desire to be with humanity takes on a new dimension.
Revealing his love for humanity and desiring to be with us, in Jesus, God becomes human:
Read Matthew 1:18–23 about the announcement of the birth of Jesus to Joseph in a dream.
Matthew 1:18-23
18 Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows: After His mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Spirit.
19 Then Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not wanting to make her a public example, was minded to put her away secretly.
20 But while he thought about these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take to you Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit.
21 And she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.”
22 So all this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying:
23 “Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and bear a Son, and they shall call His name Immanuel,” which is translated, “God with us.” (Matthew 1:18-23)
Immanuel means “God with us.” But, in the Old Testament, the people of God, after being freed from Egyptian Slavery, lived in the desert for a time before reaching the land God had promised them. While in this wilderness, God dwelled among His people in a Tent called the Tabernacle or Sanctuary. Now, in the New Testament, God came to live with humanity in the Person of Jesus of Nazareth.
Jesus’ coming to earth lets us know that God still loves us and desires to be with us. Thus, He has made it His mission to seek us and have a loving relationship with us.
You need to know that Jesus, God’s Son, was fully human and fully God. He acknowledges this when He says in John 14:6, “ ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me’ ” (John 14:6, NKJV).
In other words, Jesus was God in human flesh. God became a man and lived among us.
This says a lot about how much God loves us and desires to be with us. He loves us so much that he became human flesh.
Now, who else would do that for you? Could you be looking for love in the wrong place?
Notice what John 1:14–18 says about God and His endless love and pursuit of us.
14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
15 John bore witness of Him and cried out, saying, “This was He of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me is preferred before me, for He was before me.’ ”
16 And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace.
17 For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
18 No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him. (John 1:14-18)
Never a one loved like this man! God, in fulfilling his mission through Jesus, presented Himself to humanity. In Jesus, God lived as a human among His people.
God keeps his promises. He never breaks a promise. Through Jesus, He kept all the promises He made in the Old Testament. God promised that Jesus would become one with us. So, that’s what Jesus did.
In accordance with his divine plan for us humans, Jesus became one with us. Jesus was God in human flesh. God in Jesus and, by the power of the Holy Spirit, continues to show his love and fulfill his mission to save us so that we can be with him eternally.
Think about God’s love for you. God loves us so much that He sent his only son to this world to represent Him. He was born as a Human Baby. He came as one of us to live with us.
How does this love make you feel? How does this love help you see that real love, true love, comes only from God?
But the demonstration of God’s love does not end at Jesus’ birth. There is more. Continue to the next segment of this video: Segment 5: The God Who Continues to Be With Us
God’s Mission, My Mission (Lesson 1)
‘God’s Mission to Us: Part 1
Segment 5: The God Who Continues to Be With Us
Jesus’ life and work were the best and ultimate revelation of God’s plan to redeem humanity and bring us back into a loving relationship with Him.
Jesus’ mission, His work on earth, lasted for three and a half years.
During this short time, God showed us more about who He is and His saving plan than He had shown us at any other time in human history.
Colossians 1:15 tells us that Christ was the perfect “image of the invisible God,” And in Colossians 1: 19, 20 we find that Jesus is the One in whom “all the fullness should dwell, . . . having made peace through the blood of His cross.”
In other words, Jesus made peace for us with God when He died for us on the cross.
Colossians 1:15 says:
15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. (Colossians 1:15)
Colossians 1:19-20 says.
19 For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell,
20 and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross. (Colossians 1:19-20)
In Jesus, God showed us humans how much He loves us and wants to save us. Jesus Himself revealed His mission to us, saying in Luke 19:10
10 for the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.” (Luke 19:10).
Carefully read John 3:16 and think about what Jesus says:
16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. (John 3:16)
Later in His ministry, as Jesus approached His last week of life, things became crucial. Did God really love us enough to give His only son? Our final destiny was at stake the last week before Jesus’ death.
Things happened during that final week of Jesus’ life that connected God’s promises from eternity past with our hope for eternity future. In that final week, Jesus celebrated the Passover. This celebration was a reminder to the Jews of the time when God delivered His people out of Egyptian slavery. During this Passover, Jesus gave up His life to set us free from the bondage of sin. Paul wrote, in 2 Corinthians 5:21
“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21, NIV)
After Jesus rose from the dead, as he was preparing to ascend to heaven, he gave his followers a commission. It is found in Matthew 28:18–20.
18 And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.
19 Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
20 teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen. (Matthew 28:18-20)
Now, Jesus’ death on the cross was only part of His plan, his mission, to reunite us back to God. In His resurrection from the dead, Jesus won the war over sin and death, and then God gave Jesus
“all authority . . . in heaven and on earth” (Matthew 28:18).
Because Jesus has all authority over everything, He commissioned His followers, his disciples, to make new followers, new disciples around the entire world.
Then Jesus added this powerful promise in Matthew 28:20: “ ‘I am with you always, even to the end of the age’ ” (Matthew 28:20). He promised to be “with you always.”
In this commission, Jesus gives us hope. He promises us that He will be with us always, even until the end of the world. This is a promise we can be sure of because Jesus loves us. He gave his life to save us.
And down through the ages, God has always kept his promises. Jesus’ commission and promise left us with a work to do to show Him how much we love him.
What does God expect us to do? Read John 14:1-3 and proceed to the final segment of this video. Segment 6 The God Who Will Come Back to Us
God’s Mission, My Mission (Lesson 1)
‘God’s Mission to Us: Part 1
Segment 6: The God Who Will Come Back for Us
Jesus’ followers, His disciples, those who had been with him and had grown to know and accept His love, desired to be with Him. Yet he was going away. Therefore, in John 14:1–3, Jesus tells them these kind and loving words in a promise:
1 “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me.
2 In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.
3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. (John 14:1-3)
So, during Jesus’ work on earth, He made us a very precious promise. He promised to be with us forever. This promise is called the Blessed Hope. The Blessed Hope shows us just how much God loves us and wants to be with Him.
The promise Jesus made is not limited to the disciples during His days upon the earth; His promise is extended to all those who have and will accept his love from the beginning of earth’s history up to our day and even into the future.
He promises, “ ‘I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am’ ” (John 14:3). (Split)
In Revelation, John, seeing down to the end of the age, tells us that Jesus’ promise becomes a reality. He says in Revelation 21:3
And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God. (Revelation 21:3).
A quote from the Book Desire of Ages paints a beautiful picture of the future of this reality for those who accept Jesus’ love. It says:
“The work of redemption will be complete. In the place where sin abounded, God’s grace much more abounds. The earth itself, the very field that Satan claims as his, is to be not only ransomed but exalted. . . . Here, where the Son of God tabernacled in humanity; where the King of glory lived and suffered and died,—here, when He shall make all things new, the tabernacle of God shall be with men. . . . And through endless ages as the redeemed walk in the light of the Lord, they will praise Him for His unspeakable Gift,—Immanuel, ‘God with us.’ ”—Ellen G. White, The Desire of Ages, p. 26.
God’s mission, His plan to reunite with humanity, is finally accomplished. He gets what he has longed for: His desire to be with His children forever. You can be a part of this exciting experience by accepting His love.
Now, here is an assignment for you this week. Pray every day of the coming week for God to open your heart to accept his love and be a part of His mission and His purpose for you. Assignment #2: Is there someone who annoys you? Is there someone that does things that you just do not like? Is there someone that you have stopped speaking to, or is there someone you do not care for? Pray for this person every day. Then, see what God has in store for you.
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