unconditional love

I have loved you with an everlasting love.
~ Jeremiah 31:3b

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.
~ John 3:16

As a new Christian at age 19, I accepted with joy the unconditional love of God in Christ and was made a "new creature" in Him. I was overwhelmed with awe at how He could love me so much but could not even begin to fathom how or why He would. However, the birth of our first daughter gave both me and Tim a fragment of insight into God’s love.

The day we brought Trina home from the hospital, we sat and watched her sleeping peacefully in her cradle. We were struck with her delicate beauty and overwhelmed with a fierce, protective love for her, deeper than any love either of us had ever felt before.

I found myself thinking, "If anyone were to ever harm this precious child, I fear what I would do to that person!" Then it hit me: This is how God loves me!

As tears poured down my face, I turned to Tim and explained what I had been thinking. We both gave thanks to God for the gift of our new, precious child. And then we gave thanks to Him for His great, deep, unconditional love toward us, and for Christ’s incredible act of love and grace: willingly laying down His perfect life for us, dying on the cross, shedding the blood that would pay the price for the sins of all who would trust in Him.

“How deep the Father’s love for us,
How vast beyond all measure,
That He should give His only Son
To make a wretch His treasure.”
~ (Anonymous; mid-1800s)
~ Melody Plaxton