GOD Is Love . . . And Making All Things New In Me.

I see a Cross on the Hill of Reproach!

(Alexander Smellie, "The Hour of Silence" 1899)

"GOD is Love!" 
1 John 4:8

It is a little flower which I pluck

from the garden of John's letter--

this fragrant definition of GOD. Yet

it suggests mysteries and miracles 

for which my intellect has no solution.

For it carries me away into the dateless

years of eternity. Always Love has

been GOD'S name; always Love has

summarized and crowned GOD'S nature.

Deep in HIS heart it lay through

these far-off years. But, even then,

it cared for me, and foresaw my

sin and bitterness and and death

and damnation. Long before my

world was made, GOD, who is Love,

was busy devising my salvation!

I look again at John's rose-blossom, 

and I see a Cross on the Hill of 

Reproach. Love could not remain 

pent up in the bosom of GOD. 

It broke the confining barriers. 

"The GOD of love," Plato said with 

unconscious prophecy, "would be 

found one day lying on the city streets, 

shoeless, penniless, homeless." 

It is true of my GOD. 

HE gave HIMSELF for me! 

HE became, in this apostle's 

phrase, the atoning sacrifice 

for my sins!

Again I lift John's flower, and 

it awakens in me a glowing 

hope for myself. There is none 

so wondrous and powerful as this 

GOD of love. I welcome HIM and . . .

  my heart is transfigured,

  my life is sublimed,

  I am changed into HIS image,

  I dwell myself in love,

  love becomes my atmosphere 

and my universe.

GOD is Love . . .

  Love indwelling me,

  Love sacrificing and suffering for me,

  Love melting and conquering me, 

and making all things new.

    ~  ~  ~  ~  ~

GraceGems has published another powerful article by Jonathan Edwards',
"Wrath Upon the Wicked to the Uttermost!"