Knowing the love of the Father

"I have made known to them thy name, and I will make known unto them, that the love with which thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them." John 17:26

For his people in the past, God was known as a great, mighty God, who took care of his own with grace and patience, but also as a righteous judge, not "holding the guilty as innocent" (Exodus 34: 7). Often the people regarded him as a terrifying God ! But through His Son, God made Himself known especially under another character: a good God, full of love, who brings forgiveness, grace, salvation, a God whom the believer may call the Father. The prophet had already proclaimed it : "You will call to me : My Father" (Jer 3: 19).

Throughout his earthly life, Jesus has made himself known to his Father in this character of the God of love. He came to satisfy the righteousness of God, to wrest men from the grasp of Satan by dying for them, but also to manifest and make known the Father. We can therefore understand his sadness when Philip asks him to show him the Father ; He replied : "I have been with you for so long, and you have not known me, Philippe ? He who has seen me, has seen the Father" (John 14: 9).

The believer no longer has to feel fear before a great, powerful and terrifying God since God sees every believer through the sacrifice of his Son, made holy and righteous, adopted as a son or daughter. Everyone can therefore approach him as freely as his father and feel the love of God towards him. In his prayer before going to Gethsemane, Jesus said to his Father : "Thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me" (John 17:23). We can not understand that God loved us as intensely as his own Son ; This inability to understand is normal: we are finite beings and we are at the gates of the infinite ... God does not ask us to understand it, but simply to believe it! This is also faith.

God desires that the love with which he has loved his own Son be in us ... What love should we then manifest! First of all for the Father, for the Son, of course, but also around us. We can never, however, manifest a love like that of Father, but ask him to fill us with his love and shine around us.

Source (To pleasing the Lord)