Obviously, when one hopes for something, there has to be effort on the part of the giver to extend that hope to the one who receives it. This is no less true in the hope that God has extended toward mankind. God made (and continues to make) an effort to extend that hope to a lost and dying world. The next few posts will examine how God extends hope. We will follow that up with an examination of man’s part in laying hold of that hope.
Love:
This is the motivation for God extending the hope of salvation to mankind. The beauty and humbling factor in God’s love is that it was not expressed as a result of man first showing his love to God. In fact, God extended His love toward man even though man had made himself the enemy of God: “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). John tells us much the same thing in 1 John 4:10: “In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”
How is true love manifested? It is not manifested through words alone. Consider what James said in regard to faith: “If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead” (James 2:15-17). He tells us that true faith can only be manifested in action. The same can be said of true love . . . it, too, can only be manifested in action. It was through the actions of God that His love was manifested to mankind.
What action did God take to manifest His love to mankind?
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