The reason the Father gave his Son is so that we might not perish but have everlasting life. Or as 1 John 4:9 says, “God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him.” Paul says in Galatians that if the law could have given life, then Christ died in vain. To die in vain is to die for nothing. It would be like jumping into the lake and dying for your little brother when he isn’t drowning. You may have the best intentions in jumping to your death and you may be eager to demonstrate your love by dying, but if what you do doesn’t benefit your brother, then it isn’t good or even loving. 

Stuart Townend’s hymn, “How deep the Father’s Love for Us,” says that the Father’s love is beyond all measure. Nevertheless, if we were to attempt to measure it, how would we go about doing that? We use a thermometer to gauge the temperature and a ruler to measure the height and width of an object. But how do we determine, to borrow Paul’s words in Ephesians 3:18, what is the breadth and length and height and depth of the Father’s love?

One instrument that we can use is the object of our love. Love for those who are good or who are like us is commendable, but it isn’t extraordinary. So too is love for those who love us. Frankly, that is easy to do. As Jesus said, “For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same (Matt. 5:46-47)?”

Love shows its depth, not in loving those who deserve our love or in loving those who are easy to love, but in loving the unlovable, which is exactly who God loves. He loves the weak, the ungodly, sinners, and even his enemies (Rom. 5:6, 8, 10). 

Another instrument that we can use to plummet the depths of love is timing. Paul says in Romans 5, that God demonstrated or showed his love for us “while we were still sinners (vs. 8),” and “while we were enemies (vs. 10).” 

Dylann Roof is a mass murderer, who had gone to a Bible study at Emmanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in South Carolina where he shot and killed nine people in the hopes of igniting a race war. He is evil and has done unspeakable evil. For the sake of illustration, consider him as an unrepentant and unreformed criminal. He doesn’t regret what he did. In fact, he would do it again if he could. He remains every bit the monster he was when he entered that church and killed nine people. By contrast, consider him as if he was someone who had been reformed and transformed. He is utterly broken over what he has done. He has apologized to the victims’ families, even though he believes that he doesn’t deserve to be forgiven. He is not the same person he was before. He is kind, considerate, helpful, and loving. Which person would be easier to love? Obviously, the one who had changed.

God loved us while we were still sinners and his enemies, and not after we had waved the white flag or after we had reformed ourselves. He loved us while we hated him, while we were evil and doing evil, while we were shaking our fists at him. Moreover, God didn’t love us because he could see down the corridor of time that we would change and stop hating him. He loved us while were still sinners and it is because he loved us that we have changed and have stopped hating him. “In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that he loved us (1 John 4:10).”

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