People are always asking, “How would you describe God? Who is God? What is God all about?” For me, the best answer I’ve ever found is three words: God is love.
When I slow down and really think about the love of God, it blesses me every time. It’s the greatest thing a believer can operate in today as a child of God — and I believe understanding His love is the best way to understand God Himself.
The whole thing rests on two verses I keep coming back to:
1 John 4:7–8 (KJV): “Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.”
Or, in an easier-to-read version: “Dear friends, let us love one another, because love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.”
Love Is of God — It Starts in Him
Notice it says love is of God — love comes from God. That’s why I’ve always said it’s the best definition of love: love is defined by where it comes from. I don’t manufacture love and then hand it up to God. It starts in Him and flows out. He’s the spring the water comes from.
And here’s what settles me: God is not going to love me any more tomorrow than He does tonight. He’s not going to love me more when I do well. He loves me — full and constant. What can grow is how much of that love I receive and return. I can love Him more, and that’s my true desire — because when I do, I’m able to reach other people.
God’s Kind of Love Has a Name
The love in these verses is agape — God’s own self-giving, sacrificial love. Not romance, not friendship. It’s the love that chooses the good of another person regardless of feeling, merit, or whether it’s ever returned. It’s the cross kind of love.
Jesus displayed that agape love by going to the cross and dying, even though He didn’t feel like dying. “Nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done” (Luke 22:42). He sought the good of mankind regardless of His feelings. That’s the love the world had no word for until God defined it.
You Only Come to Know God by Spending Time With Him
Verse 7 says everyone who loves “knoweth God.” That word knoweth means to know by experience — knowing God firsthand, the way you know a person, not just knowing facts about Him.
And there’s no shortcut. For me to know God, I have to spend time with Him. I have to see who He is — His characteristics, His traits. Sometimes that just means meditating on a scripture. Sometimes it means being still. Because I want to know God in a greater way, and I want love to be a fruit of the Spirit in my life. When I catch myself not loving, that’s not a scolding — it’s an invitation to come spend a little more time with Dad.
When I’m Not Loving, It’s an Indication — Not an Indictment
If I don’t love today the way I should, it doesn’t mean I’m a failure. It’s just an indication that I’m not spending time with God like I should — that I need to get in tune with His Word and let Him speak to me today.
It works from the inside out. If my mind isn’t renewed to the Word of God, I may say things that aren’t of God — “be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Romans 12:2), because “out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh” (Matthew 12:34). A low-love day is a gauge, not a gavel. It’s the fuel light coming on, not a verdict on my worth. “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1).
What Love Looks Like on a Hard Day
Paul says “charity suffereth long” (1 Corinthians 13:4). The word behind “suffereth long” literally means long-tempered — the opposite of short-tempered. There’s a long distance between the irritation and the explosion.
A short fuse looks like this: something happens, I feel irritated, I react. But long-tempered love creates some space: something happens, I notice what I’m feeling, I pause, I choose my response. It doesn’t mean nothing bothers me. It means the irritation doesn’t get to pick my response. And that little space — between what happens to me and what I do next — is exactly where the Holy Spirit does His work.
Maybe growth isn’t that nobody ever gets on my nerves. Maybe the evidence of growth is that my fuse is getting longer, because I’m giving the Holy Spirit room.
He Meets You Right Where You Are
The thing that amazes me most is that God meets me exactly where I am. I’ve had to lean into that in my own life — trusting God with my mother’s care when I could no longer be her hands. He didn’t wait for me to clean myself up — “while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). He meets you where you are; He just loves you too much to leave you there. And His love for each of us is the same — “God is no respecter of persons” (Acts 10:34). That takes all the comparing right out of it.
When I bring Him what I’ve gotten wrong, I’ve learned this: I can’t fix it — I can only ask Him to forgive me and move forward. That’s a big part of why God wants us to surrender: I hand Him what I was never meant to carry, because He can do what I can’t. And when God forgives, He doesn’t even remember it, so why should I? “As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us” (Psalm 103:12). Holding onto what God has already dropped isn’t humility — it’s not believing Him.
A Simple Prayer
Father, thank You that You are love, and that Your love for me is full, constant, and the same as it is for everyone. Help me to know You by spending time with You today, and let Your love flow out of me to the people You’ve placed in my path. When I’m short, give me the pause. When I fail, remind me there’s no condemnation in Christ. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Need prayer? I’d be honored to pray with you. Email prayer@frankwyatt.com or call (937) 732-5868. You don’t have to walk through your hard season alone.