Zephaniah 3:17 (NIV) 17 The LORD your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing."
Ephesians 2:3-7 (NIV) 3 All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. 4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions--it is by grace you have been saved. 6 And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7 in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus.
1 John 4:10 (NIV) 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.
We can risk loving as passionately as God loves. For we know that the love God makes possible is no scarce resource that must be hoarded so that it may be distributed in dribs and drabs—a little here and a little there. Love is not a rare commodity; rather, the more we love with the intense particularity of God's love, the more we discover that we have the capacity to love.—Stanley Hauerwas, quoted in Context (Sept. 15, 1989). Christianity Today, Vol. 34, no. 8. - Today's Best Illustrations – Volumes 1-4.
