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“I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.” --Jeremiah 31:3 There are four things about the love of God that I’d like you to meditate on today. First, God loves you. He loves you more than anyone else could ever love you! Second, God’s love for you is eternal. Time cannot erase it. God loves you and He will always love you. Third, God’s love for you is unconditional. This concept is hard to completely understand at times because of how conditional human love can be. Sometimes human love is dependent on how we feel about someone…or it’s dependent upon someone loving us in return. But God’s love is unconditional. Nothing you do or don’t do can alter it. Lastly, God’s love is incomprehensible! It’s immeasurable. What’s most remarkable about the love of God is that in spite of your sin and my sin…despite our failure and brokenness and worthlessness…He reached down and showed us His love by sending His Son to die in our place on the cross! It’s my prayer that you’ll remember just how much God loves you today…and that as a result, you’ll be motivated to share God’s love with others. God’s love for you is eternal, unconditional, and immeasurable! Heeding Correction by Dr. Paul Chappell “And the LORD spake to Manasseh, and to his people: but they would not hearken. Wherefore the LORD brought upon them the captains of the host of the king of Assyria, which took Manasseh among the thorns, and bound him with fetters, and carried him to Babylon. And when he was in affliction, he besought the LORD his God, and humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers,” 2 Chronicles 33:10–12 Though we are saved by grace and made part of God’s family, we will not be perfected into the image of Christ until we see the Lord. All of us do things we should not and fail to do things we should. When we sin, God corrects us. He uses the truth of His Word, the conviction of the Holy Spirit, the wise counsel of friends, and the circumstances of life to try to turn our hearts back to Him. If, however, we refuse to respond and continue on in our sin, God does not just overlook it and allow us to continue. He will increase His efforts to get our attention, knowing that chastening is often required before we will let go of the sins we cling to and turn back to Him. This was the case for Manasseh. Though his father was the godly king Hezekiah, Manasseh became a devoted idol worshiper. He ignored the warnings of the prophets, and it was not until he had lost his throne and his kingdom that he was willing to repent. There is a warning in the retelling of the story of the Children of Israel regarding our refusal to heed God’s correction. “When he slew them, then they sought him: and they returned and enquired early after God” (Psalm 78:34). God loves us too much to allow sin in our lives to continue without responding.   Today’s Growth Principle:  Rather than stiffening our necks against God’s correction, we should quickly repent and return to Him.