Daily Hope Devotional - We Need God’s Love So We Can Love Others

We Need God’s Love So We Can Love Others

BY RICK WARREN — MARCH 27, 2017

“If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them” (Luke 6:32 NIV).

If you only love on and off like a light switch, you do not love others like God wants you to love. Jesus said, “If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you?” (Luke 6:32a NIV)

His point is this: All of us can love those who love us back. Becoming a master lover means you learn to love the unlovable — when you love people who don’t love you, when you love people who irritate you, when you love people who stab you in the back or gossip about you.

This may seem like an impossible task, and it is — that’s why we need God’s love in us, so we can then love others: “We know and rely on the love God has for us” (1 John 4:16a NIV).

When you realize how much God loves you — with an extravagant, irresistible, unconditional love — then his love will change your entire focus on life. If we don’t receive God’s love for us, we’ll have a hard time loving other people. I’m talking about loving people who are unlovely, difficult, irritable, and those who are different or demanding.

You can’t do that until you have God’s love coming through you. You need to know God’s love so it can overflow out of your life into others.

Talk It Over

• How can you know God’s love better?
• What does it mean to rely on God’s love?
• What are some ways you can show love to someone you find hard to love? Ask God to help you see that person with his eyes so that you can show him or her God’s love.