This past weekend, we had our annual church retreat. One of my roles was to teach some workshops. One of the workshops I taught on was about loving God completely. This was based on how Scripture pictures God and how we should respond to that revelation.

Psalm 8 is one of the best examples of Scripture that explores the majesty of God and His love for humanity. When you read this psalm, you discover that sandwiched between verses that express the majesty of the Creator of all life, there are wonderful words that show the significance of humanity in spite of our smallness compared to Himself and the rest of Creation.

As Romans 1 tells us, God has displayed and revealed Himself and His splendour above the heavens and He has ordained praise from the heavenly host to the mouths of infants (Psalm 8:1-2). Jesus quoted this passage in Matthew 21:15-16 when the children cried out “Hosanna” when Jesus entered the city and this expression of love was enough to silence Jesus’ adversaries.

In verses 3-4, the writer shifts to a beautiful description of the beauty of the cosmos, “When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?”

From the time David wrote these words, until the invention of the telescope in the early seventeenth century, only a few thousand stars were visible to the naked eye. The Milky Way Galaxy was thought to be the universe itself. But with the technology we possess today, we realize the Earth, the solar system we live in is such a small part of a great Creation.

So the question needs to be asked, “What is humanity?” In Isaiah 40:26, it says God calls each star by name. It’s beyond imagination and incredible. His wisdom, beauty, power and dominion are beyond human comprehension. As incredible as God is, He chose to pursue intimacy with us. In essence, we are the equivalent to ants on a puny planet.

As Psalm 8:5 declares, “Yet, You have made him a little lower than God, and You crown him with glory and majesty!” Although these words are applicable to all, they ultimately find their fulfillment in Jesus Christ. As Hebrews 2:6-8 say, “But there is a place where someone has testified: “What is mankind that you are mindful of them, a son of man that you care for him?  You made them a little lower than the angels; you crowned them with glory and honour and put everything under their feet.”

Along with the words of Genesis, we conclude that God created us to reign over His Creation. Psalm 8:6-8 say, “You made them rulers over the works of your hands; you put everything under their feet: all flocks and herds, and the animals of the wild, the birds in the sky, and the fish in the sea, all that swim the paths of the seas.”

Sadly, we forsook that responsibility and privilege through sin and rebellion. However, when Christ returns, everything will be put under His feet and all will be made right.

Look at 1 Corinthians 15:24-28, “Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. For He “has put everything under his feet.” Now when it says that “everything” has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.”

As great as having dominion over nature, our true cause of rejoicing should be in the fact that our names are in the Book of life through putting our faith in Christ. In Luke 10:20, Jesus said, “However, do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.”

God has given us an incredible gift (2 Corinthians 9:15) which we should never take for granted. And what was that gift? 1 John 4:9-10 says, “This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.”

C.S. Lewis puts it this way, glory means, “good report with God, acceptance by God, response, acknowledgment, and welcome into the heart of things. The door on which we have been knocking all our lives will open at last.” In that we exalt in the hope of the glory of God (Romans 5:2).

When you take time to look at the Word, you discover that the love of God is overwhelming in its scope and nature. It is in essence the wellspring of biblical faith and hope. As you have opportunity, take a look at the book of Romans. In the book, you discover that God reveals His eternal power and divine nature as well as our imperfection and need for grace. But we also discover that in His grace and love can overcome our guilt and transform us into new creatures in Christ.

God’s loyal love for us is causeless, limitless and ceaseless. When we understand that nothing in and of ourselves caused God to love us, we begin to see Him and love Him as we ought. Christ died for us when we were His enemies. God’s love is spontaneous and unending. His love for us was a choice and if we have responded to Christ’s offer of forgiveness and relationship with Him, nothing can separate us from that love or diminish it.

Romans 8:38-39 says, “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,⁹ neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

This means that we are secure in the Lord’s unconditional love and since we belong to Him, there is nothing we can do to cause God to love us more and there is nothing we can do to cause Him to love us less.

Performance based acceptance and conditional love only lead to pain and rejection. The truth taught in the Bible seems impossible… beyond true. We ask ourselves, “Isn’t there something we need to do in order to merit God’s favour or acceptance?” If we are afraid others would reject us if they knew what we were really like, what about the holy and perfect and all-knowing God?

Beyond all human faith, beyond any imaginable hope, the eternal God of love has reached down to us and in the ultimate act of sacrifice, purchased us and made us His own.

When we were in Ireland, we saw many great historical sites that date back to before the pyramids. We saw many cathedrals, churches, and ruins. In spite of the great Christian tradition in the country, many of the people had lost their faith by which they lived their lives and in which these buildings were dedicated to. Are we here in North America headed down the same path?

We need to heed the words of Paul and David and rediscover the nature of God and His love for us. It is only then that we can truly live our lives in the way God intended by loving Him completely.