The Pearly Gate

We love Him because He first loved us.

1 John 4:19

Why does God love us? Not because we’re lovable by nature. Deuteronomy 7:7–8 offers this remarkable answer: “The LORD did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any other people, for you were the least of all peoples; but because the LORD loves you.” Read that again! “The LORD . . . set His love on you . . . because . . . the LORD loves you.” He loves us just because He loves us. His nature is to love.

Why do we love God? Not because we are loving by nature. First John 4:19 offers a remarkable answer: “We love Him because He first loved us.” Our love is responsive. William Tyndale, who was later burned at the stake for translating the Bible into English, was a brilliant, winsome scholar whose life was changed by finding 1 John 4:19 in the Greek New Testament. He called it “the pearly gate through which I entered the Kingdom.” Tyndale wrote, “I used to think that salvation was not for me, since I did not love God; but those precious words showed me that God does not love us because we first loved Him. No, no; we love Him because He first loved us. It makes all the difference!”