Loved Before the Stars

Why did God choose you? Why does God love you? Why do you choose to love those close to you?

I’m officiating a wedding next week and it’s my first chance to speak publicly in a few months. I’d like to share what is one of the biggest deals to me in all of scripture. In premarital counseling, I often ask couples why they chose to marry each other. The answers vary but tend to focus on the other person’s best qualities, things like their unselfishness, humor, looks. Good reasons, but maybe not the best ones, as all of them can fade with time and age.

In the Old Testament, God tells Israel why He loves them, and it isn’t about their looks. Reading all of Deuteronomy 7 gives you the full context, but boiled down, it comes to this:

Deuteronomy 7:7–8 (CSB) “The Lord had his heart set on you and chose you, … because the Lord loved you.”

In other words, He loves us because He loves us.

Maybe in spite of us.

The New Testament puts it this way:

John 3:16–17 (CSB) God loved the world in this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.

Timothy Keller put it this way: “God loves you just because he loves you. You cannot lose it. You cannot do anything to destroy it. It is infallible. He loves you from before the stars were founded. Bring your stubbornness, bring your self-loathing, bring everything into the light of that.”

Now that is reason to be encouraged!

And that may be the most bizarre Bible story of all.

Dan

Photo by Andy Holmes on Unsplash

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