WHAT LOVE IS THIS?

In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son... (1 John 4:10)

Themes: The Love of God, God's Foreknowledge, Incarnation, Cross, Resurrection, Union with Christ, Heaven

LYRICS

What love is this that knows my name
With tender hands that formed my frame?
Before He made the burning stars
My life was sheltered in his heart
What love is this that moved my God
To leave the realms of bliss above?
To save a guilty world from doom
Love dwelt within a virgin’s womb

What love is this in grief displayed
Upon a tree that He had made?
Forsaken in His searing pain
Behold the Lamb for sinners slain
What love is this that moved my God
To ransom me with His own blood?
There in my place, what grace unheard!
Love died the death that I deserved

What love is this that crushed the grave
And lives forever strong to save?
I have no other confidence
For Christ is all my righteousness
What love is this that moved my Lord
To give Himself as my reward?
Now I am His and He is mine
Love waits for me in joy divine

THE WORD IN THE WORDS

What love is this that knows my name

Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you... (Jeremiah 1:5) / But now thus says the Lord,he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. (Isaiah 43:1)

With tender hands that formed my frame?

For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother's womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. (Psalm 139:13-14)

Before He made the burning stars
My life was sheltered in his heart

He chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. (Ephesians 1:4-6)

What love is this that moved my God
To leave the realms of bliss above?

For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. (John 6:38)

To save a guilty world from doom

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16)

Love dwelt within a virgin’s womb

And the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.” (Luke 1:30-33)

What love is this in grief displayed

He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted...Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for guilt...(Isaiah 53:3,4,10)

Upon a tree that He had made?

All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. (John 1:3)

Forsaken in His searing pain

And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34)

Behold the Lamb for sinners slain

“Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!” (Revelation 5:12)

What love is this that moved my God
To ransom me with His own blood?

For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Mark 10:45)

There in my place, what grace unheard!

In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace (Ephesians 1:7)

Love died the death that I deserved

For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:21)

What love is this that crushed the grave

through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel (2 Timothy 1:10)

And lives forever strong to save?

We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. (Romans 6:9-11) / Behold, the Lord's hand is not shortened, that it cannot save,or his ear dull, that it cannot hear (Isaiah 59:1)

I have no other confidence
For Christ is all my righteousness

...you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.” (1 Corinthians 1:30-31)

What love is this that moved my Lord
To give Himself as my reward?

“Behold, I am coming soon, bringing my recompense with me, to repay each one for what he has done. (Revelation 22:12) / After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision: “Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.” (Genesis 15:1) / The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup;you hold my lot. The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance. (Psalm 16:5-6)

Now I am His and He is mine

My beloved is mine, and I am his (Song of Solomon 2:16) / I am my beloved's and my beloved is mine (Song of Solomon 6:3)

Love waits for me in joy divine

And the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain gladness and joy,and sorrow and sighing shall flee away. (Isaiah 35:10) / ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ (Matthew 25:21 - identical to verse 23)

DEVOTIONAL

“We love him because he first loved us.” 1 John 4:19

There is no light in the planet but that which proceeds from the sun; and there is no true love to Jesus in the heart but that which comes from the Lord Jesus himself. From this overflowing fountain of the infinite love of God, all our love to God must spring. This must ever be a great and certain truth, that we love him for no other reason than because he first loved us. Our love to him is the fair offspring of his love to us. Cold admiration, when studying the works of God, anyone may have, but the warmth of love can only be kindled in the heart by God’s Spirit. How great the wonder that such as we should ever have been brought to love Jesus at all! How marvelous that when we had rebelled against him, he should, by a display of such amazing love, seek to draw us back. No! never should we have had a grain of love towards God unless it had been sown in us by the sweet seed of his love to us. Love, then, has for its parent the love of God shed abroad in the heart: but after it is thus divinely born, it must be divinely nourished. Love is an exotic; it is not a plant which will flourish naturally in human soil, it must be watered from above. Love to Jesus is a flower of a delicate nature, and if it received no nourishment but that which could bedrawn from the rock of our hearts it would soon wither. As love comes from heaven, so it must feed on heavenly bread. It cannot exist in the wilderness unless it be fed by manna from on high. Love must feed on love. The very soul and life of our love to God is his love to us. “I love thee, Lord, but with no love of mine / For I have none to give; I love thee, Lord; but all the love is thine / For by thy love I live. I am as nothing, and rejoice to be / Emptied, and lost, and swallowed up in thee.” -Charles Spurgeon