If you have listened to any of my teachings, you’ve heard me speak
about the love of God. That’s what changed my life. The titles,
subjects, and Scripture references of my albums are all different, but
I’m always teaching about some aspect of God’s unconditional love.
<p>
I believe a true, experiential understanding of God’s love will
drastically change anyone’s life. That’s the point that the Apostle
Paul was making in Ephesians 3:19.
<p>
It says,
<br>
<b><i>And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might
be filled with all the fulness of God.</i></b>
<p>
Knowing God’s love experientially surpasses mere head knowledge, and it
always results in us being filled with all the fullness of God. I could
say it this way: If you aren’t experiencing all the fullness of God,
then you aren’t experiencing God’s love.
<p>
Many people would argue with that. They would say that they know God
loves them but that they are just under their circumstances at the
moment. My answer would be, <b><i>What are you doing under there!</i></b> The Bible
says we are to be above only and not beneath (Deut. 28:13).
<p>
When we are enjoying God’s love, everything else pales in comparison.
No problem can compare to the unsearchable riches of God’s love. It’s
like the old song says, <b><i>Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Look full in His
wonderful face. And the things of earth will grow strangely dim, in the
light of His glory and grace.</i></b> That is absolutely true.
<p>
At a recent Gospel Truth Seminar, I taught on the love of God in every
session. I’ve had a teaching series available on this subject for
years, God’s Kind Of Love: The Cure for What Ails Ya! However, at this
seminar I took a totally different approach. Instead of restating the
obvious, I decided to specifically counter wrong thinking that blinds
us to His love.
<p>
Every Christian has the head knowledge of God’s love for them, but
because of wrong thinking, it seldom translates into experience. There
are things (primarily religious teachings) that dilute and weaken that
revelation of God’s love.
<p>
I began with the sovereignty of God. Wrong thinking about this is one
of the biggest problems people have in experiencing God’s love. If you
believe God is the One who is causing all the problems in the world, it
will definitely affect your relationship with Him.
<p>
Let me illustrate it this way: What if you thought I was the one who
killed thousands in the September 11 terrorist attacks, caused the
tsunamis that devastated Asia, and destroyed New Orleans with a
hurricane. 
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On the other hand, what if you thought I was so heartless
that I would cause babies to be born with birth defects and people to
suffer terrible things like murder and rape so I could teach them a
lesson. If every evil thing in life were my fault, how would you feel
about me?
<p>
There isn’t a civilized nation on the earth that wouldn’t have me
killed, if they could prove I was behind all these things. Yet this is
what the Lord is being blamed for every day. It’s even written in our
contracts?major natural disasters and tragedies are called <b><i>acts of
God.</i></b>
v
This isn’t a true representation of God. God is not the source of our
problems. Understanding the sovereignty of God correctly is so
important that I spent an entire session on the subject. Anyone who
doesn’t get this right will never truly appreciate God’s love. It’s
impossible to feel good about God if you believe the accusers that
depict Him as evil.
<p>
Next I taught about God’s unconditional love. That is a radical
concept. Nearly all of religion links God’s love and acceptance of
people to their worthiness. In other words, God’s love is proportional
to their performance.
<p>
Some Christian religious groups, after presenting salvation as a free
gift of God’s grace, turn right around and teach new believers that
their continuing relationship with the Lord now depends on their
performance. If they don’t live holy, go to church, read their Bibles,
and pay tithes, etc., then the Lord won’t bless them or answer their
prayers.
<p>
That kind of thinking will block a person from receiving the love of
God. When their performance falls short, and it always does, their own
hearts will condemn them. They just can’t believe God could love them.
The truth is that God’s love for us has nothing to do with our
performance. He loves us because He is love (1 John 4:8), not because
we are lovely.
<p>
Understanding that God’s love is unconditional will revolutionize your
life. It certainly has mine.
<p>
Another major roadblock to experiencing God’s love is this: How can a
holy God love unholy people? To answer that, I explained how God is a
Spirit, and if we are going to truly connect with Him in worship, we
have to do it through our new born-again spirits (John 4:24). When I
found out who I was in the spirit, it forever changed me. Understanding
that is what allowed me to finally accept God’s love.
<p>
I am firmly convinced that a lack of seeing ourselves <b><i>in Christ</i></b> is
the root of all unbelief and failure to experience God’s pure love.
This is my life message. It’s at the core of all the understanding the
Lord has given me, and I believe it has to become a true revelation to
every person if they want to experience God’s love in its fullness.
<p>
This led to teaching on another major area of wrong thinking. Much of
what people believe about God’s rejection of us comes from Scripture.
They use Old Testament scriptures as the basis for what they believe,
not understanding that Jesus forever changed God’s dealings with
mankind.
<p>
They don’t understand the difference between the way God dealt with
people under the Old Covenant of the Law and the way He now deals with
us through Christ.
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Second Corinthians 5:19 says,
<br>
<b><i>To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself,
not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the
word of reconciliation.</i></b>
<p>
Under this New Covenant, God is not imputing our sins unto us. That is
the exact opposite of what happened under the Old Covenant. This is
explained in detail in the New Covenant, and yet the body of Christ as
a whole has missed this truth. The vast majority of Christians are
still under sin consciousness, the very thing that Old Testament saints
longed to be free from.
<p>
They saw our covenant by faith and prophesied about the superiority of
the New Covenant that God would make with mankind (1 Pet. 1:10-12).
Yet, modern-day Christians aren’t taking advantage of all the benefits
of God’s love available in that New Covenant. God’s people truly are
destroyed for lack of knowledge (Hos. 4:6).
<p>
-- Andrew Wommack<br>
Capitalization of keywords by Randy Lucas