The cross of Christ. The supreme display of love.

When reflecting on our Savior’s love and death on the cross this Good Friday, consider the distinction between the essence and the deeds of love. While often used synonymously, investigating the differences and the fullness of our Lord in both, reveals a reality that ought to leave us trembling on bended knees.

The deeds of love is not the essence of love. We know this because deeds of love can be imitated. We can give the flowers but be iced over in apathy, we can show up to work merely consumed by the paycheck, we can sit through a worship service completely agitated at how many more chairs we set up than anyone else.

Christ’s cross was not a pedestal but an alter. He hung not to be recognized or patted on the back but to show His heart. The things that love prompts us to do is the display of love's essence.

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son John 3:16

but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5:8

But then what of the essence of His love?

It is here that words become insufficient and we are left to pine. Christ’s desire for, delighting in, longing for, care of, compassion for, protection over, empathy towards, yearning of, cherishing of, kindness, tenderness and affection for unworthy sinners is perhaps a start. The deeper we journey into it, the larger the list becomes. 

I will not turn away from doing good to them… I will rejoice in doing them good, and I will plant them in this land in faithfulness, with all my heart and all my soul. Jeremiah 32:40-41

he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing. Zephaniah 3:17

As you see Him nailed to the cross and see the blood run, see also the heart from where it flows, how it beats in love for you, for His Father’s glory. Be amazed and begin to love.

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