A Love Like No Other

Psalm 17:7, "Shew thy marvellous lovingkindness, O thou that savest by thy right hand..."

A genuine Christian (one who has been saved by the grace of God through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, see Ephesian 2:8-9) has a source of help in times of sorrow and trials.

I feel sorry for those who are without Christ, those who have no place to go when trials and heartaches come into their lives. Often the world looks for comfort in a liquor bottle, or a pill, or in the arms of a strange woman or an adulterous man. I often remember as an unsaved man how empty and hopeless my heart was when heartache and trials came knocking.

A genuine Christian can go directly and boldly to the throne of our Heavenly Father. Hebrews 4:16, "Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need."

Apparently David was in great distress when he penned this Psalm. Verses 5-9, "Hold up my goings in thy paths, that my footsteps slip not. I have called upon thee, for thou wilt hear me, O God: incline thine ear unto me, and hear my speech. Shew thy marvellous lovingkindness, O thou that savest by thy right hand them which put their trust in thee from those that rise up against them. Keep me as the apple of the eye, hide me under the shadow of thy wings, From the wicked that oppress me, from my deadly enemies, who compass me about."

David found himself at a point in life where he needed God's help and "marvellous lovingkindness." The word "marvellous" has the idea of something separated from all others; something that is like nothing else. He needed the love of God that is like no other.

No one else's love for you and me is like God's love for you and me. God's love cannot be analyzed or categorized. It is a marvellous love, a love like no other!

1. God's Loving Kindness is Marvelous in It's Origin. God's love for us has always existed. He loved us even before we were born. Before Adam and Eve were formed in the Garden of Eden, God loved us profoundly. Even before the creation of Heaven and Earth, God's love for us was "marvelous." God never decided to love you and I, He always loved us. His love had no beginning. Jeremiah 31:3, "The LORD hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love:" Whenever we are overwhelmed with the trials, griefs, and heartaches of life, remember Jeremiah 31:3.
   

2. God's Loving Kindness is Marvelous in It's Objects. God's love for you and I is not based upon anything lovely in and of ourselves. The moment I start thinking that I somehow deserve or merit God's love, that is the moment I reveal my ignorance of who and what I really am. Romans 5:8, "But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." It is not the proud, haughty, self-righteous person that understands how marvelous God's love is, but the poor, humble sinner. Without a doubt, one of our greatest needs in our Christian lives is to humble ourselves before God and man. (See Luke 18:9-14).
   

3. God's Loving Kindness is Marvelous in It's Outpouring. John 3:16, "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." God loves you and I so much that He gave His own Son to die and suffer the eternal judgment for your sins, my sins, and the sins of all humanity on the cross. If we are ever tempted to doubt God's marvelous love for us, we must simply look to the cross and be reminded that His love is marvelous in it's outpouring.
   

4. God's Loving Kindness is Marvelous in It's Obstinacy. The word "obstinate" means to be inflexible; immovable; unyielding. Nothing can diminish or alter God's love for you and me. There is nothing I can do to change or negate God's love for me. No action by another person can change or negate God's love for me. Not even the Devil can change or negate God's love for me! Rom 8:35-39, "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."