The Love of God

There have been times when Christians found it easy to believe in the justice of God, but found it difficult to believe in the love of God. In most of the Western world, this is no longer the case. If people believe in God at all, they assume he is a God of love, but often presuppose largely sentimental conceptions of love, with little space for holiness, justice, or wrath.

Moreover, believers have often embraced only one of the several ways the Bible speaks of the love of God, and read that one pattern into every biblical text that speaks of God's love, unwittingly producing some astonishingly nonsensical theology. This workshop attempts to explore some of the different ways the Bible speaks of the love of God, how they function, how they are integrated, and how they are related to all of the perfections of the God of the Bible.

Introduction

(1) Some ways in which the Bible speaks of God's love:

  (a) God's intra-Trinitarian love

  (b) God's providential love

  (c) God's yearning, inviting, love

  (d) God's electing love

  (e) God's covenantal, conditional, love

(2) Some theological implications

(3) Some ethical implications for Christians

Conclusion

See these other resources

Buy the book The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God by Don Carson