For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: one has died for all; therefore, all have died. He died for all, so that those who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and was raised for their sake. (2 Corinthians 5:14-15)

One of the most quoted verses is John 3:16, proclaiming that God so loved the world. Reflect on His love for a moment. Does His love inspire us to live for Him rather than ourselves? The key to overcoming our self-centered lives lies in the divine love of God. Our struggle is a love problem, rooted in a lack of understanding of the depths of God’s mercy and grace.

For those who believe in Christ and embrace the truth (Romans 1:18), they have escaped the wrath of God and received eternal life by grace alone (Romans 6:23; Ephesians 2:8-9). God so loved the world—consider the depth of this love. Christ lived the life we could not live, His righteousness imputed to us, and He died the death we deserved. We don’t deserve this love, yet He offers it freely. Paul’s prayer for the church in Ephesus reminds us of the importance of grasping this profound truth.

Meditate on this today:

“For this reason, I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of His glory, He may grant you to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.” (Ephesians 3:14-21)