1 John 4:19

We love, because he first loved us.

Inherent in this epic declaration is the fact that Christ was not crucified in order to persuade God to love people, but because God already loved mankind, the divine love preceding the entire program of redemption, and even more, existing in the heart of God even before the world was. One great purpose of the cross was that of persuading people to receive the salvation God was so willing to give. Another truth evident in this is that, "Our love (whether of God or man) is a plain duty to us, since God first loved us."[45] It should be considered by all that the very fact of God's loving sinful and fallen humanity provides a powerful incentive for all perceptive souls to do likewise. Why did God love fallen and sinful men? Even their being sinful did not change the fact that they had been designed and created in the image of the Father; and through God's provident mercy, all of the moral and eternal consequences of their sins were potentially removable, through the means God revealed. Moreover, the disaster which had fallen upon humanity in the events of the Fall, had actually been brought upon them by the seduction and skillful cunning of their inveterate enemy, Satan. God pitied those human creatures who were so heartlessly betrayed and ruined by the sadistic moral rape of their innocence in Eden; and pity is never very far from love. And should not similar considerations today lead every Christian in the direction of loving all people, every man, who like himself is a victim of sin, and yet is potentially an heir of eternal glory as a beneficiary of the blood of Christ? "Such love flows from the nature of the lover, and not from the worthiness of the one loved."[46] The great redemptive purpose of God in Christ is that of making his children like himself, and, therefore, not to love is to negate our own redemption. "After God's love in giving his Son for us, it would be monstrous not to love ."[47]

[45] J. W. Roberts, op. cit., p. 123.

[46] Leon Morris, op. cit., p. 1268.

[47] A. Plummer, op. cit., p. 105.