A youth pastor and his “Win One Now” team were passing out tracts and talking to a group of young people in New York one Saturday evening. A gang leader went up to him and shouted, “I’m sick and tired of you people talking about love. I’ve never seen love so if you’ve got it let me see it!”
How many others want to see “it?” We talk about love, sing about love, preach about love but the world is still trying to discover what love looks like. Someone once said they wanted to see “love with skin on it.” And that’s what God’s love is all about. He did not speak of an empty, self-serving love - but a love that can be seen and studied and shared and duplicated and, by God’s grace, passes all human understanding.
The Psalmist said that “The Lord has made His salvation known.” How? Through God’s faithfulness to protect and provide for the well-being of the children of Israel. He made His salvation known by His faithfulness and the fulfillment of His covenant with His children. There are no short cuts to proving what true love, God-love, is. It is not emotionally driven or sentimental. It sustained and supported Israel. That was then.
This is now. Years ago, God sent His one and only begotten Son to be born in a manger, live a sinless life, die on a despised cross and after suffering, scorned, stabbed, and shamed, be resurrected from a borrowed tomb. Then, once again, made “His salvation known.” This is His love - a love we can see. It is “love with skin on it!”
If the world cannot see this love, we who are His disciples have only ourselves to blame. All around us are people waiting and wanting to see “love with skin on it.”
Prayer: Forgive us who profess to be Christians, Father, if we fail to show Your love. May we live Your “love with skin on it” so others can know You! In Jesus’s Name, Amen!
Scripture For Today: The Lord has made his salvation known and revealed his righteousness to the nations. Psalm 98:2
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