Hence we learn [see quote from Reflections on and Admirations of God 6] how all God’s love may be resolved into His love for and delight in Himself. His love to the creature is only His inclination to glorify Himself and communicate Himself, and His delight is in Himself glorified and in Himself communicated. There is His delight in the act and in the fruit. The act is the exercise of His own perfection, and the fruit is Himself expressed and communicated. Jonathan Edwards
This paragraph brings some of the great truths of God into a focus and displays them in a way that has hardly seen the light of day in modern times. Here is a view of the greatness of the one and only God who is triune and all love is within Himself and for Himself. Here we see how the two Great Commandments are seen in God Himself. It is only in loving Himself (as triune) that God loves His creatures. As such, it is only when a human being (out of the love for Himself that God has poured into the human soul) loves God that a human being can really love another. It is a great truth and therefore a great comfort to realize that God loves His people based on His perfect and eternal love for Himself rather than a love that is based on their behavior. The behavior or moral life of people can truly only flow from a love for God rather than trying to earn His love. It is impossible to earn His love, but instead one should cry out to God for grace that one may have and live in that love.
Zephaniah 3:14-17 gives us a beautiful picture of God. “14 Shout for joy, O daughter of Zion! Shout in triumph, O Israel! Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter of Jerusalem! 15 The LORD has taken away His judgments against you, He has cleared away your enemies. The King of Israel, the LORD, is in your midst; You will fear disaster no more. 16 In that day it will be said to Jerusalem: “Do not be afraid, O Zion; Do not let your hands fall limp. The LORD your God is in your midst, A victorious warrior. He will exult over you with joy, He will be quiet in His love, He will rejoice over you with shouts of joy.” If we look at this from a view that is centered and focused on human beings, we will think that God is responding to what His people has done and is rejoicing over that. But if we think of His people doing what they do because God is working in them to manifest Himself, the picture we get is that God is delighting in Himself and the glory He has expressed in and through His people. The people are blessed in that and so join in His rejoicing. God rejoices in His own glory and His people rejoice in the sight of His glory because they love Him and His glory above all.
Edwards makes a very important distinction when he says, “There is His delight in the act and in the fruit.” The actions of God are the exercises of His perfections which God loves to exercise and manifest. The fruit, that is, the result of what He does is really Himself expressed and communicated. In a very real sense we can also make a distinction between God expressing Himself and communicating Himself as well, but in terms of the people of God bearing fruit, it is more of a helpful way of thinking than it is two things that are distinct from each other. God can express Himself in ways where He has not communicated Himself in the sense where His presence and glory are actually communicated a person.
When we think of the nature of true love, therefore, we can see why it is only a true believer who can truly love (see I John 4:7-8). Only believers are spiritual people which means only a believer has the Holy Spirit. The fruit of the Holy Spirit is love, which means that only those who have the Holy Spirit and those that the Holy Spirit is working in have true love and truly love. If we trace that back to the source, what we see is that God as triune is always in the act of His perfections in Himself and to His people. The Holy Spirit (who is fully God) expresses love from God to His people and that love is then communicated to them because the Spirit dwells in them and works Himself in them. In this sense communicating love is not just telling people about it, but it is part of the very nature of God that He shares with and works in His people. So when the people of God receive this communication of love from God, they will love others. When a believer truly loves, that is really the manifestation of the very love of God in and through that person. The love that a believer shows others is really the fruit of the of the act of God who is exercising the perfection of love in Himself and then sharing it and communicating it to His people.
When we see true believers loving God and others, it is nothing that they should be applauded for, but it is something that God should be worshipped for. When believers love others in truth, that is the very perfection of God being worked in and through His people and so it is God on display and it is God glorified. So the delight of God in seeing a true believer love is really the delight of God in Himself displayed. A believer should grow to where the believer can delight in the glory of God shining in and through him or her rather than being proud of what s/he has done. There is nothing to boast about in ourselves, but in truth we can do nothing good but what comes through Jesus Christ. He is the vine and we are the branches. All true fruit that we bear comes from Him and all the glory and praise is His.
God Loves... Himself 
Leave a comment