Through Jesus, God makes himself known to us as the One who loves. To understand this “love” we must not begin with our own ideas of what love is.  We must rather pay attention to who God is as made known in Jesus.  In him, we discover that the One who loves gives himself totally to create communion with us.  God does not will to be without us nor to leave us without him. So he acts, in love, to restore us to himself in spite of what we are like. Yes, the One who loves pours himself out without restraint for those who reject him in order to take them up into the communion of his eternal love as Father, Son and Spirit.

 However, when considering what God is like, too many allow God as Judge to predominate. Make no mistake, God is Judge. But when we see that God is love, the meaning of Judge is somewhat different.  With God as love fully in view, we see that God’s judgement is an expression of the love that he is.  The Triune One is an inexhaustible fountain of love that overflows and expresses itself in all he does.  So the One who loves must expresses his love in the justice that makes everything right in his world.  That includes pursuing restorative justice because he does not want to simply punish offenders.  He wants to restore them to fellowship within his family. So, in love, the Judge himself is judged for us so that we might live with him.

As those who are so well loved our hearts yearn to live in ever closer communion with One of such beauty.