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I Want to be Lovable
Ephesians 2:8-9
I need to be loved, but I want to be lovable.
It’s a strange thing that I find in myself, and I want to share it in case it’s something that you can relate to. I find that with people in my life who love me, I want there to be reasons that they love me. Like, I’ve done something to be a really good husband or father or, you know, son or brother and friend and that they can look and say, yeah, because of that, like he’s done this or he will do this, or he’s a stand up guy in this way. That’s why I love him.
I want to be lovable, but I need to be loved. And the thing about love, true love, agape love, that “all in” love of God is that that love isn’t based on being lovable. Actually, if it’s a love that’s based on being lovable, it’s not really true love. “All in” love says that yes, you have faults. You have these different things. It’s not based on you being good enough. It’s the fact that I’m going to love you anyway. It’s the fact that I am for you anyway. It’s the love that we see ultimately from our God, who, when he looked at this world and saw that we had turned away from him. That we’ve been stuck in our sin. That he says, I’m going to love you anyway. I’m going to send my son Jesus into this world to die for your sins and to rise again, anyway. His grace is nothing about anything we do. It’s a free gift. It’s not at all about us being lovable. Ephesians two says this so beautifully,
Indeed, it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. (Ephesians 2:8-9)
God’s love, true love, has nothing to do with how lovable you are.
I think maybe I fall back in wanting to be lovable because since sin came into this world, what, what do we do? We try to do things our own way, gain wisdom, our own way. Even, you know, think about the temptation in the garden of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. The temptation was that they would be like God, knowing good and evil. The ironic thing was that when God created humanity, how does scripture describe humanity? That they were created in the image and likeness of God. They already were like God in many ways.
Sin was getting them to try to get what they already had. And do it their own way. And trying to be lovable, being caught up with being lovable is the same thing.
You don’t have to earn love. You can’t. Love, by definition, true love is something freely given. It has nothing to do with you. You don’t have to try to be lovable today. I mean, go be lovable. Be nice to people in your life. Don’t get me wrong, but not to be loved. You already are. It’s a free gift. God’s grace. God’s love for you. You are loved.
