What Is Christ Love By Thomas Vincent

What Is Christ Love?

If you are Christians indeed, Christ loves you:

1. with the freest love;
2. with the truest love;
3. with the strongest love;
4. with the surest love.

Christ Loves You With The FREEST Love 

“We love Him—because He first loved us.” 1 John 4:19. There are many motives and attractions for your love to Christ—but Christ’s love to you is most free. There is nothing in yourselves to draw and engage His love—except your deformity and enmity to Him, except filthiness which He loathes, and wickedness which His soul hates; these are the only motives. There is no man in the world who loves you, but he finds or fancies some loveliness in you, something to be a motive to draw his love to you. Wit is a motive to some, wealth to others, beauty to some, strength to others, near relation to some, dear love to others, liberality to some, service to others, greatness to some, goodness to others. Likeness, whether it is in good or evil, is a motive to the love of the most. But Christ’s first love to you is altogether free; that which is a motive to men, and induces their love to you, is no motive to incline the love of Christ.

The sin which you brought into the world with you, and the many sins which, since you came into the world, have been committed by you, are enough to shut out all motives of love in Christ, unto whom all sin is so odious and abominable. Whatever motive induces Christ to love you, it was not drawn from yourselves—but it was drawn from His own affectionate heart! Will not this free love of Christ to you–incline you to love Him? Does He love you most freely, and will you not love Him most dearly? Did Christ love you without any motive to draw His love, and will you not love Christ, in whom there are so many motives to draw your love? Did Christ begin to love, and will not you make a return? Did Christ love you with all your sinfulness and vileness, and will you not love Him in whom there is such perfect beauty? If you now have any spiritual beauty, it is through the loveliness which Christ has put upon you! Christ’s free and sovereign love—is a matter of the greatest admiration, and should be a motive unto the greatest affection unto Him.

Christ loves you with the TRUEST Love 

There is little true love in the world. You have many who truly hate you—but few who truly love you. Also, there is much deception in the pretended love and affection of some. All who flatter you—do not truly love you. Love in show and outward appearance, in good words and fair speeches, is common. But love in deed and in truth evidences itself in real offices of love. Where there is the greatest need, this true love is rarely to be found. Job complains, in Job 6:15-17. “My brothers have proved as unreliable as a seasonal brook that overflows its banks in the spring when it is swollen with ice and melting snow. But when the hot weather arrives, the water disappears. The brook vanishes in the heat.” In the prosperity of Job, he had many friends, and their love and friendship seemed to have some strength and consistency like the ice upon the brook; but when the heat of trouble and calamity came upon Job, then the love of his friends melted and vanished away like ice and snow, before the warm beams of the sun. The love of most is selfish, for their own ends and, therefore, when their love is not likely to be beneficial to them—but rather create trouble to themselves, it comes to nothing.

True Christianity teaches another kind of love, and those who are really pious have a true love, which is ready to show itself most in an adverse state. But none do or can love you with such a true love as Jesus Christ; there is no flattery or deception in His love. His love is not in the least counterfeit, it is not in the least selfish and for His own ends. He does not love you to receive good from you—but that He might do good unto you. He loves you not only in prosperity—but chiefly He evidences His love in affliction and adversity. He is a present help in the time of trouble, and then gives the most tender demonstrations of His love. He is touched with the feelings of your infirmities when you are tempted and sympathizes with you in your sorrows when you are afflicted. He shows His love in visiting you under your troubles, in supporting you, in relieving you, and in delivering you. Oh! What love should you have unto the Lord Jesus Christ, who loves you with such a true and sincere love!

Christ Loves You With The STRONGEST Love 

His love is stronger than death, more ardent than the fire which has a most vehement flame. The strength of Christ’s love to you shows itself in the activity of His love, in His doing for you; and this will appear in three things:

1. in what He has done for you;
2. in what He is doing for you;
3. in what He will do for you.

Christ’s love to you show itself in what Christ HAS done for you. 

I shall briefly name some particulars:

It was the strong love of Christ that brought Him down from heaven for you, to assume your nature. What kind of love was this—that God should become man! That spirit should become flesh, that He who made the world should be born of a poor virgin, and all for your sakes!

It was the love of Christ that made Him fulfill all righteousness for you. He yielded perfect obedience to the law, both moral and ceremonial, that you might have the benefit of it.

It was the love of Christ which made Him submit Himself to the temptations of the devil for you—so that He, suffering, being tempted, might be able to support you when you are tempted.

It was the love of Christ that made Him endure the contradictions of sinners for you. He bore many affronts, abuses, envyings, and blasphemies of wicked men—that He might give you an example of how to carry yourselves under similar circumstances.

It was the love of Christ which made Him lay down His life for you; John 15:13-14, “Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. You are My friends!” That such a person as Christ, so excellent, so innocent—should undergo death, and such a death as that of the cross—so disgraceful, so painful; that He should submit to such ignominy, and endure such agony, such tearing in the flesh, such pressures in His spirit; and that with such resolution and willingness, with such submission and patience; and that for such as you, although now His friends—yet, while in a state of nature, you were His strangers and enemies; here was love stronger than death! Oh, the height, oh the depth of this love! There are such dimensions in this love of Christ, as the longest line of your most extended thoughts and imaginations, can never be able to reach and measure.

It was the love of Christ which raised Him again from the dead for you; Romans 4:25, “Who was delivered for your offenses, and was raised again for our justification.”

It was the love of Christ which carried Him up from earth to heaven, where He was before you, John 16:7 “It is for your benefit that I go away, because if I don’t go away, the Comforter will not come to you. If I go, I will send Him to you.”

Christ’s love to you show itself in what He IS doing for you.

He is interceding for you at the right hand of God, Romans 8:34, “Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life–is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.” It is through love, that Christ pleads for you in heaven that you may be accepted, your sins pardoned, your prayers answered, and the Holy Spirit may be sent down to you to teach, sanctify, and comfort you.

He is preparing a place for you, John 14:2, “In My Father’s house are many dwelling places; if not, I would have told you. I am going away to prepare a place for you.” It is through love that Christ, as your forerunner, has for you entered into the glorious palace which is above, to take possession of it for you, and to prepare places there for your reception.

Christ’s love to you show itself in what He WILL do for you.

He will keep you in His hand so that none shall pluck you thence, John 10:28, “They shall never perish, neither shall any pluck them out of My hand!” Because you are received into the arms of His love, therefore, you shall be kept by the hand of His power and, therefore, you shall never, either finally or totally, fall away.

Christ will make all things work together for your good, Romans 8:28, “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God.” Christ has an endeared love to all you who love God, your love to Him—being the fruit of His love to you; and when men and devils conspire together to do you harm, Christ’s love will turn it unto your spiritual advantage.

Christ will stand by you in trouble and at death, John 14:18, “I will not leave you comfortless; I will come to you.” When affliction arises, especially if it is for His sake, and you are bereaved of all outward comforts, Christ will not leave you comfortless. When friends fail, and flesh fails, and heart fails, yes, and life fails—Christ will not fail—but will stand by and strengthen you, and be a light to you in your darkest hours, a stay to your spirits when they are ready to sink within you.

After death, Christ will take care of your souls. He will not allow the devil to seize on them as His prey—but He will send His angels to conduct and convey them into the heavenly paradise that, where He is, there they may be also, Luke 16:22, “And it came to pass that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham’s bosom.” 2 Corinthians 5:8, “We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.”

Christ will raise up your bodies at the last day. If your bodies should be consumed by fire, or drowned in the water, or rot in the earth, whatever becomes of them, the Lord Jesus, at His second glorious appearance, will find them, and raise them, and transform them into the likeness of His most glorious body, John 6:40, “And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son, and believes on Him, may have everlasting life; and I will raise him up at the last day.” Philippians 3:20-21, “Our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. He will transform the body of our humble condition into the likeness of His glorious body!”

Christ will send forth His angels to gather you into the society of the elect that have lived in all ages and all parts of the world, and to convey you into His presence to meet Him in the air when He comes to judge the world, Matthew 24:31, “And He shall send His angels, with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.” 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17, “For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the archangel’s voice, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are still alive will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words!”

Christ will own you, and crown you, and admit you into the kingdom of heaven, which He has prepared for you, Matthew 25:34, “Then the King will say to those on His right—Come, you who are blessed by My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world!” Here is strong and active love indeed! And shall not the consideration of this love of Christ, raise and heighten your love unto Him? Shall it not provoke and excite you unto activity of love, unto the lively and most vigorous exercised thereof? Has Christ united himself to your nature—and shall not your hearts be united to His person? Has He fulfilled all righteousness for you—and will not you fulfill His command of love? Has He endured such temptations, contradictions, and sufferings, upon your account, and given Himself to die for you—and will not you give your hearts unto Him? Has He risen from the dead and ascended into heaven for you—and will not your affections arise from the earth and ascend into heaven where Jesus Christ is? Does He plead in heaven with the Father for you—and will not you hearken to His pleadings by His Word and Spirit with you for your love? Is He preparing a glorious mansion for you in His Father’s house—and will not you prepare a place for Him, and entertain Him in the inner room of your chief affections?

Does, and will, He preserve you in His hand—and will not you embrace Him in your bosom? Will He make all things work together for your good—and will not your affections work towards Him? Will He stand by you in trouble and at death—and will not this put life into your love? Will He send His angels to convey your souls into His presence, when separated from our bodies—and shall not your hearts get to Him and lodge with Him before? Will He raise up your bodies at the last day—and will not the hopes of this raise up your affection? Shall you be caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and will Christ there own and crown you—and will not the believing forethoughts of this, ravish your hearts with love to Christ, and transport you with unspeakable joy? The strength of Christ’s love to you, methinks, should engage your love for Him, not only in the truth of it—but also in the strength of it!

Christ Loves You With The SUREST Love 

Some friends may love you a while with some kind of strength and ardency—but such differences may arise between you, as shall soon weaken and cool their love, and of friends, they shall prove strangers, yes, become enemies to you. Or, if their love does abide, it is not sure, because they may not continue to live. If their love did not die while they live, they may soon die, and then their love is at an end; but the love of the Lord Jesus Christ unto you, is the surest love.

If He begins to love you—He will continue to love you. If He loves you once—He will love you to the end, or rather without end. The love of Christ is not subject to mutations and changes like ours. If you lag in your love—He will not fail in His love. Though you offend Him—He is not irreconcilable. He may, indeed, upon unkindness on your side, withdraw the manifestations of His love for a while—but He will never wholly remove His love from you.

The love of Christ admits of no changing, knows no end. Christians, what motives can you find in any person, or anything in the world, which are comparable to those which you have in this Lord Jesus Christ? He is a person most amiable in Himself; His greatness, His holiness, His wisdom, His faithfulness, His fullness, His kindness, all make Him shine with an admirable luster. His relation to the Father, and the love which the Father bears to Him, His relation unto you, being your Shepherd, your Captain, your Teacher, your Advocate, your Sovereign, your Benefactor, your Brother, your Husband, your Redeemer. All these commend Him to your love; but when matchless beauty and loveliness meet in a person that bears matchless love to you: when this most amiable Lord Jesus loves you with such a free love, such a sure and constant love; when His love is incomparable, surpassing all other love, and incomprehensible, surpassing all knowledge, O! With what activity, ardor, and constancy, should you love so suitable an object!

This article is edited from “The True Christian’s Love to the Unseen Christ” by Thomas Vincent. Check our collection of articles on this topic in the related posts, alternatively, you can get a copy of the book from Amazon.