How to Stop Trying to Earn God’s Love
Most of us, if we’re honest, measure our relationship with God from our own side. How much have we prayed lately? How faithful have we been? Are we doing enough, and is He pleased with us? None of those questions are bad, but if they’re the only ones we ask, we end up living like someone on a performance review that never ends. Good weeks make us feel close to God. Bad weeks make us feel like He’s keeping His distance until we get our act together.
Scripture starts somewhere else. First John 4:19 says it in a few words: “We love him, because he first loved us.” Our love for God was never the starting point. It’s a response. We didn’t go looking for Him. He came looking for us, through a moment, a person, a word, or a song on a long flight home. If He hadn’t first shown us His love, none of us would have ever turned toward Him.
Paul makes this even plainer in Romans 5. While we were still without strength, Christ died for the ungodly. He points out that almost no one would die for a good person, but God proved His love by dying for us while we were still sinners. God didn’t wait for us to become worth loving. He loved us at our worst and acted on it.
That’s why Ephesians 2 is so freeing. Paul describes us as dead in our sins, following the ways of this world and giving in to whatever our flesh wanted. Then come two of the best words in the Bible: “But God.” Because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ. It is by grace we’ve been saved, through faith, and not by works, so that no one can boast. We get a seat we didn’t earn, and we’re judged on Jesus’ works, not ours.
Any parent understands a small piece of this. There are times when a child has clearly earned a consequence, and you’re ready to hand it out. Then something in you says to give them a hug instead. That doesn’t happen because the child deserved it, and it doesn’t make the rules stop mattering. It happens because love can reach a heart in ways punishment can’t. Romans 2:4 tells us it’s God’s kindness that leads us to repentance. Love does what laws can’t.
This is also why understanding God’s love isn’t a soft add-on to the Christian life. It’s the engine of it. Second Corinthians 5:14 says Christ’s love compels us, so that we no longer live for ourselves but for Him. When we try to serve God out of pressure, we burn out and start keeping score, like the older brother in the story of the prodigal son who stayed home, worked hard, and still felt like a servant. When we serve out of knowing how loved we are, obedience stops feeling like a weight and starts feeling like a response.
It’s worth noticing what Paul prays for the church in Ephesians 3. He doesn’t pray that they’ll finally break their bad habits or try harder. He prays that, rooted and grounded in love, they’ll be able to grasp how wide and long and high and deep the love of Christ is, and to know a love that goes beyond knowledge. Paul believed that if people understood God’s love, everything else would follow.
That love reaches every part of our story. It heals the past, because the One who loved us at our worst has washed us clean. It gives us strength for today, because if God is for us, nothing can stand against us. And it gives us confidence for tomorrow, because Romans 8 says nothing in all creation can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus. When we look back over the valleys and the mountains, the waiting and the hurting, we find the same thing every time. There was Jesus.
This week, look back. Pick one hard season from your life, maybe a loss, a failure, or a time you felt completely alone, and ask the Lord to show you where He was in it. Write down what you see. Then, every time you catch yourself trying to earn your standing with God this week, say it out loud: “He loves me.” It isn’t a magic formula. It’s simply the truth about who you are.
Scripture starts somewhere else. First John 4:19 says it in a few words: “We love him, because he first loved us.” Our love for God was never the starting point. It’s a response. We didn’t go looking for Him. He came looking for us, through a moment, a person, a word, or a song on a long flight home. If He hadn’t first shown us His love, none of us would have ever turned toward Him.
Paul makes this even plainer in Romans 5. While we were still without strength, Christ died for the ungodly. He points out that almost no one would die for a good person, but God proved His love by dying for us while we were still sinners. God didn’t wait for us to become worth loving. He loved us at our worst and acted on it.
That’s why Ephesians 2 is so freeing. Paul describes us as dead in our sins, following the ways of this world and giving in to whatever our flesh wanted. Then come two of the best words in the Bible: “But God.” Because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ. It is by grace we’ve been saved, through faith, and not by works, so that no one can boast. We get a seat we didn’t earn, and we’re judged on Jesus’ works, not ours.
Any parent understands a small piece of this. There are times when a child has clearly earned a consequence, and you’re ready to hand it out. Then something in you says to give them a hug instead. That doesn’t happen because the child deserved it, and it doesn’t make the rules stop mattering. It happens because love can reach a heart in ways punishment can’t. Romans 2:4 tells us it’s God’s kindness that leads us to repentance. Love does what laws can’t.
This is also why understanding God’s love isn’t a soft add-on to the Christian life. It’s the engine of it. Second Corinthians 5:14 says Christ’s love compels us, so that we no longer live for ourselves but for Him. When we try to serve God out of pressure, we burn out and start keeping score, like the older brother in the story of the prodigal son who stayed home, worked hard, and still felt like a servant. When we serve out of knowing how loved we are, obedience stops feeling like a weight and starts feeling like a response.
It’s worth noticing what Paul prays for the church in Ephesians 3. He doesn’t pray that they’ll finally break their bad habits or try harder. He prays that, rooted and grounded in love, they’ll be able to grasp how wide and long and high and deep the love of Christ is, and to know a love that goes beyond knowledge. Paul believed that if people understood God’s love, everything else would follow.
That love reaches every part of our story. It heals the past, because the One who loved us at our worst has washed us clean. It gives us strength for today, because if God is for us, nothing can stand against us. And it gives us confidence for tomorrow, because Romans 8 says nothing in all creation can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus. When we look back over the valleys and the mountains, the waiting and the hurting, we find the same thing every time. There was Jesus.
This week, look back. Pick one hard season from your life, maybe a loss, a failure, or a time you felt completely alone, and ask the Lord to show you where He was in it. Write down what you see. Then, every time you catch yourself trying to earn your standing with God this week, say it out loud: “He loves me.” It isn’t a magic formula. It’s simply the truth about who you are.