“The kindness and the love of God our Savior” (Titus 3:4)  

Some saints come into the Kingdom of God after years of self-abuse, unable to comprehend God’s love. I was one of them. Before God saved me, I used people for my pleasure, and knew only the kind of “love” that says, “Scratch my back, and I’ll scratch yours”. After God saved me, I force myself every day, for three years, to trust the Scriptures that said Christ loves sinners, and by inference, God loves me. As far as I could know, I obeyed everything the Bible and the Holy Spirit led me to do, but I prayed that one day, God would help me experience, “the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us” (Romans 5:5). 

 In this state, I walked by faith that God loved me. By the grace of God, I tried to obey the Holy Spirit and God’s Word, while trusting God would also help me to one day feel His love. It was much later, I realized, God fulfilled this Scripture in me: “He who says, ‘I know Him,’ and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoever keeps His word, truly the love of God is perfected in him. By this we know that we are in Him. He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked” (1 John 2:4-6). The Greek word translated “perfected” is “teleio”, from which we get the English word “teleological”, which means, “the purpose of the thing”. God’s purpose is that you grow in love for Him by doing what He commands. 

 After three years, I could say with feelings of love, “I myself was foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating others. But then, the kindness and the love of God my Savior was manifested, not by works of righteousness which I did, but according to His mercy He saved me, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on me abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior” (Titus 3:3-6). Even if you can’t say this with feelings of love, say it with faith until “the love of God pours into your heart by the Holy Spirit He’s given to you” (Romans 5:5).