DO you love Jesus better now than you did three months since?” I asked a young girl who had then trusted in Him as her Saviour. “Yes, I love Him better every day,” she replied. “Tell me, does Jesus love you better now than He did three months since?”
In a thoughtful and decided tone she replied, “No, He could not do that; He could not love me better!”
Her calm, quiet response brought most forcibly and preciously to my mind that beautiful verse, “Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, and today, and forever.”
Dear reader, have you learned to trust in Jesus as your Saviour? If so, can you rest in Himself as the unchangeable One, as the One who, with unabated affection, “having loved His own which were in the world, loved them to the end;” as the One who is filled with untiring, unchanging love to each and all who have trusted in His finished work for salvation―as the One “who could not love you better?”
The secret of my young friend’s growth in the knowledge and love of the Lord Jesus, and of her “loving Him better every day,” was her rejoicing in the unclouded sunshine of His unchanging love.
Christian reader, why do you doubt His love? What did you find Jesus in the “yesterday” of the past? I hear you reply “Unchangeable; His gracious love my earthly path hath ceaseless viewed;” goodness and mercy dropped from His hands―yea, plenteous droppings; He led me by a right way; it was all love―the sorrows, as well as the joys―all worked together for good.
What of the future―the “forever”? That is all settled; my Father’s many-mansioned house will be my abode throughout a blissful and endless eternity. “Forever with the Lord,” you say, is your cheering hope now.
Let me ask what of the present, the “today”? Does that try you? I think I hear you say: the trials, troubles, weariness, poverty, pain, and temptations from within and without make me listen sometimes to the suggestions of Satan, and I do not realize His love as I should. Looking back I can say, “Ever faithful”; looking forward, “The glory is before me”; but the present tries me, and I sometimes think He does not love me, or He would not allow these heavy strokes.
Oh, dear friend, if thus tempted, let the sweet reply of that dear child speak to you, “He could not love me better.” Impossible, for He is the “same Jesus.” “I change―He changes not.” “His love, not mine, the resting-place.” Doubt no more―for
“‘Tis well when on the mount
We feast and joy with Gods
And ‘tis as well in His account
When we the furnace prove.”
Nothing can ever quench His love, nothing can separate us from it, nothing can change it, for He is the same Jesus, yesterday, today, and forever, and “could not love you better.” H. N.