God Loved Us First

                                 "Never did creature turn his affections toward God,
                                  if the heart of God were not first set upon Him."
                                                                                 John Owen



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                           Only the ones the Father draws to the Son will come to Him.
                           God acts first and gives eternal life to everyone who comes
                           to Him in faith.

                           God shows His love for His people by electing them to salvation.

                                        [Jesus said],

                                        "No one can come to me unless the Father who
                                         sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at
                                         the last day."
                                                                          John 6:44


                           God opens the hearts of those He calls, enabling them to
                           trust in Him.


                                         "One of those listening was a woman named
                                           Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth from the city
                                           of Thyatira, who was a worshiper of God.

                                           The Lord opened her heart to respond to
                                           Paul's message.  ... she and the members
                                           of her household were baptized ..."
                                                                             Acts 16:14, 15a


                           God is Sovereign and has the right to give His mercy to
                           whomever He wishes, and to harden whomever He wishes.


                                           "For he [God] says to Moses,

                                                    'I will have mercy on whom I
                                                    have mercy, and I will have
                                                    compassion on whom I have
                                                    compassion."
                     
                                             It (God's unconditional election) does not,
                                             therefore, depend on man's desire or effort,
                                             but on God's mercy.

                                             Therefore God has mercy on whom He wants
                                             to have mercy, and He hardens whom He
                                             wants to harden."
                                                                         Romans 9:15-16, 18


                           God showed His love for His people by sending His only
                           Son as the Substitute for their sins.  We love Him because
                           He loved us.


                                             "In this is love:  not that we have loved God,
                                              but that He loved us and sent His Son to be
                                              the propitiation for our sins.

                                             We love because He first loved us."
                                                                        1 John 4:10, 19