The Love We Want

May 17, 2021

The years 2020 and 2021 have been memorable for all of us in numerous ways, mostly because of the COVID-19 virus. But singer and American Idol Judge Katy Perry found them memorable for two very special reasons. In August 2020 she and fiancé Orlando Bloom welcomed daughter Daisy Dove into their lives. Then, on May 9, 2021, she celebrated Mother’s Day for the first time as a mother.

Katy wrote emotionally on Twitter, “I found everything I was ever searching for when I became a mother. So grateful for that profound, deep love and honored to join the mama club. Happiest Mother's Day."

I’m going imagine that every emotionally healthy mother can identify with that deep and overwhelming love. But, as great as it is to become a mother, it is only a taste of what God’s love is. I fully understand the desire she has to be loved unconditionally. That is exactly what babies do, and it is what every person longs for. The problem is that the baby grows up and has a free will to choose how they love, when they love, who they love, and all of that. That perfect love is very short-lived. Katy’s parents, her dad a pastor, discovered that with Katy herself, as she grew and became her own very strong personality.

Only God’s love is everlasting and unconditional. I hope she will know that she can find the love for which she ultimately is looking in a vital personal relationship with Jesus. Nothing you’ve ever done or will ever do can stop God from loving you. God said in Jeremiah 31:3, “I love you with an everlasting love” (GW). Think of that for a minute. How long is everlasting?

Well, it’s forever. Forever and ever and ever and ever… more evers than we can list. There is nothing you can ever do that will make God stop loving you; He will love you for eternity. His love isn’t based on what you do. He doesn’t wait for you to do something loveable to love you. It’s based on who He is. He is your Father and Creator. The only reason you’re alive is because God made you to love you.

That’s why God sent His Son: “For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16 NLT). God wants you to know His love. He wants you to not just intellectually KNOW it. He wants you to feel His love. God’s love will transform you when you feel it. It turns somebody who is hateful, bigoted, or racist into a kind, gentle, and loving person. When God’s love actually reaches your heart, it changes you. Jesus said that when we actually know Him, it makes us so loving to others that the world will know we are His followers and will believe that He is truly God (John 17). The kind of love He is talking about is not a fluffy love; it is the deeply committed love that loves others in the style and degree that God loved us.

If your life hasn’t changed, then you don’t know God. You can’t have somebody as big as God come into your life and not be changed by it. I didn’t say that—Jesus did.

When God’s love comes into your life, it changes how you react to everyone else. When you truly understand and experience the love of God, you can’t help but pass it on to others. That’s what Katy Perry is looking for. She and the rest of the world, including you and me. It is the only love that truly satisfies forever.