July 24, 2025 - Exodus 33:19 - "God's Sovereign Love"

Exodus 33:19

"And he said, I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee; and will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy."

There is no human love that can ever compare to the love of the LORD God for His people. As much as we may profess love for our spouses and children, we must honestly admit that our love is often conditional. We tend to say, “I will love you if you just do this or that for me.” The expression of our love is frequently erratic, unpredictable, and selfish, often governed by our mood at the moment.

Thankfully, the love of God for poor sinners in Christ is not like this. God’s ways and thoughts are infinitely higher than ours and His love is unchanging from everlasting to everlasting toward His elect people.“For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him” (Psalm 103:11). Sadly, many portray the love of God in the same way as their love.“These things hast thou done, and I kept silence; thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself” (Psalm 50:21). How does God’s love differ from what men naturally think?

1). Many say that God loves everyone equally and without exception. However, the Bible sets God’s love forth as a distinctive, distinguishing love. “Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated” (Romans 9:13). His love is particular, as it says in Psalm 103:11:“...toward them that fear him...”

2). Many make God’s love conditional upon man believing first. However, the Scripture says, “We love him, because he first loved us...”(1 John 4:19). If there is any faith, goodness or obedience in any sinner, it is because God first set His love on them. Left to their own decision, none would ever love God, for “There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God” (Romans 3:11).

3). Many would exalt God’s love over His justice. They presumptuously think that God is too loving to send sinners to hell. They assume that if they give their best effort, His love will overlook their ‘shortcomings’. How false this is! For God the Father to show His love toward sinners, He needed to deliver up His Son to redeem and justify them from the curse of the law. The LORD Jesus and His effectual death for the elect as their Substitute is the effect of His everlasting love for them and was not for everyone: “...when Jesus knew that His hour was come that He should depart out of this world unto the Father, having loved His own which were in the world, He loved them unto the end” (John 13:1).

As the glory of God passed before Moses and we read the sovereign declaration of His grace: “I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy.” This is not a wavering love, nor a conditional mercy, but the everlasting, unchangeable, and eternal love of God in Christ. At the cross, where justice and mercy met in perfect harmony (Psalm 85:10), God revealed the fullness of His grace. There, for all His elect, the LORD obtained eternal redemption in accord with His unbreakable covenant love. Because Christ has finished the work, God’s mercy toward His people is not a response to their worthiness, but a reflection of His unchanging purpose and eternal grace.

May every redeemed soul rest in this: that God, Who is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us, has loved us with an everlasting love, and obtained forever an eternal redemption in the blood shed unto death of the LORD Jesus, God's Sacrificial Lamb.