8 Ways You Can Discover God's Love

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Perfect love is the essence of God. 1 John 4:8 tells us something very important about God’s character—that He does not only feel love, He is love.

But sometimes, the warm sun of God’s love can feel like it has sunk below the horizon of our lives. When we experience hardship, or even just a dry spell in our faith, we can lose sight of the unconditional love of the Lord.

Thankfully, God has left love letters for us to find when we lose sight of Him. These love letters are etched into all of creation—into nature, into art, history, your own heart, and even humanity, itself. And that’s only the beginning.

Sometimes, we just need a little reminder to take a look around us in order to recapture the everlasting love of God. If you’re missing God’s warmth, let this list of 8 ways you can discover God’s love be just the reminder you need to find it once again.

In Scripture

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If you want to discover God’s love for you, scripture is the place to look. It contains God’s complete revelation about Himself, and within the pages of the Bible, you will find everything you need to know about His character.

First of all, you’ll find that God plays no favorites—Christ died not for the few, but for the world. God doesn’t love the rich more than the poor. He doesn’t love the powerful more than the weak. He doesn’t love the pious priest more than the average churchgoer. Job 34:19 tells us that God “Show now partiality to princes, nor regards to the rich more than the poor, for they are all the work of his hands”.

Second, you’ll realize that you are the work of His hands. Think about that. You are a son or daughter of a God whose very essence, as we see in 1 John 4:8, is love.

Third, you’ll find that His love is unconditional and unchanging. Isaiah 40:8 shows us God’s dependable character, saying “The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever”. His love for you will not ever change.

The more you read scripture, the more of God’s love you will discover. Give it a try!

In Nature

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Although scripture is the primary source of information on the love and character of God, He has left clues for us everywhere—particularly for those of us who have a hard time feeling love radiate from ink and paper.

One of those clues lies in nature.

Have you ever simply wondered at the miracle of life? Have you ever marveled at the workmanship found in a mountain peak, or in the simple, soft beauty of moss growing on a log in the forest? Does the earth’s very ability to sustain life amaze you?

If you focus on all of this as the work of God’s hands, you’ll find God’s love in nature. Just look at what He has provided! God created all of this for you—for humankind—and He preserves it all for your benefit.

He crafted the sunrise to inspire your mornings, and the moon and stars to guide you by night. He created the water cycle so that you might always have clean water to drink. He made plants that scrub the air of toxins and microbes that break down the things we throw away.

In nature, you can plainly see how much God cares for His creation, so the next time you feel distant from God, just take a walk outside. Written on every tree, leaf, and creature, you’ll find His love letter to you.

In People

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In Genesis, it is written that every man, woman, and child is made in the image of God. In each of them, we can see His character—and His love.

Before we talk about that, we must acknowledge that yes—people can be horrible. They can be vile and awful. That’s just the truth. In these fallen aspects of humanity, it is difficult to see the image of God.

But in the best part of humanity, we can, indeed, see the love of God.

Someone in your life loves you. It may be a parent, a sibling, a friend, or a spouse. Someone cares for you. If that person is made in the image of God, yet broken and infinitely less, just imagine how much more God loves you. In the love of that person, you can see a microcosm of what God feels for you.

Open your eyes, and you’ll see that the people around you, when they’re at their best, are like lighthouses for God’s character, displaying His love for all to see. Keep this in mind as you interact with others, and you’ll find that love.

In Yourself

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Well look at that. You’re alive!

It is in this simple fact that you can read another of God’s love letters to you. Taking a moment to simply close your eyes and breathe, slowly inhaling and exhaling, can remind you that God so loves you that He chooses to sustain you.

And because He shaped you—every part of you—He knows you intimately. He knows, as Luke 12:7 tells us, every hair on your head.

Think about it: God knows you perfectly, personality flaws, weird thoughts, physical blemishes, and all, and still loves you wholeheartedly. You are of incalculable value to Him.

And look at the gifts He has given you! All of us have things we are good at—you may think you don’t, but you truly do. You are a helper or a guide or a parent or an encourager, or one of a million other things. Examine your life and the role you play in the lives of others—you’ll find your strengths.

God ‘s love is there, as well. Your strengths not only show God’s love for you, but for others, as well. Don’t miss out on the love letter that is you!

In the Universe

Psalm 19: 1-6 tells us that “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard.”

Many people never think about the enormity of what lies beyond our planet’s atmosphere. Space is enormous—unthinkably so.

And, what’s more, it’s dangerous.

Space is full of black holes, supernovas, inhospitable climates, acidic atmospheres, and violently colliding solar systems. Our little blue world just happens to be the perfect distance from our sun, and sits within a solar system that’s on a perfectly peaceful arm of the Milky Way galaxy.

If anything about Earth or its placement in the solar system and galaxy were different, life could not exist. In this, the heavens truly do declare the glory of God.

His love is revealed by the care in which He created our perfect place in what would otherwise be a vast, cold, uncaring universe, and in a way that transcends all language barriers. Look up into the sky tonight, and witness God’s cosmic love letter to man.

In History

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There’s no doubt that human history is filled with tragic events. But history, read as a whole, is another of God’s love letters to humankind—and to you.

God is active, and His guiding hand can be seen throughout history. Time and again the human race has been stricken by one disaster after another in our fallen world, and has even made many attempts to destroy itself through war and conflict.

But God works through all things, and if you look at history through the lens of scripture, you can see God’s guiding, loving purpose in the course of human history.

In scripture, you can see the pattern of God’s large-scale guidance in the history of the Israelites, as written in the Old Testament. They would follow God’s commands for a time, fall away, be shepherded back, and begin the cycle anew—this was called the cycle of apostasy. God led and loved His people over and over, even though they failed him time and again.

We can see this same pattern repeated throughout history—God has never taken His hand from us, even for a minute. He has worked through individuals and nations to not only guide us, even while allowing us the freedom to act of our own accord.

So take a look at history with God’s providence in mind. There, too, you’ll find His love.

In Art

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Think you can’t find God’s love in Picasso or Spielberg? Think again.

It’s amazing how much you can learn about an artist by studying their work. You can go without reading a particular artist’s biography and know them well by what they produce. And just as you can see the attributes of God in nature and the universe—His art—you can see it in the very human art of those who are created in God’s image.

J.R.R. Tolkien, author of “The Lord of the Rings,” once wrote that when writers create fictional worlds, they are engaging in a very special kind of worship—they become “Sub-creators,” bearing the creative image of God in their own small way.

This ability to sub-create isn’t limited to authors. Artists of every kind do this. And in the creativity of human beings, we can see how much God loves us—enough to gift us with the ability to create beauty, even as He does, albeit on a lesser scale. We can fill our own world with wonderful things that move us.

Although human art fades away over time, like all else in this world, it allows us to experience those moments of beauty. And what love letter would be complete without that?

In Prayer

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Finally, we can find the love of God in a close and personal relationship with Him—specifically, through prayer.

Speaking to God not as some distant old man on a celestial throne, but as loving Father, allows us to draw close to Him. And because, as you remember, God’s essence is love, the closer you get, the more of that love you will feel.

Prayer is one of the most important ways to come to know God—we may get information from the Bible, but prayer is often an experience. To fully know God, we need both.

In Matthew 6: 9-11, we learn about what happens when we talk to God. “Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?”

If you speak to God in earnest, He will speak to you. It may not be in audible words. It may not be in the way you expect. But He will speak.

And He will deliver this final love letter to you, personally.

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