Does God Love Me?

You Are the One Jesus Loves

Scripture References

Primary text

• John 3:16
• Romans 5:8
• 1 John 4

Other references

• Luke 9

Overview

At this Christmas gathering the sermon answers one aching question: “Does God love me?” Beginning with John 3:16, the pastor insists we hear the familiar verse as though for the first time. He contrasts the world’s merit-based love with God’s value-giving love, illustrates that love with his decades-old teddy bear “Bobby,” and traces the transformation of the hot-headed disciple John into “the one Jesus loved.” The call is clear: believe that God’s unconditional love in Jesus is personally aimed at you—right now.

Context

• Congregation stood to honor Scripture on Christmas week.
• Message title announced: “Does God Love Me?”
• Immediate corporate prayer asked God to “open up heaven and reveal Your love.”

Main Points

Two very different kinds of love

• Love #1: loves because the object is valuable—countertops, shoes, collections, anything admired or earned.
• Love #2: loves and therefore gives value to the object.
• The speaker confessed never feeling worthy of the first kind, which fuels doubts about God’s love.

Illustration: Bobby the Bear – love that gives value

• Story: From childhood the pastor clung to a worn, smelly teddy bear named Bobby—originally his mother’s toy from the 1940s. Missing fur, crooked eyes, magic-marker nose, essentially “a rag doll,” yet still priceless to him.
• Point: “You ain’t nothing but a rag doll… but you’re God’s rag doll.” Value comes from the one who loves.
• Bobby was placed onstage as a visual reminder throughout the sermon.

God demonstrates this love in Christ

• “While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8, read aloud)

• Love is God’s essence, not merely His action: “God is love.” (1 John 4)
• God didn’t shout love from heaven; He showed it on earth through the virgin birth of Jesus, sent “that we might live through Him.”
• Therefore God’s love doesn’t look for worthiness; it makes us worthy.

From “Son of Thunder” to “the one Jesus loved”

• Writer of 1 John was the disciple John—once a brash fisherman nicknamed “Son of Thunder” (see Luke 9 reaction: wanting to call fire down).
• Spending time with Jesus reshaped John’s identity; three times he calls himself “the disciple whom Jesus loved.”
• Identity lesson: God’s love overrides labels of failure, temper, or past sin.

You are the one

• Congregation was led to close eyes and softly declare, “I am the one Jesus loves.”
• Emphasis: regardless of regret, shame, or how dark life feels, nothing can separate us from Christ’s love.
• Christmas celebrates that love becoming flesh “to save His people from their sins.”

Key Truths

• God’s love gives value; it is not triggered by value.
• Our flaws and secrets are fully known, yet we are fully loved.
• Love defines God’s nature; it is not a mood or response.
• Jesus’ birth, death, and resurrection are the ultimate demonstration of that love.
• Accepting God’s love redefines identity—no longer by past failures but by Christ’s affection.

Response

• Receive Jesus’ unconditional love personally.
• Release shame, regrets, and self-loathing; let God’s love assign you worth.
• Declare regularly: “I am the one Jesus loves.”
• Pray for family and friends who have not yet experienced this love and look for Spirit-led moments to show it.
• Invite others to hear the gospel during the Christmas season.

Closing

The pastor urged every listener to be convinced that nothing—“neither death nor life… nor anything else in all creation”—can separate them from God’s love in Christ. He invited believers to intercede for loved ones and led seekers in a prayer of surrender, reminding all:

“You are the one that Jesus loves.”

Prayer

The congregation prayed for open hearts to God’s love, for boldness to share it with others, and—through a guided salvation prayer—for many to receive forgiveness, be filled with the Holy Spirit, and begin a new life in Jesus.