By Hymn Stories

      S. Trevor Francis, 1834-1925

      "I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ." (Ephesians 3:17, 18)

      Who can fully grasp the dimensions of God's great love for us? Yet the Scriptures teach that we are to have a growing awareness of divine love. Love is the very heart and essence of God, not only for the lovely but for the vilest of sinners. Christ did not die merely to display God's love--He died because God is love (1 John 4:8). If the New Testament teaches us anything, it teaches us about God's love in searching for lost men. Becoming a Christian in a very real sense is simply putting ourselves in the way of being found by God--to stop running from His loving pursuit.

      As we mature in the Christian faith, we begin to realize that every situation that comes our way is an opportunity for God's love to be made more evident in our lives. Once we realize this, our attitude changes dramatically toward suffering people as well as toward ourselves when we are called to suffer. Then even during those times when our spiritual fervor declines and our devotion to God subsides, despite these shortcomings, God's love remains unfailing--continually working for our eternal good.

      The author of this text, S. Trevor Francis, was a prominent lay leader with the Plymouth Brethren in England and was known as an effective devotional speaker throughout Great Britain and around the world.

      "O the deep, deep love of Jesus--vast, unmeasured, boundless free! Rolling as a mighty ocean in its fullness over me, underneath me, all around me, is the current of Thy love--leading onward, leading homeward, to my glorious rest above.

      "O the deep, deep love of Jesus--spread His praise from shore to shore! How He loveth, ever loveth, changeth never, nevermore. How He watches o'er His loved ones, died to call them all His own; how for them He intercedeth, watcheth o'er them from the throne.

      "O the deep, deep love of Jesus, love of ev'ry love the best! 'Tis an ocean vast of blessing; 'tis a haven sweet of rest. O the deep, deep love of Jesus--'tis a heav'n of heav'ns to me; and it lifts me up to glory, for it lifts me up to Thee."

      For Today: Romans 5:8; 8:35-39; Ephesians 3:14-20; 1 John 4:8; Revelation 1:5,6

      Ask God to enlarge your understanding of His great love and the ability to share it with others.