Dial In with Jonny Ardavanis - Experiencing God’s Love | 10 Wonderful Features | A Deep Dive Into Psalm 103

Episode Date: March 18, 2025

Explore the profound depth of God's love as Jonny Ardavanis and Hank Bowen break down 10 remarkable aspects of God’s love from Psalm 103. This episode examines how God's holy love transforms our understanding of salvation, forgiveness, and our intimacy with Him.Learn why A.W. Tozer believed that "what comes into your mind when you think about God is the most important thing about you" and discover why understanding God's holiness is essential to experiencing His love fully. Jonny explains how God loves each person as if they were the only one to love, and why this truth should be the most soul-satisfying element of our lives.Key topics include:Why God's love is holy, forgiving, and satisfyingThe meaning of God's "loving kindness" (chesed) and its eternal natureHow God demonstrates His love through ChristThe fatherly dimension of God's infinite lovePractical ways to experience God's transforming love dailyWhether you're struggling to feel God's love or seeking deeper spiritual understanding, this conversation provides biblical insights that will renew your perspective on God’s amazing love.Watch VideosVisit the Website Buy Consider the LiliesFollow on Instagram

Augustine says in this regard that God loves each one of us as if there were only one of us to love. I think sometimes we get this idea that God loves the world, right? Macro level, John 3, 16, it says that. But God's love is not divided by the world. God's infinite love is extended to each individual infinitely through the power of his spirit. And that truth ought to be the most soul-satisfying element of our life. All right, welcome back in to the Dial-In Podcast Studio. I'm sitting here with Johnny Artivanis, and I'm going to go off script here for a second, Johnny. People don't know, we recorded this entire podcast. We did. When you didn't have a voice. So maybe we'll drop like a couple of clips here and there and drip them out when Johnny just-

It sounded a little bit Gotham-y. It was Beauty and the Beast. And for the first time, I wasn't Beast. Yeah. For the first time, I was Beauty. We had to redo it. A hundred percent. For those of you who are listening or watching us- My voice is back. Yeah, we appreciate you tuning in. One quick request would be please like, comment, subscribe, help others find these conversations

if they've been helpful to you. We're grateful for the dial-in community and we want others to find it to the extent they're helpful. But today, Johnny, I think we're diving into a core doctrinal point, and that is the love of God. So why don't you frame up for us kind of where are we going with the love of God today? Yeah, you're probably familiar with the quote by A.W. Tozer. I think a lot of people are. He says, what comes into your mind when you think about God

is the most important thing about you. I don't know what you would say is the most important thing about an individual, but Tozer says it's what comes into your mind right when you think about God, because you are the sum and substance of your thoughts about God. And if you can think about God and not have a large view of his love, then the most important thing about you, namely your view of God, is tainted. And so I think in that regard, we need to explore this subject. Even, you know, growing up, I remember praying as even a young kid, Lord, help me to love you. But the Bible says we love because he what?

First loved us. First loved us, which means that to really pray, God, help me to love you. The appropriate prayer would be, Lord, help me to have a deeper understanding of your love for me, because my love for you is just a reflection of my understanding of the love that you've extended to me in Christ. And so in that regard, I want to look to Psalm 103. Psalm 103, there are 42 Kings in the Old Testament. Only one of them is referred to as the man after God's own heart. That guy's name is David. You know him. And I think to be a man or a woman after God's own heart, we need to first and foremost David. You know him. And I think to be a man or a woman after God's

own heart, we need to first and foremost understand the heart of God. And David initially starts off in Psalm 103 with a familiar line. He says, bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Sometimes in church, I mentioned this verse kind of in the course of our worship through song that David's going, come on soul bless the lord he knows that he has to kind of rekindle even his emotions to be able to worship god appropriately he wants to give god the worship he deserves and so he's kind of like when you were i don't know playing football when you're a kid we used to bang helmets i i use that analogy of going like like let's go we actually do that every time before we sit down to record. Yeah, let's go, Hank. David knows that worship is, it's cerebral in the sense where it involves our mind, but it's not stoic in the sense that it doesn't involve our emotions and affections.

And so David wants to throw fuel on the furnace of his affections. And so what he does throughout the remainder of the psalm, I'll make the argument, is draw out great thoughts about the love of God. And you're probably, even before we progress, I want to give 10 realities about the love of God in this episode. But we probably have to start just by explaining fundamentally that God's love, when we talk about it, is different than the love we talk about in our culture because we use love so shallowly. I was going to say, I love Caesar salad that my wife made for lunch today. Is that the same thing we're describing when we talk about the love of God? No, well, obviously not Caesar salad love, but I think it's worth differentiating because the attribute of God that is most well-known, his love is probably the least understood because we

don't really view it through a biblical lens. And I think beginning where I'll begin in just a moment is so critical to our understanding. So 10 realities about the love of God. The first of which is that it says in verse one that we are to bless God's holy name. And that first feature here of the love of God is that God's love is a holy love. And as we consider one attribute of God, it's very important that we do not separate one part of God's attributes or one of God's attributes from the whole, because as I'll talk about even in our next episode, God's attributes are not pieces of the pie. He's not composed of parts. We say in theological terms that God is simple,

not that he's simplistic, but that he's all of his attributes all of the time in full measure. And so it's important to understand that God's love is a holy love. And what we mean by that is that it's unlike every other type of love, every other type of love you've been extended or received, his love is holy. Now in our modern context, when we want to emphasize something, we highlight it, we circle it, we underline it. Yeah, bolden. But in the scripture, when God wants to emphasize something in his word, he repeats it.

And there's only one attribute of God that is emphasized to the superlative degree, and that is the holiness of God. God in Isaiah is not love, love, love. He's holy, holy, holy. holy now the scripture asks us a question you can give the answer exodus 15 11 moses begs the question who is like the lord majestic in holiness what's the answer no one no one and that is the definition of god's holiness that's what it means no one is like god god's holiness is not just his moral purity.

It's his otherness. It's the reality that he is separate and more than any other attribute in the Bible. God is identified by his holiness. If you're in Christ, which you are, God is your friend. He is your father. But when we view him through the lens of his holiness, we also are reminded that he is the king of creation. No one fist bumps God. We are invited in Hebrews to come into his presence with boldness, but not flippantly, not cavalierly. You know, people wear shirts that say Jesus is my homeboy. And I understand that they're referring to the reality that Jesus is a friend of sinners. But in order to understand God's love, you have to elevate your view of God. He is a holy king. And in our modern context, on a quest to elevate the love of God, we have all but practically

denied the truth of his holiness. And in doing so, most people understand neither. I don't know. What song did you grow up singing in the church regarding the love of God? You know, hymn or? I was going to say, we went to a very traditional church. So we were singing to the pipe organ and we were singing all the classics. Even with the kids, you know, if you're singing, Jesus loves me, right?

And Lily sings, Jesus loves me. You know, one of the things that I'm always watching out for as a father is, you know, some of the people that i know and you grew up in the church that have the most difficult time understanding and experiencing the love of god or those that grew up affirming it without ever coming to grips with god's holiness because you can sing amazing love right how can it be that thou my god should stye for me notice that i'm not jumping come on jump in. I care for our listeners too deeply. Yeah, but you could sing about God's love being amazing,

but that'll never be the outburst of your soul unless you begin with his holiness because you can't understand what God loves and how God loves until you understand what he hates. God hates sin. he abhors sin and if you grew up thinking that you're born a child of god rather than a child of wrath you're going to get this faulty type of thinking that god's love is something you actually deserve so if i'm hearing you correctly a shallow view of god's holiness leads to or flows to a shallow

view of god's love ironically yeah because you to a shallow view of God's love, ironically. Yeah, because you need to understand that there was nothing in you that wooed the heart of God. As we're reminded of God's holiness, we are reminded inevitably of God's or our own unworthiness, which accelerates our gratitude. You can't be in awe of the love of God if you're not in awe of who God is as a holy king. And that's so important because people grow up praying, "'Dear heavenly Father,' and yet that's only something

that the gospel extends and affords. And so this is really important to begin here. The first feature is that God's love is a holy love. And that makes the second all the more amazing, that God's love is a holy love and that makes the second all the more amazing that god's love is a forgiving love it says in verse 2 of psalm 103 bless the lord o my soul and forget none of his benefits and then david goes on from there to recount the greatest of benefits that we could ever receive from god in verse 3 and says who pardons all your iniquities and who heals all of your diseases now how, how many of your sins has God forgiven you if you're in Christ?

Yeah, according to that, all of them. All of them. Says who pardons all your iniquities. My friend Eric Tana says that Satan wins if you believe God has forgiven you of 99.9% of your sins. And so here in the scripture, we read that God forgives them all.

But not only does he forgive them, he forgets them and he removes them. Read verse 12 for me, Hank. Yeah, it says, as far as the east is from the west, so far as he removed our transgressions from us. That's an infinite distance by an infinitely loving God. Now, the verse in the Old Testament that is often repeated is the truth that God declares to Moses up on the mountain.

Moses asked God, show me your glory. He begs God, show me your glory. And then God responds with the proclamation of his character. I think first of all, that's worth reiterating. Moses asked God, show me your glory. God responds by proclaiming his character and says, the Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in loving kindness and truth who keeps loving kindness for thousands and then he says who forgives iniquity transgression and sin when God wants to reveal something about his glory he proclaims that he is a forgiving God and this is why David says in Psalm 32 verse one, how blessed is the man whose

transgressions are forgiven. If you want a magnified view of the love of God, you need to take stock of the forgiveness you've received in Christ. It tracks logically from starting from a place of God's holiness, that forgiveness to your exact point just brings in a great, great contrast, the forgiveness and how unholy my background is, but keep, keep going, keep building for us. Yeah. And I, I would say third here that God's love is a satisfying love. David says in verse five of Psalm 103, who satisfies your years with good things so that your youth is renewed like the Eagle. David says, God satisfy, satisfies our years with good things. Now, what is he talking about? Well, this isn't the promise of perpetual youthfulness when he says

that your youth will be renewed like the eagle. David is mindful of the reality that we grow old and we grow numb to most of earth's pleasures. But David is talking here about a satisfaction that never wanes and that is the love of god when he says he satisfies your ears with good things i think at the top of the list david is thinking of what he mentions even in psalm 63 he says because your loving kindness is better than life my lips will praise you i like what john piper says he says every true christian knows the love of god not just as an argument, but as an experience. When we're talking about the love of God, it's not just a truth that we

affirm. It's not a box that we check. It's supposed to be through the power of God's Holy Spirit, a reality that thrills our heart. And that's actually one of the chief functions of the Holy Spirit in Romans 5, that he pours out the love of God into our hearts so that when we sing, God loves me, it actually means something to us. Augustine says in this regard that God loves each one of us as if there were only one of us to love. And even that idea, Hank, I think sometimes we get this idea that God loves the world, right? Macro level, John 3, 16, it says that, but God's love is not divided by the world. God's infinite love is extended to each individual infinitely through the power of a spirit. And that truth ought to be the most soul satisfying element of our life.

Well, it's, as we cover, I mean, we're covering 10 different attributes of God's love or 10 different observations or features about God's love. We can feel like we need to hit through and move through all these observations, but it's just not lost on me that just that one observation, that one element of God's love is overwhelming if you just ponder that reality. There's 8 billion people in the world or whatever the number is. And yet God loves me. He loves Hank. He loves Johnny. He loves you, listener, in a unique way because he created you. I mean, just that is overwhelming. Yeah. That's even Galatians 2.20, right? Paul says, I've been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. The life I now live in the flesh,

I live by faith in the son of God. And then he says, who loved us? No, he says, who loved me and who gave himself up for me. You know, we can confirm the reality of God's satisfying love, but sometimes be lapsing and wanting of that. I want, I want to know that. And so we, like one of the godliest men in the Old Testament, Moses can pray, satisfy us in the morning with your loving kindness. That's Moses' prayer and the only psalm he ever wrote. That's the way he ends. God, please satisfy me with your love.

So wherever there's dissonance between what we're affirming and what we're experiencing, we ask God's spirit to help us to be satisfied by that truth. Yeah, absolutely. The next reality or feature of the love of god is that it's loyal there's a unique word i want you to just maybe punctuate verses 8 11 and 17. it says the lord is gracious compassionate and gracious slow to anger and abounding in what does your bible say loving kindness loving kindness it says in verse 11 for us high as the heavens are above the earth so great is his loving kindness loving kindness verse 17 it says but the loving kindness of the lord you know uh that's a special

word that word loving kindness in the bible is the hebrew word has said it refers to god's steadfast love maybe another translation would say is patient or his loyal love one of the features about the love of god that David highlights here and is highlighted throughout the scripture is that God's love is a love that will not let you go. It's a love that endures. We live in a world where love can often be identified with a fickleness, right? It wanes. But Jeremiah, the prophet in the book of Lamentations when he's lamenting kind of the destruction of the city the destruction of their nation the Babylonians had prevailed

it's heartbreaking time in Lamentations 3 he gives us that well-known verse that the Lord's loving kindness never ceases his compassions never fail they're new every morning and then here's the line of the great hymn, great is your faithfulness. And then Jeremiah says, the Lord is my portion, says my soul. Therefore I have hope in him. If you had to summarize the book of Lamentations, you would have

to say, life is really hard at times, but God's love is loyal. It's there. It's consistent. This world is going to come to an end, but God's love will not. Well, and tying back to where we started with God's holiness, his otherness, just thinking I'm conscious of the fact that people around you can let you down invariably. I know you have a history

and history of broken families or backgrounds where so many people have these important people in their life that fail them at some point. And your point here is God's loving kindness never fails. His loyalty never fails. Yeah, it endures. And even that relates to this fifth feature of the love of God. And that being that God's love is measureless.

Would you read for me, Hank, verses 11 and 12 and 13, actually? Yeah, absolutely. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his loving kindness towards those who fear him. As far as the east is from the west, so far as he removed the transgressions from us. As a father has compassion on his children, so Yahweh has compassion on those who fear him. I love those three verses because there's three consecutive similes there. If you were to ask the question, how much does God love you? God's word gives us the answer. As high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his loving kindness towards those

who fear him. Sinclair Ferguson once said that the greater the lover, the greater the love. The lesser the object of love, the greater the love. The lesser the object of love, the greater the giver of it. And meaning that the higher we view God, the more we're going to think we're unworthy of it. And then the lesser the object of the recipient, that just magnifies the whole thing. And yet our God who extends his love isn't giving us leftover love he's not giving us pods that go to the swine he's loving us with with an unfathomable immeasurable love you know if you're going to use simple language and you were to ask the question how much does god love me you would have to say more than you could possibly fathom

right more than you could possibly explain more than you could possibly write with words and that's why i love the hymn, The Love of God. Could we with ink the ocean fill, or were the sky of parchment made, were every stock on earth a quill, or every man a scribe by trade, to write the love of God above would drain the ocean dry, nor could the scroll contain the whole,

though stretched from sky to sky. I mean, I love that. And then it says, oh, love of God, how rich and pure, how measureless. You cannot measure the love of God. You can't quantify it. And so that's a precious truth. And then sixth feature here is that God's love is a fatherly love, a fatherly love. Would you read for me, Hank, verses 13 and 14? Yeah. As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him for he himself knows our form but he

remembers that we are but dust it says as a father has compassion on his children you uh have babies right how much do you love your your kids yeah a lot um i don't know if you know this but every chapter except for one in the quran begins with words, Allah, the merciful and compassionate. Muhammad got that right out of the Old Testament. The problem is that Allah in the scripture, in the Quran is not merciful or compassionate at all. If you read the Quran, Allah deals with people on the basis of their performance, not on the basis of grace or kindness or love. I remember explaining this to a group of students in Albania at one point. And I had a young man that came up and grabbed me by the collar literally and said,

how come no one ever told me that our God was a father who loved me? And it was a moment I'll never forget. But this fatherly love of God is so critical to understand. Martin Lloyd-Jones, the great preacher, once said that the moment we understand this, that God loves you as a father, it will change everything. Martin Luther says, Abba, that's kind of the equivalent of Papa or Daddy. He says it's a little word, and yet it contains everything. There's two spectrums that people can fall into. They can start viewing God as a father without viewing him as a king, which diminishes their view and the privilege that we've been extended

to call God father. Then people can view God only as a sovereign king and not also view him as father, which diminishes the intimacy they should feel. But it says here that God loves us as a child. He knows our frame. He knows us. He gets us. And the God who knows us at our worst is the one that loves us the most. That's well said. God's love seventh is an everlasting

love. It says in verse 15, as for man, his days are like grass, as a flower of the field, so he flourishes. When the wind has passed over it. It is no more and its place acknowledges it no longer, but the loving kindness of the Lord is from everlasting, everlasting on those who fear him. There is a brevity here, um, to our life. It says, as for man, his days are like grass. You cut your lawn. I think, right? Absolutely. Right. I'm like, you're a real man. Do you cut yours? Yes, absolutely. Electric mower though. Yeah, absolutely.

I got it from Jeff. The Bible says our days are like grass. Spurgeon says, here is the history of grass, sown, grown, mown, blown, gone. I love that. Our life is so brief, but the truth of the scripture is that grass withers, flowers fade, men die, but God's love is from everlasting to everlasting. This is big. Jeremiah

31, 34 says, I have loved you with an everlasting love. There are 26 verses in Psalm 136, where 26 times the verse ends with, for his loving kindness is everlasting. And the last hymn that Jesus ever sang with his disciples is Psalm 118, which begins with four successive verses declaring that God's loving kindness is everlasting. Now, what are the implications you think we draw from that? It's like an amazing observation, I guess, but practically like, how does that maybe influence what, what is the application? What do I take away from the reality that God's love is everlasting? Well, if God's love for you began before time began, well, if there's no beginning of God's love for you, what does that tell you about God's love for you in regards to you earning it?

Totally. So the implication being, I, I do nothing in regards to you earning it. Totally. So the implication being, I do nothing in regards to this love. This love set upon me in a way that I'm not earning. Ephesians 1.4, he chose us in him before the foundation of the world. We use the common vernacular, it takes two to tango, but as it relates to the love of God, it didn't take two to tango. God set his love on you before you existed because his love never had a beginning. It's from everlasting to everlasting, which means his love is uncaused and undeserved. Eighth feature here is that God's love is a demonstrated love. In verse 19, it says, the Lord has established his throne in heavens and his sovereignty rules over all. That's just

speaking to God's sovereignty. And we'll talk about that more in our next episode, but read verse 10 for me, Hank. Yeah. He has not dealt with us according to our sins and he has not rewarded us according to our iniquities. Now I want to try to tether these realities together. Verse 19 is about the sovereignty of God and in the sovereignty of God at the appointed time, the one who rules and reigns over all creation, left glory to be born and placed in a manger. He exchanged the crown of glory for a crown of thorns, exchanged the faithful angelic warriors for the fickle crowds. And we read in verse 10 that God does not deal with us according to our sins nor reward us according to our iniquities we've already discovered the and observed the reality that god's love is a forgiving love

but how on earth is it possible for god to not deal with us according to our sins if he's holy and we began there if he's righteous and we began there if he's just how can god not reward us according to our sins what's the answer jesus well yeah it's jesus because on the cross god treated jesus according to our sin and repaid him according to our iniquities if we're in christ and that's a a demonstrated love i remember you know just i think it's ian murray who says if you doubt the love of god you look to the pulpit of calvary where god preached the loudest strongest sermon on his love and it's a demonstrated reality if you doubt god's love you look to the cross i even love what john owen the 17th century english theologian says, he says, the greatest sorrow and burden you can lay upon

the father, the greatest unkindness you can do to him is to not believe that he loves you. I think it's worth understanding that it's not just that we miss out on experiencing the richness of the Christian life when we doubt and don't meditate on the love of God, it would be wounding, right? To you as a father, if your child lived in constant doubt that you loved him. And so we've already examined, Sinclair Ferguson says, the greater the lover, the greater the love, the lesser the object of love, the greater the giver of it. And then he says, I think third here, that the measure of the love is in the measure of the gift. And the gift that God has given to us is his one and only son.

And so this is a demonstrated reality. Jesus takes our place. And that's why God doesn't have to deal with us according to our sins, because he looked at Jesus, declared him guilty and poured out his wrath on his one and only son. And this truth, ninth here, the love of God should have an effect on our life, right? So I think that's the ninth feature in verse 20 is that God's love is a transforming love. Would you read verse 20 for me, Hank? Absolutely. It says,

Bless the Lord, you his angels, mighty in strength, who perform his word, obeying the voice of his word. Bless the Lord, all you, his hosts. You will serve him doing his will. Now, I think, you know, often those who experience pain and trial have a harder time believing in God's love than in God's sovereignty. Sometimes people that are going through deep trouble, I know God's in control, but I'm struggling to experience his love. Why would a good God who loves me allow me to experience such sorrow? And one of the answers from scripture is that we have to understand that God loves to transform those whom he loves. God bids us to come to him as we are, but he has no intention of leaving us as we are. And he loves to transform us.

And even that love here is evidenced in verse 20 that the angels do the bidding of God and they obey the voice of his word. And so do those who love him. It changes everything about us. And even as we could drill down even further on the Psalm, God's love is a very discriminating love. There's certain qualifiers in verse 11, 13, 17, and 18. It says, as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love towards those who what? Fear him. Verse 13,

so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him. It says in verse 17, but the loving kindness of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him. And this is even a component that as we magnify our view of God's holiness and his love, that's going to change. What's the fear of God? Well, it's the awe of God. It's looking at him and it's the worship of God. I find it really fascinating that one of the last things Jesus prayed in the garden before he was taken away to be crucified, he's praying to the Father and he prays on his disciples' behalf and just prays that they would understand and experience the greatness of this love. He says in John 17, Father, I desire that the world would know that you have loved them the way that you love me.

That's a game changer. How much do you think God the Father loves Jesus the Son? A lot. He says, I pray that they would understand that you love them as you love me. Yeah, wow. This 10th feature is right here at the end. And that's just that this is a glorious love. David is so pumped on the love of God that he says in verse 21,

bless the Lord, all you, his hosts, you who serve him doing his will, bless the Lord, all you, his works in all places of dominion, bless the Lord. He's just responding that if you've experienced the love of God, if you're thrilled by it, let's go everybody, everybody right let's give god glory and give him praise we wrote down a couple thoughts but just in regards to how do we respond to this truth you know obviously we want to be satisfied by it but i think it should give us assurance you know god loves us as a father worship right if uh we we want to feed our soul these truths it should give us joy.

Maybe just as we close, Hank, what would you tell someone who's lapsing in their experience of this love or having a hard time believing in this? I feel like it's almost situated throughout the entire episode here. But I think one of the observations to me is just all these truths are embedded in his word and preserved for us. And so one of the things that strikes me is just i mean in this own episode we've gone from the old testament to the new testament prophets everything in between and and these treasures are hidden for us i think how

often i neglect in kind of the the undulations or the fluctuations of my own emotional state throughout the day or weeks or months that these truths are hidden here for us and in the same way that david kind of gathers himself he's almost amping himself up as he's writing this psalm that we can like david read these words and be encouraged they're a balm and a reminder for my own heart yeah what might you add i just think even what you're saying you know they're right here for us in the word jesus says in John 15, abide in my love. And in the same breath, he says, abide in my word, right? Because you can't abide in the love of God if you're not abiding in the word of God. But if you're abiding in the word of God, you can pray and ask God's Holy Spirit,

satisfy me with your love. And so that's a great truth and thankful for that reality. Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for unpacking it, Johnny.