“Do you wish to see God’s love? look at the cross. Do you wish to see God’s wrath? look at the cross”. – D. A. Carson

It is plausible if you wonder why the title of the book is The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God. If it was the doctrine of predestination or union with Christ, then yes, they are not doctrines that are easy to understand for us. But isn’t God’s unconditional love easy to understand? Other people might say that it is more important to feel the love of God rather than to think about the theology of the love of God. 

In a sense, It is true because knowing God is much more than accumulating knowledge about Him. But, it’s also never less than knowledge. If you want to know all other aspects about the love of God other than that His love is unconditional, then I’d recommend you read this book.

This book explores aspects of God’s love holistically as described in the Bible. The author summarizes the love of God into five categories, as follows:

1. The intra-Trinitarian love of God
2. God’s providential love for all of creation
3. God’s yearning, inviting, commanding love for the whole world
4. God’s effective, electing love toward His church
5. God’s conditional love

Furthermore, the author also elaborates in the book that we need to view the love of God in conjunction with all of His other attributes, like the holiness of God. Common misconceptions, such as a different God in Old Testament and New Testament (Old Testament is angry God while New Testament is gracious God) is also discussed in this book. 

Not only the theological concepts of love of God is expounded, but pastoral implications of this doctrine, such as “God loves the sinner, but hates the sin” is also explored. While some parts of the book can be  scholarly and a little bit hard for laymen’s mind to grasp, as John Piper said, “Raking is easy, but all you get is leaves. Digging is hard, but you might find gold”. 

I recommend this book for those who want to know more about God and His love, and as Paul prays for the Ephesians, I pray that we “will have power, together with all the saints, to comprehend the length and width and height and depth of the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge” (Eph. 3:18 – 19). 

Note: you can access the ebook freely in this link