The foundation every other truth about God is built upon.
What is the very first thing someone should know about God?
If I had to choose just one truth, it wouldn’t be about His power, His wisdom, or even His holiness.
It would be this:
God loves you, and because He loves you, He accepts you.
That simple truth has the power to transform the way you relate to Him for the rest of your life.
We Live in a World That Measures Our Worth
Whether we realise it or not, many of us spend our lives trying to prove ourselves.
We measure our value by our performance, our achievements, our appearance, or what other people think of us. We quietly believe that acceptance must be earned.
At first, that mindset can even seem productive.
Work harder.
Do better.
Be stronger.
Keep everyone happy.
But sooner or later, life reminds us that we cannot carry that weight forever.
A disappointment.
A failure.
A broken relationship.
A loss we never expected.
Suddenly, everything we built our identity on begins to shake.
This is why the gospel begins somewhere completely different.
It begins with God’s love.
The apostle John writes:
“We love because he first loved us.” (1 John 4:19)
Notice the order.
We don’t love God first so that He will love us.
He loved us first.
Everything else flows from that.
God’s Love Came Before You Ever Responded
In the Old Testament, God’s people were commanded:
“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” (Deuteronomy 6:5)
But as the gospel spread beyond Israel, the apostle Paul revealed something even deeper.
He wrote:
“Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ… God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ.” (Ephesians 1:4–5, NLT)
Pause for a moment and let that sink in.
Before you had done anything right…
Before you had done anything wrong…
Before you had even taken your first breath…
God had already set His love upon you.
We hear the words “God loves you” so often that they can lose their impact.
But if we truly understood them, they would change everything.
The Moment This Became Real for Me
I didn’t fully understand this until one of the hardest seasons of my life.
My wife, Eniye, and I experienced two miscarriages. The second happened around the same time of year as the first. We had lost our baby at five months into the pregnancy.
We were devastated.
For two weeks we barely left our bedroom. We cried. We prayed. We questioned. Like many people who experience deep pain, I found myself asking God,
“What is happening?”
During that season I listened to a sermon where the preacher simply said,
“God loves you.”
At first, I almost brushed it aside.
I’d heard those words before.
But later, as I spent time with God, something changed.
I began to realise that He had never left us.
He was with us in our grief.
He felt our pain.
Yes, we live in a broken world where tragedy exists.
Yes, bad things happen.
But suffering does not mean God has stopped loving us.
In fact, His love became more real to me in my weakness than it ever had in my strength.
That experience changed the way I see God.
The First Expression of God’s Love Is Acceptance
If someone asked me where to begin in knowing God, I would start here:
God accepts you.
Many people believe they need to clean themselves up before coming to Him.
We tell ourselves:
“I’ll pray once I’ve sorted my life out.”
“I’ll come back to God when I’ve stopped struggling.”
“Surely He doesn’t want to hear from me after what I’ve done.”
But Jesus says something completely different.
“All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away.” (John 6:37)
Notice what He doesn’t say.
He doesn’t say,
“Whoever fixes themselves first…”
“Whoever becomes worthy…”
“Whoever gets their life together…”
He simply says,
“Whoever comes.”
That invitation is still open today.
You Don’t Have to Earn Your Place
I love the picture Jesus paints.
God isn’t standing at the door with crossed arms, waiting for us to explain ourselves.
He isn’t asking us to prove we’ve changed.
He isn’t keeping score.
He simply welcomes us.
That is exactly what Jesus illustrated in the story of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11–32).
The son expected rejection.
Instead, he found a father running towards him.
Not because he deserved it.
But because he belonged.
That is God’s heart towards us.
We often think acceptance comes after transformation.
The gospel says transformation begins with acceptance.
Come Just As You Are
If there is one truth I hope you carry away from this article, it is this:
You are accepted by God.
That doesn’t mean He leaves us where we are.
His love changes us.
But it changes us because we know we are already loved—not because we are trying to earn His love.
Other people may judge you.
You may feel like you’ve failed.
You may carry regrets that no one else knows about.
Yet Jesus still says:
“Whoever comes to me I will never drive away.”
Come to Him.
Not because you’ve earned the right.
But because He has already made the way.
A Final Thought
One of the commitments I’ve made in my own life is to keep reminding people of this truth because I believe it establishes the right foundation for our relationship with our Father in heaven.
Before God asks anything from us…
Before we can ever love Him…
He has already loved us.
Before we ever accepted Him…
He accepted us.
When we truly believe that, something changes.
We stop running from God.
And we begin walking with Him.
Because the first perspective we should have of God is this:
He loves you.
He accepts you.
And His invitation has always been the same:
“Come.”
Reflection
Perhaps today you feel like you’ve drifted from God.
Maybe you’ve been waiting until you felt “good enough” to come back to Him.
Jesus’ invitation hasn’t changed.
Come.
Just as you are.
Because the relationship doesn’t begin with your love for God.
It begins with His love for you.
