He Loves Me!

By Cedrick Brown and Lisa Brown

He Loves Me! by Cedrick Brown vigorously wrestles with the underlying
question within ones heart: Does God really love me?
Over the years, I have encountered countless people who do not feel loved
by their parents, their spouses, their children, or anyone at all. This unloved
feeling, I have also witnessed, possesses the power to cause them to ponder
the seemingly never-ending question: Does God love me? Like them, I too
have wrestled with this frustrating question, which eventually manifested
itself in many tangible ways that those closest to me found themselves
engulfed by its fl ames.
Maybe the side eff ects of this age-old question have tipped your life scale in
the wrong direction, and those around you are feeling its eff ectsunloved
by you.
Like petals falling from a fl ower, we all grapple on the inside with this
unavoidable question: Does God love me? We still pluck each imaginary
petal, with each emotional stroke, saying . . .
He loves me,
He loves me not,
He loves me.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Mar 13, 2015
• ISBN: 9781503548923

Cedrick Brown

Cedrick D. Brown was born and raised the last of eight children in Compton, California, which is labeled the “Gang Capital of the World.” After playing defensive back for the Philadelphia Eagles, he served as the team chaplain for the Eagles and the Temple University football team. He is the founding pastor of Commitment Community Church of Lindenwold, New Jersey—one of the most racially and culturally diverse churches in the state of New Jersey. His work has been featured in South Jersey Magazine, the Courier-Post, and Barclay Press. Cedrick is also the author of Influencing Your World, The Racial and Cultural Divide: Are We Still Prejudiced?, and Act Like A Man: Woman Can You Help Me?

Book preview

Copyright © 2015 by Cedrick Brown.

ISBN:      Softcover        978-1-5035-4893-0

                 eBook            978-1-5035-4892-3

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Scripture quotations marked NASB are taken from the New American Standard Bible, © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by the Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.

Rev. date: 03/12/2015

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Contents

Foreword

Acknowledgments

Love

Love, More than Just a Feeling

Setting the Stage for Love

Part One

Why Would We Ever Think God Doesn’t Love Us?

Chapter One He Doesn’t Respond to Me

Chapter Two God Doesn’t Give Me What I Ask For

Chapter Three We Don’t Abide in His Love

Chapter Four Abiding in His Love

Part Two

How Can We Confidently Know God Loves Us?

Setting the Stage for Love

Chapter Five We Know God Loves Us When We Are Born Again and Born of God

Chapter Six We Know God Loves Us When We Love Others

Chapter Seven We Know God Loves Us When We Live because of and for Christ

Chapter Eight We Know God Loves Us When We Are Perfected by Loving the Unlovable

Chapter Nine We Know God Loves Us When We Confess Jesus Christ as the Son of God

Chapter Ten We Know God Loves Us When We Know and Believe God’s Love

Chapter Eleven We Know God Loves Us When We Abide in God and He in Us

Chapter Twelve We Know God Loves Us When We Are Confident in Our Coming Judgment

Chapter Thirteen We Know God Loves Us When We Are as He Is in the World

Chapter Fourteen We Know God Loves Us When We Are Not Afraid

Part Three

What Are the Benefits of God’s Love?

Setting the Stage for Love

Chapter Fifteen If God Be for Us, Who Can Be against Us?

Chapter Sixteen How Will He Not Also with Him Freely Give Us All Things?

Chapter Seventeen Who Will Bring a Charge against God’s Elect?

Chapter Eighteen Who Will Separate Us from the Love of Christ?

Part Four

What Is Our Responsibility in the Love Relationship?

Setting the Stage for Love

Chapter Nineteen We Love

Chapter Twenty We Love One Another

Chapter Twenty-One We Love to Keep His Commandments

Conclusion

Love You Too

Study Guide

Part One

Why Would We Ever Think God Doesn’t Love Us?

Chapter One He Doesn’t Respond to Me

Chapter Two God Doesn’t Give Me What I Ask For

Chapter Three We Don’t Abide in His Love

Chapter Four Abiding in His Love?

Part Two

How Can We Confidently Know God Loves Us?

Chapter Five We Know God Loves Us When We Are Born Again and Born of God

Chapter Six We Know God Loves Us When We Love Others

Chapter Seven We Know God Loves Us When We Live because and for Christ

Chapter Eight We Know God Loves Us When We Are Perfected by Loving the Unlovable

Chapter Nine We Know God Loves Us When We Confess Jesus Christ as the Son of God

Chapter Ten We Know God Loves Us When We Know and Believe God’s Love

Chapter Eleven We Know God Loves Us When We Abide in God and He in Us

Chapter Twelve We Know God Loves Us When We Are Confident in Our Coming Judgment

Chapter Thirteen We Know God Loves Us When We Are as He Is in the World

Chapter Fourteen We Know God Loves Us When We Are Not Afraid

Part Three

What Are the Benefits of God’s Love?

Chapter Fifteen If God Be for Us, Who Can Be against Us?

Chapter Sixteen How Will He Not Also with Him Freely Give Us All Things?

Chapter Seventeen Who Will Bring a Charge against God’s Elect?

Chapter Eighteen Who Will Separate Us from the Love of Christ?

Part Four

What Is Our Responsibility in the Love Relationship?

Chapter Nineteen We Love

Chapter Twenty We Love Each Other

Chapter Twenty-One We Love to Keep His Commandments

Notes

More about Cedrick

Endnotes

Dedication

To my Father in heaven, the God of all creation, Your more than amazing love has swept me off my feet. Once I have truly encountered Your unfailing and unfading love, my life has never, ever been the same. Through the power of Your love, You’ve taught me how to love my wife and my children, of course, but You’ve also trained me through Your unwavering love toward me, how to even love my enemies. Because of this, Satan has lost his grip and I now walk in victory, and I am forever deeply indebted to serve You for the rest of my life.

With all my heart, soul, and mind.

Love’s in need of love today

Don’t delay send yours in right away . . .

Hate’s goin’ round breaking many hearts

Stop it please before it’s gone too far.

—Stevie Wonder,

Love’s in Need of Love Today

Foreword

He loves me. He loves me not. For years this was my dilemma: did God love me or not? Sadly, most of the time my flower petals ended with the not. As a young lady, I constantly struggled with the question of God’s love for me. The cause, you may ask? I had no relationship with my earthly father. I, like many, needed a father I could see and touch, which made it hard for me to believe that God in heaven—my Heavenly Father—would love me and think I was special. It wasn’t until a difficult time in our family arose that I was able to see and, most of all, experience God’s love for me like never before. In this season, during my deepest and darkest desperation, God took me on a journey of love. In a moment of urgency, my Heavenly Father, through the pages of scripture, spoke words of love within my heart. His words helped silence a longing in my heart to be loved. My Father from heaven was helping me answer a nagging question once and for all. He reassured me, and I now know with great confidence that God loves me just as I am—faults and all!

As I continue to reflect, I vividly remember the words of love that impacted me the most found in Isaiah 49:15–16, which says, "Can a woman forget her nursing child and have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, but I will not forget you. Behold, I have inscribed you on the palms of My hands; Your walls are continually before Me." These words set my heart free, and from that point on, I have been convinced beyond any shadow of doubt that my God loves me! I was reassured because an engraver’s tool cuts deep, and nothing can ever erase its work. It is permanent, and so is God’s love and care for me.

My prayer for you as you read the book He Loves Me, written by my husband, along with the scripture, is that you too will experience the irresistible, insatiable love of the Father for you!

Remember, with God there is no He loves me not; it’s just "He loves me!"

Lisa Brown

Acknowledgments

Dad—Louis Brown

Thanks for modeling how a man can love his God and his wife as Christ has also loved the church.

Mom—Dorothy Brown

Thanks for the unconditional love you’ve displayed and continue to display in the lives of all eight of us.

Brothers and sisters—Paulette, Charles, Cynthia, Dorothy-Ann, Durante, Terry, and Anthony

Thanks for the unique love you have shown toward me. Unique because I have received love uniquely from each one of you over the years; I cherish it all.

Brett Fuller, Alan Reid, Reggie White, and the elders of Commitment Community Church

Thanks for teaching and sharing with me that it’s healthy for me, especially a man, to say I love you.

Commitment Community Church

I love you dearly, and thanks for loving me back.

Joshua, Jessica, and Jaime

I love you!

My bride—Lisa

Thanks for being my tool of love. God loves me enough to give me you, and because of you, I have learned how to love better. Thanks for really loving me!

Love

Love, More than Just a Feeling

In a recent article titled How to Feel Loved,¹ the author suggests the following:

Feeling unloved? It can be a raw, hollow feeling to think that nobody loves you in life. However, you may not know how much you are actually loved because of miscommunication or misunderstanding. A lot of the time, we feel unloved because we’ve shut ourselves away from the ability to feel loved. You can open yourself up to those feelings again and encourage the people you love to open up their hearts.

Now, the author makes a few valid points. There is much miscommunication or misunderstanding concerning the topic and feeling of love. We do have the tendency to shut ourselves away from the ability to feel loved. And we can and even should open up ourselves to those feelings again and encourage the people we love to open up their hearts too.²

So the author goes on to suggest a few remedies, such as building up your self-esteem, building up your self-confidence, getting help, evaluating love and finding love by being open about your feelings, opening yourself to new love, volunteering, getting a pet, finding people like you, and even joining a church.³ I will agree that it’s good to improve how you feel about yourself, to be genuine about your feelings, and to volunteer. Yes, pets are good company. It’s good to have friends you enjoy being around with, and it’s even important to join a church. Nevertheless, none of the above can really change how one feels about love and about experiencing love from someone.

The love mankind needs—yes, the love even the legendary Stevie Wonder sang about—is more than just a feeling. Yes, over time many have miscommunicated and misunderstood much about this love. Yes, we shouldn’t shut ourselves to it, but we should open our hearts to it, and we should encourage the people we love to open up their hearts to it. This love I speak of is the unconditional love of an infallible God, which is available for fallible people like you and me.

God’s love, found in and through the finished work of Jesus Christ, is far more than a feeling, though feelings will be rightfully stirred, because one cannot truly encounter the awesome love of God without feeling something on the inside that is unexplainable. Nevertheless, if God’s love were hinged on our feelings, we would continuously question His love for us like an elementary love found on the playground of life. We would reach for the nearest flower and begin plucking each petal, reciting, He loves me, He loves me not, He loves me, He loves me not. Always ending with the last petal, exclaiming with great pain, He loves me not.

My hope today is to inspire your feelings of love, not by giving you a series of steps toward knowing God’s love, but simply through the facts. The facts of God’s love for you should help you, as they have so helped me throughout the years, to become convincingly sure of God’s love for you. A love so substantial that it has healed me from the inside out, and it has empowered me to live victoriously over Satan’s grip, which has further empowered me to freely love my enemies. These facts from the authority of God’s Word will become your compass for love when the billows from the seas of life come crashing down on you. From these facts, you will ever more possess the capacity to navigate back toward God’s unconditional, uncompromising love.

With flower in hand, let’s proceed.

He loves me,

He loves me not,

He loves me,

He loves me not,

Yes, He loves me!

Setting the Stage for Love

Love is as critical for your mind and body as oxygen. It’s not negotiable. The more connected you are, the healthier you will be both physically and emotionally. The less connected you are, the more you are at risk. It is also true that the less love you have, the more depression you are likely to experience in your life. Love is probably the best antidepressant there is because one of the most common sources of depression is