By this we know love, that He laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.  1 John 3:16 ESV

This year, the kids in our Vacation Bible School will learn about a simple message:  God loves us, so we should love each other.  

Love is a tricky thing to define.  Many people today seem to think that it means simply accepting someone as they are, imperfections and all.  But when those imperfections are not just shortcomings and foibles but personal attacks and insults against us, our obbligation to love one another turns up missing.

God's love is better than that.  We have insulted and rejected Him.  Our sins are not just cute imperfections that He can accept; they are rebellion against God--the very definition of evil.  He can't let that go.  Nor would we want to worhsip a God who fails to judge evil.  But God so loved the world that He sent His only Son, and Jesus so loved us that He laid down His life for us.  He died in our place, bearing the punishment that we deserve for our sins.  God couldn't just accept our sins, but He did something even better--He washed them away by the blood of Christ.

This what our Song of the Month for July is all about.  To read the words and listen to the song, click here.