Guess How Much I Love You - Sam McBratney & Anita Jeram

This book, along with the TV series that was produced from it, were a staple for our kids growing up.

Little Nut Brown Hare wants Big Nut Brown Hare to know how much he loves him but everything he thinks of, Big Nut Brown Hare has a bigger example. They compare their love to the height they can reach or jump and to a distance of something they can see like down the road to the river.

I’ll not spoil the ending but it’s very cute.

As with all good stories, they connect with a desire or longing in us. They connect us to something in our heart and soul. In this case, we all want to know that we’re loved. We all like to know how much we’re loved. We all like to express how much we love other people.

There’s a deep desire in us to be securely loved. Loved in such a way that when things go wrong, circumstances are hard, or we fail in some way, we will be safe.

The problem we have is that however much we love someone and however much they love us, that love isn’t perfect. We can say that we love unconditionally. We can say our love will last forever. We can say that nothing will every change it. But we can’t guarantee that.

When couples make vows on their wedding day, they commit to loving one another through thick and thin, even until death parts them. But, sadly, we know that many marriages end with divorce rather than death. I love my wife and my kids so much. But I am well aware, as are they, that my love isn’t perfect and my love isn’t enough.

We’re hardwired for love. We’re hardwired for relationships. Yet, none of the relationships we have on this earth, even the closest and most intimate ones, satisfy the deepest longing in us for love. That’s because we need know and enjoy a greater love. We were created by the God who is love. God; Father, Son and Spirit have always existed in perfect love and made us to know and enjoy that love.

We don’t know it because we’ve rebelled. We’ve rejected God and gone our own way. Without a relationship with God, we have a serious love deficit that we can never make up. That’s why we need to know Jesus.

As a kid in church we used to sing a song called ‘Jesus’ Love is Very Wonderful.’ Part of it went like this:

“So high you can’t get over it,

So low you can’t get under it,

So wide you can’t get round it,

Oh! Wonderful love.”

In Ephesians chapter 3 the apostle Paul prays that the Christians he’s writing to will be able to grasp the enormity of the love of Jesus.

“And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge…” Ephesians 3v17b-19a

We want to be loved. We want to know how much we’re loved. And the Bible tells us we are more loved than we can dream or imagine. In fact it doesn’t just tell us how big the love of Christ is, we get a mind-blowing definition too:

“In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”

1 John 4:10

We don’t need to guess how much God loves us. He’s shown us in the most amazing way. God’s love for us the gold standard. There is no greater love.

This isn’t a love based on something in us, or on something we’ve done. This is love that never fails. This is a love that endures forever. This is why we can always be safe and secure in.

Jesus Christ laid down His life for us while were still His enemies, rebels against His rightful rule. He paid the price for our sin by dying on the cross. Jesus said “I love you” with a crown of thorns rammed onto His head, nails driven through His hands and feet, and by being forsaken by His Father instead of us.

We don’t need to guess how much God loves us. We need to come to Him and enjoy it.