I Love You This Big

In this year’s finals, Scotty McCreery, the new American Idol, sang a song called, “I Love You This Big.”  It’s a love song that might end up being sung at weddings, but it has caused me to reflect on a bit more than that.

Little kids like to spread their arms out as wide as they can and look at their moms or dads and say, “I love you this big!”  Some of them were taught that by their parents, who want them to know that they deeply love them.  This is like our relationship with our Father in Heaven.  When we love Him, we want to hold our our arms to Him and declare our love.  The reason we love Him in this way is because Jesus came here to earth and revealed our Father’s great love for us.

How did Jesus do this?  He stretched out His arms wide and let the Roman soldiers nail his hands to the cross.  He gave up His life for us in order to pay the price for our sins.  He didn’t want us to die and to be separated from our Heavenly Father forever in hell.  Instead, He mirrored the Father’s love for us.  The Father’s arms are open wide, ready to welcome us into His Presence.  He is just waiting for us to respond to His love and to express our love back to Him.  Jesus showed us His big love for us.  Let’s look to Him and tell Him, “I love You this big!”

I suspect that Scotty knows the love of Jesus. He wore a cross every week on American Idol and kept his songs and actions clean in spite of the sexual connotations, dances, and dress of many of the contestants.  He wears an “I am second” bracelet.  And when he won, he said, “First of all I want to thank the Lord.”

Maybe he sang his song about human love to reflect the love that God has shown us.  He declares in his song that he knows what love is.  The Bible teaches us that there is no greater love than that one person lays down his or her love for another.  It also teaches us that we should love God above everything and everyone else and love others in the way we love ourselves.  As you listen to his song, sing to God, “I love You this big!”