We Love Because God Loves Us

1 John 4:9-13

Our true story comes from a part of the Bible called the First Letter of John. The letter was written by John because he loved Jesus and wanted everyone to know about Him.

Our true story begins with God. Do you know that God LOVES you? It’s true! God LOVES you! Because God loves us so much, He gave us the best gift ever! God gave us His Son, Jesus, to be our friend forever.


Baby Jesus was born on the very first Christmas. 


Did Jesus stay a little baby? 


No. Baby Jesus grew up to do amazing things that only He can do, AND He showed us how to love others.  matter where Jesus went or what He was doing, Jesus stopped to show people that He loved them. 


Like one day, Jesus stopped to talk to a man named Zacchaeus, even though Zacchaeus had made bad choices. Jesus loved Zacchaeus, no matter what. 


On another day, Jesus had been teaching ALL day, and He wanted to take a rest. But Jesus loved all of the people, and He wanted to help them. So, Jesus kept teaching them instead of resting.


Then there was a time Peter, one of Jesus’ good friends, told people that he wasn’t friends with Jesus. How would you feel if one of your good friends said they weren’t your friend? I would feel sad, and it would probably be hard to forgive them, but not Jesus. Jesus loved Peter and forgave him. Jesus is an amazing friend who loved everyone. And God sent Jesus to show us how to love everyone, too.


We can love others by listening to them. We can love others by helping them. And we can love others by forgiving them. When we listen, help, and forgive, we are loving others the way Jesus showed us how to love. And Jesus is such an amazing friend that He will help us love because Jesus can help us do everything!






Bible Verse: I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength. —Philippians 4:13, NLT

Text Truth: Jesus can help me choose love.


Family Devotional

This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: He has given us of his Spirit.
—1 John 4:9-13

In our Bible story, we learned that God loves us so much, He gave us Jesus to be our friend forever. And when Jesus is your friend forever, He can help you do everything! 

I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength. —Philippians 4:13, NLT

With your family, make a list of people you can love because one of the things Jesus can help you do is choose love. Then when you pray, you can ask God to help you love others the way He loves us.

Pray with your family. Allow any family members to pray if they wish. In your own words, say, “Dear God, thank You for loving us so much that You gave us Jesus to be our friend forever. Thank You that Jesus can help us do everything—like choose love. Please help [family member name] choose to love [name they listed]. Help [family member name] choose to love [name they listed] . . . (continue with each family member.) We want to love others the way You love us. In Jesus’ name, amen.”

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Story illustrations are the copyright of Sweet Publishing and licensed by FreeBibleimages (http://freebibleimages.org) for free download under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Share-alike 3.0 unported license.
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