EXTRAVAGANT LOVE

By: Dennis Harworth

EXTRAVAGANT. That’s a word you don’t hear very often. The word means an excessive use of time, money, and material; to go beyond normal bounds, to be unrestrained; to be profusely or exaggeratedly decorative or showy. In addition it means extreme abundance – existing or produced in quantity.

    Extravagant was first used in the 15th century in England, most likely used to describe coronation balls, dubbing of knights, regal parades, and royal weddings. Fast forward to the 21st century and the world witnessed the extravagance of the 34 million dollar royal wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton, in which her wedding dress alone cost $400,000. Don’t despair; extravagance is not limited to the lavish lifestyles of royalty or the rich and famous. Anyone can experience it regardless of their “lot in life”, and it does not necessarily come with a price tag. Extravagance just means going beyond in excess what is expected, usual or normal.

    For example: I love my wife so much that every month I celebrate our wedding anniversary by writing her a poem of love and giving her flowers. Granted, this alone might be considered extravagant. However, on our actual fifteen year anniversary, I wanted to go overboard and do something really special; going way beyond what has now become expected or normal, (even for me). So I bought her jewelry, wrote her a poem, and with the help of my neighbors’ flower gardens, gave her fifteen dozen roses of fifteen different varieties and colors. I had achieved my goal, but then the Lord told me that although my love might be considered excessive, it is only a drop of water compared to the oceans of His love. 

   I tried to grasp the enormity of that statement. The Bible even uses the ocean, so vast and wide (Psalm 104:25 NLT) as one of the ways to describe the immeasurable vastness of His inexhaustible love! When I heard a verse from the song “Your Love Is Extravagant” it helped my understanding. 

Deeper than the deepest ocean,

Your love is higher than the highest mountain

Reaches higher than the heavens

Still it finds its way to me

Finds its way to me

Your love is extravagant

Your love is extravagant

Your love is extravagant

-  Darrell Evans

    You cannot just hear about or just think you know about God's extravagant love, you have to experience His love for yourself. Did you know that you are able to know and comprehend the breadth and length and height and depth of it (Ephesians 3:18-19)? God's love is entire and complete. It reaches every area of our lives and every corner of our existence.

His love is wide — it covers the breadth of your entire life experience. God has given to you all things that pertain to life and godliness.  He has also given to you all of His exceedingly great and precious promises, which enables you to be partakers of His divine nature (2 Peter 1:3-4).  Now that is extravagant love!

 His love is long — it continues the length of your life. His love never fails, He never gives up, and He never holds out on you. He never leaves you nor forsakes you (Hebrews 13:5). God loves you with an everlasting love (Jeremiah 31:3) that extends through all ages (Ephesians 3:21). Now that is extravagant love!

 His love is deep — it reaches to the depths of discouragement, despair, and even death. When you feel shut out or secluded, or have sunken into the depths of sin and sadness, remember that you can never be lost to God’s amazing love.  Absolutely nothing in heaven or earth or hell shall be able to separate you from this love (Romans 8:37-39). Now that is extravagant love!

His love is high — it raises you from the lowest depth of depression to the greatest height of celebration and joy. God loves you so very much that He can take you from your worst as a sinner to seating you in heavenly places as a saint (Ephesians 2:4-6). Now that is extravagant love!

Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.

For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 8:37-39

    I pray that you will open your heart and invite Him in so that you may really know and experience the extreme abundance of the love of God for yourself. Then you will be able to grasp an understanding of the extravagant dimensions of His love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God (Ephesians 3:19 MSG). Now that is EXTRAVAGANT LOVE!