And if the question is asked, Why does God thus love? the only answer
is, Because he is God. 'Not for your sakes, O house of Israel ... but
for Mine own name's sake.' The love of God is self-originated. In it,
as in all His acts, He is His own motive, as His name, 'I am that I
am,' proclaims. It is inseparable from His being, and flows forth
before, and independent of, anything in the creature which could draw
it out. Men's love is attracted by their perception or their
imagination of something loveable in its objects. It is like a well,
where there has to be much work of the pump-handle before the gush
comes. God's love is like an artesian well, or a fountain springing up
from unknown depths in obedience to its own impulse. All that we can
say is, 'Thou art God. It is Thy nature and property to be merciful.'

'God loved the people.' The bed-rock is the spontaneous, unalterable,
inexhaustible, ever-active, fervent love of God, like that with which a
mother clasps her child to her maternal breast. The fair flower of this
great thought was a product of Judaism. Let no man say that the God of
Love is unknown to the Old Testament.

II. Notice how, with this for a basis, we have next the guardian care
extended to all those that answer love by love.

The singer goes on to say, mixing up his pronouns, in the fashion of
Hebrew poetry, somewhat arbitrarily, 'all _His_ saints are in
_Thy_ hand.' Now, what is a 'saint'? A man who answers God's love
by his love. The notion of a saint has been marred and mutilated by the
Church and the world. It has been taken as a special designation of
certain selected individuals, mostly of the ascetic and monastic type,
whereas it belongs to every one of God's people. It has been taken by
the world to mean sanctimoniousness and not sanctity, and is a term of