In a world filled with pain and doubt and confusion, the love of God can sometimes feel like an abstraction,

something we know in theory but struggle to fully grasp or experience.

Yet the Bible speaks of God's steadfast love as a central, unshakable truth, woven through

its pages and revealed most profoundly in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

In today's episode of the Crossway podcast, I sit down with Sam Storms to explore what

it really means when the Bible says that God is love. How do we reconcile his love with the

brokenness that we see all around us, even in our own lives? What do we do when we struggle to feel

his love, even as we affirm it by faith? Sam is the founder and president of enjoying God

ministries and serves on the council of the gospel

coalition. His newest book is called The Steadfast Love of the Lord, experiencing the

life-changing power of God's unchanging affection from Crossway. Let's get started.

Well, Sam, thanks so much for joining me on the Cross Bay podcast today.

I've been looking forward to this. I'm happy to be here. So probably the most well-known verses in the Bible, all of the Bible, both for those inside the church and those outside

the church, would be verses that directly relate in some

way to the love of God. I think of John 316, for God so loved the world. He gave his only

begotten son. I think of 1 John 4, where we read that God is love. Those concepts that

associating the Christian God with this idea of love are so foundational,

even in the broader secular culture. And yet, you open your new book talking about this

kind of personal story, a recent story even for you, where you feel like you came to understand

and even question or struggle with the reality of God's love in a new and a fresh way.

I wonder if you could start there by just sharing a little bit more about that story.

Sure. Yeah, it wasn't a very pleasant experience, to be perfectly honest. I have never prior to this

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