Calvin quotes Augustine\u2019s Tractates <\/em>on John (Institutes <\/em>2.16.4) in summarizing God\u2019s motive in sending the Son:<\/p>\n \u201cGod\u2019s love is incomprehensible and unchangeable. For it was not after we were reconciled to him through the blood of his Son that he began to love us. Rather, he has loved us before the world was created, that we also might be his sons along with his only-begotten Son\u2014before we became anything at all. The fact that we were reconciled through Christ\u2019s death must not be understood as if his Son reconciled us to him that he might now begin to love those whom he had hated. Rather, we have already been reconciled\u00a0to him who loves us, with whom we were enemies on account of sin. The apostle will testify whether I am speaking the truth: \u2018God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us\u2019 [Rom. 5:8]. Therefore, he loved us even when we practiced enmity toward him and committed wickedness. Thus in a marvelous and divine way he loved us even when he hated us. For he hated us for what we were that he had not made; yet because our wickedness had not entirely consumed his handiwork, he knew how, at the same time, to hate in each one of us what we had made, and to love what he had made.\u201d<\/p>\n God\u2019s hatred for what damages His good creation and His image is subordinate to His loving passion to repair it. Both are necessary: Without love, the Son does not come; without hate, the Son does not destroy what enslaves us.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Calvin quotes Augustine\u2019s Tractates on John (Institutes 2.16.4) in summarizing God\u2019s motive in sending the Son: \u201cGod\u2019s love is incomprehensible and unchangeable. For it was not after we were reconciled to him through the blood of his Son that he began to love us. Rather, he has loved us before the world was created, that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3021,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[579],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16693","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-atonement"],"yoast_head":"\n