Fridtjof Nansen was a famous explorer from Norway who lived around the year 1900. He became famous for his explorations of the Arctic Ocean. He and another explorer came to within about 300 miles of the North Pole, which was closer than anyone else had gotten.
While exploring the Arctic Ocean, Nansen tried to measure how deep it was. He took a long, weighted measuring line and threw it overboard. He discovered that his line did not reach the bottom. He wrote in his log book, “Deeper than that!” The next day he tried a longer line and still could not reach the bottom. Again he wrote, “Deeper than that!”
Finally, he tied all his lines together and let them down, but again he wrote in his log book, “Deeper than that!” He never found out how deep the ocean was at that point. He only knew that it was deeper than the length of his tied-together lines.
Yes, Nansen could not measure how deep the ocean was. Do you know that God’s love is so wide and so deep that it cannot be measured either? His love is so great that He sent His only Son, the Lord Jesus, to die for sinners. Christ did not die for good people; He died for sinners. Are you a sinner? The Bible says that we are all sinners (Rom. 3:2323For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; (Romans 3:23)). Yet the love of God is so great that even though we are sinners, He still loves us. “Hereby perceive we the love of God, because He laid down His life for us.” 1 John 3:1616Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. (1 John 3:16). He died on the cross for sinners like you and me.
ML-06/12/1983