Does God Like Me? Questions Many Christians Ask
Psalm 139 helps us see how God’s intimate knowledge of us should bring us comfort. That, in essence, is the goal of this book: to understand the blessing of being known and loved by God so that we can live confidently in His knowledge and love. We might have no trouble believing that God generally loves His people, but when we consider just how well He knows us, we struggle to believe that God loves us individually. Me, individually. You, individually. Does He even like us? Maybe you’ve had questions like these before:
Is God’s love personal? Did He just barely allow me into the kingdom? Is God perpetually disgruntled toward me? Is He begrudging in His affection? Did I escape judgment by the skin of my teeth? Does God keep me at arm’s length to remind me of my wretchedness? Does He stay mad at me to keep me in my place?
Does God Like Me When I Struggle With Sin?
Maybe you haven’t consciously voiced such explicit questions, but I’ll bet they’ve shaped your view of God in some fashion. When you know you’ve sinned, do you assume God is sorry He saved you? Do you assume God loves others more than He loves you? Do you feel that you’re a consistent failure in His eyes? Do you feel you need to obey to keep Him happy toward you? Do you keep watch on your spiritual disciplines with a feeling of dread?
Does God Like Me Despite My Unworthiness?
My theology favors a strong view of God’s sovereignty and providence, sometimes leaning a little too hard on our unworthiness as sinners to receive God’s love and mercy. And I understand why the people in my theological circles orbit in this direction.
I’ve watched many professing Christians in American culture celebrate a soft, permissive form of love attributed to God that never corrects sin, that tolerates every form of disobedience, and requires zero repentance or holiness. That’s not God’s love. It’s not biblical. God’s love never allows us to continue in sin. To be saved by grace through faith in Jesus will mean that we are sanctified—made holy—day by day as we walk in obedience to God’s commands. He will shape our minds and hearts through Scripture, prayer, the church, and His Spirit. He never leaves us to continue living in sin. As the old hymn declares, we’re “saved to sin no more!”
Following Jesus requires repentance because true saving faith will change the way we live. Our former lives were characterized by sin and, if that wasn’t a problem, then we wouldn’t have needed Jesus to die for us and pay for our sin.
But sin was our problem, and we did need Jesus to free us from it.
Does God Like Me More Than I Realize?
God’s love does not permit ongoing, unrepentant sin. That said, it is a massive overcorrection to reduce God’s love to something so miserly that we’re not even sure if God likes us. Twenty-five years ago, theologian Don Carson wrote The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God in response to the growing theological trend that emphasized a permissive and theologically weak definition of God’s love to the exclusion of His holiness and justice.
Carson wrote, “Nowadays if you tell people that God loves them, they are unlikely to be surprised. Of course God loves me; he’s like that, isn’t he? Besides, why shouldn’t he love me? I’m kind of cute, or at least as nice as the next person. I’m okay, you’re okay, and God loves you and me.”
Carson’s book served as a needed correction in a day when Christians were tempted to extol God as a divine kind of Santa Claus who looked the other way when you were naughty.
To be certain, Carson’s correction is still a needed word as we seek to keep our understanding of God’s attributes balanced in our minds. In the years since, though, I think perhaps we’ve moved too far in the other direction, tipping again toward an imbalanced view of God’s love as it pertains to God’s holiness. It’s difficult to grasp in human terms what God expresses perfectly without detracting from all His other perfect, divine attributes.
He is able to be everything that He is perfectly, without compromising any part of His character. Carson says that God “enjoys all knowledge. He not only knows everything—he even knows what might have been under different circumstances . . . and takes that into account when he judges (Matt. 11:20–24) . . . God’s knowledge is perfect.”
Does God Like Me? Psalm 139 Gives the Answer
Psalm 139 helps us rightly understand God’s perfect knowledge and investment in our lives. He doesn’t know and ignore. He knows and loves. He places value on our lives as image bearers. He ordered our steps and ordained our days before He spoke the world into existence. He has always planned to save you, so your life will always matter to Him.
Jesus said that God knows the number of hairs on your head. If you’re like me, that number varies wildly every day. Between shedding and regrowth, the number of hairs on my head is an ever-changing integer. He knows the number of hairs on your head too. And freckles and T cells and heartbeats. Why would He bother with that kind of knowledge if He didn’t love us?
Does God Like Me? The Cross Proves God’s Love
Yes, God is fully aware of our sinful state. The Bible is rife with truths about the condition of the human heart. God knows:
“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” (Jer. 17:9)
“And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.” (Heb. 4:13)
“But Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said, ‘Why do you think evil in your hearts?’” (Matt. 9:4)
“Every way of man is right in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the heart.” (Prov. 21:2)
“None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God.” (Rom. 3:10–11)
The Bible always tells the truth about our hearts. And because the Bible is God’s Word, God is the one telling the truth about who we are. He knows who we really are. That’s why He sent Jesus to die in our place to bear judgment for our sins. He loved us while we were still in our sinful condition and sent Jesus to rescue us. This is real love. This is affection. It’s not miserly or drudgery.
It’s not begrudging or disgruntled. God doesn’t do anything He doesn’t want to do. He cannot be coerced into loving us. He just does. Because it delights Him to do so. Read that again. God delighted in saving you and making you a new creature in Christ. He was happy to provide a way out for you.
Adapted from Known and Loved: Experiencing the Affection of God in Psalm 139 by Glenna Marshall (© 2025). Published by Moody Publishers. Used by permission.
Glenna Marshall is married to her pastor, William, and is the mother of two sons. She is the author of The Promise Is His Presence, Everyday Faithfulness, Memorizing Scripture, and Known and Loved. She is a member of Grace Bible Fellowship in Sikeston, Missouri, where she and her husband have served for over twenty years.
