"Lovest thou me?"

"Do you love Me?"
The Lord Jesus Christ, after His resurrection asked this question to His apostle Peter.

But so many times we are the ones who ask this question to the Lord, "Lord, do You love me?" When we are going through tough times, we ask Him, "Lord, do You love me?"
And when we are entangled in sin, we ask, "Lord, do you still me?"
Many have been the times when our pillows are wet with our tears or when we are walking about with a smile on our face so that no one may notice that tiny tear at the corner of our eye. Then this silent cry has gone up to heaven, "Lord, do you love me?"
Peter himself was probably asking this question. For all his loud boasting, he had abandoned the Lord when He needed His friends the most. He denied his Lord even when the Lord Jesus could still hear every word he was saying.
After all this Peter was full of doubts and fears, "Does the Lord still love me?"
The Lord Jesus Christ knew all this, but He did not address any of these questions directly. He went straight to the question that really mattered. He said, "Peter, do you love me?"

Like Peter, we also keep asking the wrong question. The question is not whether or not the Lord loves us. He settled that question once and for all on the cross.
He bled and died for us "while we were yet sinners". He suffered silently for our salvation even as our disobedience mingled with the voices of the mocking crowd.
He called us to be His own even when He knew how we would repeatedly stumble and break His heart by our sins and doubts.

The question is not whether or not the Lord loves you but it is, do you love Him?
Do you love Him enough to show respect for His sacrifice for you?
Do you love Him enough to give up your sinful lifestyle and live for Him instead of making excuses?
After you have stumbled and fallen, do you love Him enough to get up again, brush yourself off of all malice, anger and sin and walk in His grace?
When you are all alone in the valley of the shadow, when your life seems useless and meaningless and death seems like a welcome release, do you love Him enough to trust His promise that He will never leave you and is able to restore all you have lost? Do you love Him enough let His light shine through you in the darkness. Do you love Him enough to go on in His strength which is perfected in your weakness?

Never ask the Lord if He loves you. He's settled that once and for all. He loves you with an everlasting and unchanging love.
That is why, instead of answering any questions that were in Peter's mind, the Lord Jesus Christ asked him the only question that really mattered.
Even today, He asks us the same question, "Do you love Me?"