"SO"

GOD SO LOVED THE WORLD. That love of God is a very wonderful thing, especially when we see it set upon a lost, ruined, guilty world. What was there that God should love it? no fragrant flower grew in that arid desert, enmity towards Him, hatred of His truth, disregard for His word, unthankfulness, these were the thorns and briars which covered the waste land, no desirable thing blossomed there. Yet, God loved the world says the text so loved it that even the writer of the book of John could not tell us how much, but so greatly, so divinely did He love it that He gave His Son, His only Son to redeem the world and to gather out from it a people to His praise.
Whence came that love? Not from anything outside of God Himself, He loves because it is His nature to do so. God is Love. As I have already said nothing upon the face of the earth could have merited His love, though there was much to merit His displeasure. This stream of love flows from it's own secret source in the eternal Deity and it owes nothing at all to any earth-born rain or rivulet, it springs from beneath the everlasting throne. God loved because He would love. He has so much love that He must needs let it flow forth to a world perishing by it's own wilful sin. And when it flowed forth it was so deep, so wide, so strong, that even inspiration could not compute it's measure and therefore The Holy Spirit gave us that great little word SO and left us to attempt it's measurement, according as we perceive the love of God more and more.