You are fully known and fully loved by God.

But aside from being a catchy Christian phrase and beautiful song lyrics, what does it actually mean to be fully known and fully loved by God?

Do you remember the last time you made a new friend?

I’ve been there, many times over. I love building relationship with people, but no matter how many times I’ve done it or how much I love it, it still makes me nervous.

Can you remember the excitement of finding someone you just click with, and the anticipation of having a new best friend? Do you also remember what it’s like to cautiously navigate the early days, as you try to put your best foot forward and not go to hard too soon?

Being friends with God is different.

There is no get-to-know-you phase from His side. He isn’t trying to work out if you will be great friends, or if your interests align. He isn’t trying to work out if your personalities are a match or if you’ll like hanging out together.

God already fully knows you and fully loves you. Even more, he already knows he wants to be your friend. He’s given everything so that He could be in relationship with you.

But what does it really mean to be fully known and fully loved by God?

Read more about your identity here.

What does it mean to be fully known by God?

Being known by God goes beyond just knowing about us. His knowing doesn’t come from watching and learning about us, it comes from designing us.

Psalm 139 reveals many of the ways that we are known by God. Here are some of the ways that we are known by God:

• He knows your every movement, like when you rise and when you sit (verse 2).
• He knows everywhere you go (verse 3).
• He knows what you are going to say before you even say it (verse 4).
• He knows everything about us (verse 1).
• He knows how you were formed in your mother’s womb (verse 13).
• He knows how marvelously complex you are (verse 14).
• He knows every day of your lives, past and present (verse 16).
• He knows your hearts desires (verse 1).

God knows you from beginning to end. He knows everything you have done and will do. He knows it all! Whether you realise it or not, the way he has beautifully designed you is worthy of His praise.

You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it.

Psalm 139:13-14

Nothing is Hidden from God

Nothing is hidden from God, he sees and knows it all (Hebrews 4:13). He knows our favourite song and place we like to eat. He knows our greatest joys and celebrates our greatest triumphs. He knows our greatest needs, and every tear we cry alone. He knows the outcome of our health appointments and cries when we lose a loved one. He knows our struggles, heartaches and deepest moments of despair.

He knowns us so intimately, but why should this be something we celebrate?

Because God fully knows every part of you, and He still chooses you.

He knows the good, the bad and the ugly. Yet there is absolutely nothing you have done or will do that changes the way He feels towards you. Time and time again, the enemy tries to deceive God’s children into thinking that what they have done in their past, is too awful or horrible for God’s forgiveness.

But this is the beauty of being fully known by God!

He fully knows you and still chose to fully forgive you.

But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.

Romans 5:8

Learn more: How to Hear and Know God’s Voice

What does it mean to be fully loved by God?

Being fully known is one of our deepest desires, but also one of our greatest fears.

Being fully known by someone is always a risk. The depth of our relationships are only as deep as our trust for someone. We don’t share the deepest parts of our hearts with people we don’t trust.

There is no risk in being fully known by God, because we are also fully loved by Him.

To be known, is to be loved.

To be loved, is to be known.

And God does both. He fully loves you, and fully knows you.

There are no hidden agendas, never any malice or wrong intent, there is only love. He cannot operate in any other way towards us, other than in love, because that is who he is. God is love (1 John 4:16).

The Ultimate Love Story

The Bible is one long love story about how the Father relentlessly pursues his children. God wants to be in relationship with you. When we understand that we are fully known and truly loved by God, it allows us to come with confidence before His throne (Hebrews 4:16). Not because of anything we have done, but because of His glorious grace he has towards us.

The enemy intends is to disconnect us from God. If we are overwhelmed by the shame of our sin, we won’t repent and accept the forgiveness that Jesus’ has given us. Again, there is nothing that can separate you from the love of God (Romans 8:38-39). The enemy tries to deceive us into thinking that our sin is beyond his forgiveness. But think about it, if your sin your sin is beyond his forgiveness, I’d question whether you believe that Jesus truly died and conquered sin and death on that cross?

What if we saw the deepest, darkest sin in our lives, as an opportunity for God’s glorious and powerful mercy and grace to displayed? How glorious is His love for us! Jesus fully knew what He was getting into, while we were still sinners, He chose to die for us (Romans 5:8).

Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure.

Ephesians 1:4-5

You might also like: Discovering your God-given purpose starts with knowing your identity.

Four Kinds of Love in the Bible

There are several words in the Greek language that are used in the Bible to describe love. Understanding the four types of love in the Greek language – eros, storge, phileo and agape – can give us a deeper appreciation for what love truly means.

• Philia is friendship. It describes a strong and powerful bond between friends.
• Eros is a romantic, sensual love. It is where we get the English word erotic.
• Storge is family love. The love shared between family members.
• Agape is perfect, immeasurable love. It is the self-sacrificing love, and the highest form of love in the Bible.

Agape love is perfect, pure and unconditional, and it is the divine love that God displayed when he sent to die on the cross for all humanity.

The ultimate sacrifice, was the ultimate act of love.

It is the love that is spoken about in John 15:13 – Greater love [agape] has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.

When we take a step back and look at the love that God has for people, it’s hard not be struck by awe. But it is when the truth of his perfect, pure and unconditional love, that he has for humanity, perforates our hearts, we are changed forever.

God’s love towards you is the ultimate, sold-out, self-scarifical, immeasurable and perfect kind of love.

How does being fully known and fully loved by God change us?

The truth is that we are fully known and fully loved by God. But how would things be different if we truly lived by this truth?

Knowing we are Fully loved and Known deepens intimacy with God

You are fully known by God and he still chooses to fully love you. When we understand the depth of this truth, I’ve got some some good news for you here – there is freedom to be found!

There is no fear in love (1 John 4:18), which means we can boldly come before God, unafraid to be fully known and fully loved by Him. There is no uncertainty in His love. So we can afford to risk intimacy with God, because he has already made his love for you secure.

Look with wonder at the depth of the Father’s marvelous love that he has lavished on us! He has called us and made us his very own beloved children.

1 John 3:1 TPT

Knowing we are Fully loved and Known deepens intimacy with others

Being fully loved, helps you fully love.

Have you ever felt insecure in a relationship? Either with a friend, family member or a romantic relationship? When you don’t know where you stand in a relationship, it’s easy to feel insecure, so you seek affirmation. Do they love you? Do they want to be around you?

Knowing that we are fully known and fully loved by the One who authors your every day, designed you for a glorious purpose and knows your deepest thoughts, you realise his love is enough. God’s love is all we need. Nothing more, nothing less. And our purpose, identity and worth are found in Him alone.

When you love from a place of being fully known and fully loved by God, you no longer need relationships with others to feel validated. Your worth is not dependent or dictated by the relationships in your life, it is authored by your Heavenly Father.

Being fully known and fully loved by God allows you to not have to need relationships in your life, but to enjoy relationships.

We love because he first loved us.

1 John 4:19

Fully Known and Fully Loved Bible Verses

What the Scriptures say about Being Fully Known by God

This is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence: If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything. 1 John 3:19-20

Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure. Ephesians 1:4-5

Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account. Hebrews 4:13

You have searched me, Lord, and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you, Lord, know it completely. You hem me in behind and before, and you lay your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain. Psalm 139:1-6

For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. Psalm 139:13-16

Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations. Jeremiah 1:5

Discover more Bible verses about Your Identity in Christ.

What the Scriptures say about Being Fully Loved by God

And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them. 1 John 4:16

There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. 1 John 4:18

We love because he first loved us. 1 John 4:19

Look with wonder at the depth of the Father’s marvelous love that he has lavished on us! He has called us and made us his very own beloved children. 1 John 3:1

The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying: “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness. Jeremiah 31:3

But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5:8

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God. Ephesians 2:8

For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:38-39