I’m irritated. I just read an article someone shared. I won’t mention names, sites or titles – let’s just say it’s one of those lists of things the church has gotten wrong. And now I am highly annoyed.
Don’t misunderstand. The church – the collective body of Christ throughout time all over the world – has gotten plenty of things wrong. The Crusades. The Inquisitions. The Salem witch trails. Need I say more?
But one thing we have not gotten wrong is the love of God. I’m upset because the well-meaning author of the irritating article said that God’s love is conditional. And that is simply NOT true.
God IS love (1John 4:8). Love is the essence of who He is. Love is His nature. Love is the basis and foundation for everything He does. And since He does not change (Malachi 3:6 & Hebrews 13:8), then He will always be love and all He does will flow from His love.
God loves ALL of humanity – regardless of who you are, what you’ve done, what you look like, what your genealogy is, your ethnicity or socio-economic status is. John 3:16 makes that pretty clear: for God so loved the WORLD. The word “world” in this passage means the inhabitants of the world. If you are an inhabitant of this planet – God loves you. There are no exceptions.
Even if you don’t love God, He loves you. Even if you reject Him, He loves you. Even if you are unfaithful to Him, He loves you. Even if you renounce, curse and hate Him, deny His existence, choose to follow another “god” or reject Jesus, He loves you. Nothing you can ever do will change His mind about you. He faithfully loves you (Psalm 100:5).
And that is because His love for you is based upon who He is [LOVE] and not who you are. God’s love for us is not a response to us – our good behavior, good works or good words. God’s love initiates the relationship. He loved us first. (1John 4:19) And this is what makes His love unconditional – He is the initiator, reaching out to everyone, regardless. (Romans 5:8, Ephesians 2:4-5 & 1John 4:9-10)
We don’t have to perform for it. We don’t have to earn it. We don’t have to qualify for it. We don’t have to do anything. He freely pours His love out on all of humanity.
This is why Abba is so amazing [among other things!] – His continuing, unfailing, faithful, consistent, unrestrained, unlimited, unconditional love. It’s so deep, so wide, so expansive and vast that we simply cannot comprehend how great His love for us is. (Ephesians 3:18) His love for each, individual human is so far outside anything that we know or have ever experienced that we must have His help to be able to just grasp the edges of His incredible love for us! It is so deep, profound and expansive that eternity will not be enough time to explore and discover every aspect of His love.
And when we enter into a relationship with Abba through Jesus, the journey of exploration begins. We begin to experience His love for us in a greater way. The understanding of His love starts to unfold within us. We discover the benefits of His love. His love does some incredible things in us.
And we choose whether we want it or not. But our choice does not diminish the reality that He loves us all.
That’s why I’m irritated. God’s love is poured out on all of humanity without restriction. It’s such a wonderful, amazing thing. And I hate that anyone would ever think or feel that His great gift of love was not available to them. That they must meet some standard or criteria. Even if they don’t want it – I think they should know He still loves them.
So you heard it right the first time – GOD LOVES YOU.
Comments 9
It is the truth but a hard thing to grasp! Some have grown up being taught just the opposite and live under the belief that God is all about judgement and condemnation. Thanks for sharing the Good News of the gospel!! Hope many receive this truth and believe!!
Author
This Truth is massive and mind-blowing. It requires meditation and rumination! Memorizing verses that declare Abba’s love for us. And as we do this, it changes our perspective and shifts us away from a lie to the Truth 🙂
I grew up (as I am sure many people have) believing that the God of the Old Testament was hard and full of anger, but the Jesus of the New Testament was loving and kind, gentle and meek. This leads one to believe that God the Father is less loving than God the Son. I even had trouble really believing every word of John 3:16. My idea of God was a great big hand poised over my head ready to hit me the moment I did wrong. I feared God, but it wasn’t the godly fear that was of the right kind. It took a long long time for me to really understand my misconception. I can now happily say that I know that Abba loves me even as much as Jesus loves me. After all, Jesus said that if we saw Him we would see the Father.
When I read Genesis a couple of months ago, something wonderful jumped off the pages. When Adam and Eve sinned and then subsequently hid themselves from God in fear, the unexpected happened. God shows up not angry but concerned. God’s response to their failure was not “You worthless beings! Could you not obey even one commandment?” No, those words did not come out of His mouth. He said instead, “Adam, where are you?” That is a question of concern. And that is how God reacts even to us today. He is concerned when He knows our sinful condition, because He knows what sin will do to us. He arrives on the scene to provide a way out of our sinful dilemma. That is love. “For God so loved the world”. God loves us even when we fail Him. He loves us unconditionally. No matter what we have done, He sees us as valuable and precious. That is the kind of love that causes a response from me. I love a love like that! I can love God because He loves me. Because I can love God, I can love myself Because I can love myself, I can love others, even the unlovable. Love expands outward from God through me to others.
God’s love shed abroad in our hearts causes us to hurt when we see others in sin, because we know what sin will do to the individual. God’s love causes us to weep and mourn for those who are in the throes of sinful lifestyles. God’s love gives us a compassionate heart. The world needs to see God’s love extended, for most of the world believes (as I did) that God is “out to get them.”
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Thanks for sharing your experience and insight with us David. Discovering His love for us is an amazing thing!
Thank you Abba for your GREAT love for us! Another great article from our amazing Pastor, Kim Wahl. 😀
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Thanks Penny!
I sometimes think people that don’t love themselves, so they have a hard time understanding God’s love. With wisdom of what love really is..God’s love for us…that’s all we need..God’s Love is unconditional for all.. Reading in Ephesians 1– 9 things God has done for us…Blessed us, Chosen us, Predestinated us, Made us accepted, Redeemed us, Abounded Towards us, Made known to us, Give us a inheritance, Sealed us..
Right away at the beginning of letter, Paul burst out in praise for the God who chose Him before the foundation of the world..
We’ve been chose and blessed by the Lord.. He made us because He loves us.
I sometimes think people that don’t love themselves, so they have a hard time understanding God’s love. With wisdom of what love really is..God’s love for us…that’s all we need..God’s Love is unconditional for all.. Reading in Ephesians 1– 9 things God has done for us…Blessed us, Chosen us, Predestinated us, Made us accepted, Redeemed us, Abounded Towards us, Made known to us, Give us a inheritance, Sealed us..
Right away at the beginning of letter, Paul burst out in praise for the God who chose Him before the foundation of the world..
We’ve been chosen and blessed by the Lord.. He made us because He loves us.
Author
Sherry,
His love is so powerful and amazing! And as we begin to see how deeply He loves us, it frees us to love our self – which is far more important than most people realize. Thanks for sharing that!
I always go back to Ephesians 3:18: And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep His love is.
Understanding and believing His love for us is the foundation for everything else!