Agape: It's Unconditional Love

Are you a Pharisee? Do you ever find yourself in the company of Pharisees? Usually well meaning believers (and sometimes even unbelievers) that believe that in order for God to love us and them, we must believe AND be perfectly good- obeying all His commands and commandments? People that believe that if we sin or slip up, that He won't love us anymore? Let me be perfectly clear: That is a lie from the pit of hell! And don't you believe it for one second! God's love is unconditional. Let me repeat that: UNCONDITIONAL. He loves the saint, the sinner, the believer and the unbeliever all the same! There is NOTHING you or I can do to make Him love us more or less. He even loved Judas- the one He knew would betray Him. He even loves me-- the one He knew would turn from Him time and again. He even loves you--no matter what you've done or will do.

God's love means that He WILL discipline us though. True love requires this. God will use discipline to call us to Himself. He will use discipline to guide us back into His will when we go astray. God will use discipline, ultimately, in letting one pay the consequences of rejecting His love.  Unconditional love means letting us choose whether or not we will love Him in return. It also means receiving the blessings of belief in Him.Everyone knows John 3:16 but there's more to be found in John 3:18... just two verses later.

"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life....Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God" (emphasis mine)

God is not human and His ways are not our ways. In fact, He is so different from the natural human that His Word says He is beyond understanding. His love is not like ours. We can only hope to try to love as He loves. We can only come close when He is Lord of our lives. Now that we know there's nothing we can do to earn His love, why then should we even bother trying to be holy? Why does it even matter if we sin? Why should we care? We should care because our love for Him should be reflected in how we act, what we say, how we think and in how others see us. We are to be the earthly representation of God to those around us. If you love God, you will WANT to please Him. You will NOT be perfect at it. In fact, sometimes you may not even be good at it. The more you look to God, the more you ask Him for wisdom and to reveal His plan for your life, the more you WILL please Him. We need to make an effort towards godliness.

For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge,6 and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness,7 and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.8 For if these qualitiest are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Peter 1:5-9 (emphasis mine)

When the Pharisees asked Jesus what the most important commandment was, do you remember what He said? Mark 12:30-31 records it this way:

 And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.'31 The second is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these."

Loving your neighbor as yourself means loving them no matter where they are on the spectrum of belief. Love them no matter what. No condition. Knowing that there is no condition to God's love for you. God will discipline those HE sees fit to discipline. God will call those that He will call. God will be Lord to those He will be Lord to. As believers, we are commanded to love. That is how we will show we love the Lord.

Cleaning Out the Hidden Places

Today, my baby boy wanted to look out the front window at the street outside. So I opened the blinds so that he could. Then as I looked closely, I realized the tracks of the window were quite dirty, as were the blinds. Now, I keep a fairly tidy home- especially when you consider that I have five children. However, I don't always keep up on the areas that stay hidden from view, or that don't need to be done daily or weekly. So, I had no idea the state of my blinds and window tracks. I'm sure I'm not the only one that forgets to look at these things, so I'm not going to beat myself up about it. However, as I began cleaning these (I could NOT leave them like that) I was struck with a parallel for my spiritual life. I thought I would share with you, with the prayer that it might be of some help or use to you as well.

 

As I was cleaning, it became clear to me that by ignoring these seemingly inconsequential tasks, I had created a task much too big to be completed in one day, and maybe even too big to do by myself. I was going to need some help. This is much the way we are before we begin to rely on God to change us. Now I'm not saying we can't strive to better ourselves and our behavior, but apart from God we cannot be good enough. We can never be clean enough on our own merits.

As it is written: "There is none righteous, no, not one;" Romans 3:10

Not only is this the case before we begin to rely on God and call Christ our Savior and Lord, but it is also true after we claim the promise of the cross. Many times, we go about our daily lives, and we let the "little" things in our spiritual lives get ignored. We let our prayer time become less and less; we read our Bible only once a day, if at all; and we isolate ourselves from fellowship with other believers. These are just a few ways that I have noticed that I have ignored my spiritual life on occasion. I'd like to pretend that I'm always on top of it; but like the state of my house, it's only clean if you don't look too closely. But unlike the state of my house, I always need the help of the Lord to clean it up my spiritual state. He continues to change me day by day, but only as long as I let Him do it. I need not feel overwhelmed by all that needs to be done in me. God will do it. But I do need to remain ever vigilant and aware of when I begin to drift away. If I do not remain aware, there will always be consequences and a much bigger mess to clean. I'd much rather clean a small mess than a big one, wouldn't you?

Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. 1 Peter 5:8

Today I pray for vigilance. Amen!