Unconditional Love, Conditional Relationship

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Gentle Reader,

I’ve been hearing a lot about love and acceptance lately, from conversations with friends to articles in magazines to snippets on the radio.

It’s got me thinking.

Does unconditional love equal unconditional acceptance? Can relationships be healthy if they do not have boundaries?

Let us consider the parent-child relationship. Healthy parents (healthy, not perfect) love their kids because the kids are theirs. The kids don’t have to do anything; this love is based on who they are. Sonship and daughtership are unique, strong bonds. These bonds move the parents to declare, “I love you because you are mine.” And yet healthy parents don’t let their kids do whatever they want. They don’t say, “Oh, sure. Go play in the street because that will make you happy.” Parents know more than kids. They have access to greater knowledge and a better understanding of life.

So, a healthy parent makes the rules and follows the breaking of them with consequences. That’s part of the process of raising children. And let’s be honest: We’ve all been in the grocery store with kids whose parents let them run wild. It’s irritating. We wonder what the parents are thinking.

Love with no boundaries doesn’t work. When parents do that, we see them as doormats, allowing pint-size tyrants to control the situation. There are even occasions when this kind of thing crosses over into outright neglect. In adult-to-adult relationships, whether romantic, platonic or collegial, boundaries, rules and consequences function to protect the participants from abuse. If I thought that unconditional love meant that I had to accept Chris beating me (he doesn’t! don’t call the cops!), you’d be right look at me like I was nuts. Or at least massively co-dependent.

Love is based on who someone is. Acceptance is based on what someone does. Looking back at the parenting example, as kids grow into adults and their relationship with their parents changes, the parent may very well have to say, “I love you, but I can’t be around you because of your choices.” I see this all the time at the shelter. Many of the ladies and children who live there do have some familial connection; someone loves them. They bring the residents clothes, food, money, presents. But there is a line. There is a point at which the family has had to say, “I love you, but we can’t have a deeper connection until you make better choices.”

If I was a betting woman, I’d wager that all of this sounds like common sense to you.

So, tell me why we don’t apply this line of thinking to how we relate to God?

Some stamp their feet and demand to be let into Heaven whether or not they’ve ever even thought of God. It’s only “fair.” Others live as they please but try to  hide under grace. Cheap grace, it’s called, when people want God but also want to do whatever they please. Pray a prayer and go on their merry way. Because God loves me unconditionally.

Yes.

But does He accept us unconditionally?

Anyone who truly wants to know God has to start by saying that God is greatest. God is over and above. There has to be an acknowledgment that God is the Ruler, and therefore He gets to define the terms of relationship. Without that premise, we try to pursue God on our own terms, and that’s not how this works. It’s just reality. Any god that we can have a relationship with in our way, on our own terms, is no god at all.

That kind of god? It’s called an idol. A god made in man’s image, if you will. And they all suck. They disappoint every single time because man disappoints every single time. We desperately need something, Someone, better than ourselves.

Starting with God as the In Charge One, we then seek to know what His terms are. Happily, He spells them out for us:

1. God does, indeed, love us unconditionally…

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son… – John 3:16a (NKJV)

Since God is love (1 John 4:8) and He made everyone and everything (Genesis 1-3, Colossians 1:16 – and, no, we’re not talking about the mechanisms by which He made everyone and everything, so don’t even go there), He can’t not love people. It’s Who He is. Sure, there are places in Scripture that talk about God hating (Romans 9:13), but these places, in the original, talk about God loving someone less, not loathing them, as we understand the term “hate” to mean. (Unpacking this more is beyond the scope of this post, but please do some reading, starting with the above linked article). So it is quite correct to say that God loves each person unconditionally, because it is based on Who He is – and also on who we are, His creation.

2. …but He does not accept us unconditionally.

…that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. – John 3:17b (NKJV)

God’s love for humanity means that He knew our pathetic condition and sent us a Savior. He offers salvation to everyone. It’s a free gift that anyone can take at any time this side of Eternity. But not everyone takes it. So, though salvation is universally offered, salvation is not universal. Everyone doesn’t go to Heaven. Everyone is not right with God.

Those are the basic terms. The passage goes on:

For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.

He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God. – John 3:17-21 (NKJV)

Jesus’ job during His time on earth wasn’t to condemn. His job was to live perfectly (or “fulfill the Law”) and offer Himself as the once-and-for-all, without blemish sacrifice. Yet make no mistake. Refusing to submit to the Lordship of Christ carries with it condemnation. It means choosing your own way over God’s way, which He will allow you to do, but that choice means you reject God. You thumb your nose at Him and tell Him that you want to live separately. He will allow that. What He will not allow is any attempt to force Him to do things our way. He won’t. He doesn’t have to.

We come to God by walking the road paved with His Son’s spilled blood.

Or we don’t come at all.

3. We can’t “sprinkle a little Jesus” on our lives.

Here we move from the “before and during” stage of coming to Christ and into the “after.” Faith without works is dead (James 2:17). Learning to obey God is a life-long process that we never do complete this side of Heaven, but it’s an insult to Holy God to ask Jesus to save you and then keep doing whatever you want to do. Just as God isn’t going to be acquiesce to our terms in coming to Him, neither is He going to say, “Oh, okay! You prayed and asked Me to save you, so you’re good! Do whatever you want!”

I’ve heard that called fire insurance.

Let me be blunt: If that’s what you think the Christian life amounts to, you are extremely immature. Get your sweet little behind settled on a comfy couch and read the Gospels. Take some time to actually dwell on what Jesus went through. If the intensity of His sacrifice doesn’t compel you to love Him and serve Him, then I think you have to question whether or not you truly believe.

Don’t be frightened by such considerations. Better to uncover a lie and replace it with truth than go on living with the lie.

4. God gives us a multitude of opportunities to submit to Him, but eventually those opportunities are going to stop coming.

I’m not talking about death here, though that certainly does mean the opportunities have ceased (Hebrews 9:27). What I refer to is the end of all things. Time is racing toward the Second Advent, the return of Christ. And when He does set foot on this sod once more:

…when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with His mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance on those who do not know God, and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. These shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power, when He comes, in that Day, to be glorified in His saints and to be admired among all those who believe, because our testimony among you was believed. – 2 Thessalonians 1:7b-10 (NKJV)

God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth,  and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. – Philippians 2:9-11 (NKJV)

Bow willingly now or bow unwillingly then. Either way, we’re all going to bow.

…behold, a white horse. And He who sat on him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and makes war. His eyes were like a flame of fire, and on His head were many crowns. He had a name written that no one knew except Himself. He was clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God. And the armies in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, followed Him on white horses. Now out of His mouth goes a sharp sword, that with it He should strike the nations. And He Himself will rule them with a rod of iron. He Himself treads the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God. And He has on His robe and on His thigh a name written:

KING OF KINGS AND
LORD OF LORDS. – Revelation 19:11-16 (NKJV)

I realize that this is all a bit fire-and-brimstoney, but I think we need that every once in awhile. We need to be shaken out of stupor. This is God we are talking about.

The thing about these four points? Not one of them is unfair. Stamp your feet and wave your fists if you like. Doesn’t change reality. God did absolutely everything to save us. He literally wrapped it up (John 19:40) and then put a bow on it three days later (Luke 24:1-12). All we have to do is repent, believe and obey, and God even goes so far as to give us the ability to do all three.

This is the God you want. This is the God who will meet all your needs and even grant you many of your wants. He loves you unconditionally but won’t accept you unconditionally – and you don’t want Him to. Any god who isn’t truly interested in your life, who is only there to serve you, who plays into your selfishness, jealousy, greed…that’s a worthless god. That’s a stupid god. That’s a god without any power.

Ultimately, that god looks an awful lot like the person you see in the mirror.