Do you feel unconditionally loved by God? 

Most people would say: “Sure. I know God loves me.” But do you really experience that love in your life? And how about this: Would you stake your life on that love being “unconditional?”

“Well…”

My guess is that if we take time to think about it, we hope God’s love is real and we would really like to feel more of God’s love in our lives. Unconditional? A lot of people have doubts about that.

Think of it this way: When you were an infant and took your first steps across a room, there were likely shouts of praise and joy. Your parents or caregivers were SO proud of you! You were absolutely celebrated!

When was the last time you felt that? When was the last time you were praised for walking across a room? Probably not since the first time you did it. And when walking became normalized for you, the praise stopped. 

Many people live their lives unconsciously striving to get that feeling back; that feeling of being picked up with a shout of delight; of being valued and praised.

Beyond infancy, we really don’t have a lot of direct experience with unconditional love. In fact, we don’t trust it. We feel we have to create the conditions to feel worthy of love. After all, there has to be a reason for someone to love us.

That’s not the case with God. God truly does not love you because of your accomplishments. God loves you for who you are. Like a loving parent, God would love you if you had no accomplishments at all. Of course God wants you to grow and mature in life. But really, if you stopped evolving right now; if you didn’t expand your horizons another inch, God would still think you are the most terrific, amazing person in the entire world. Really.

That’s unconditional love. And to our get-ahead-in-life mindset, it makes zero sense. In fact, to most it is a fantasy. (It also doesn’t help that until pretty recently churches promoted the idea that we are all “sinners in the hands of an angry God.” Some still do). 

But what if God isn’t wrathful? What if God is only pure love? What if that unconditional love is real; not something you can strive for but can only accept? 

More importantly, how would your life be different if you believed this were true? How would our world? What if the need to dominate other people and nations in order to avoid our inner pain and longing were replaced with the truth of God’s unrestricted love? What if we took God’s view of our inadequacies and discovered that they are just the stumblings of a toddler learning to walk? 

What if…

“What if” is a pretty beautiful and exciting possibility and it can start today. It can start with an acceptance of God’s prerequisite-free love. 

Then, watch and see how that changes the way you treat yourself and how you treat others. See how it changes the priorities by which you live and the choices you make. 

See you in church,

–Rev. Dominic