You hear it often said that God loves us unconditionally. I guess people are trying to tie the idea of grace into God's love. And also to remind themselves that our own unloveliness is no obstacle to the love of God.
It seems to me that this is a really inadequate way to describe the love of God. The two characteristics of God's love as we encounter in the OT are his steadfastness on the one hand and his jealousy on the other. How can the two be reconciled? Well, Hosea 11 picks up some of the apparent tension in the heart of God - how can I keep loving you? how can I give you up? The two lines meet of course on the cross - where God shows that it possible for himself both to love steadfastly AND jealously. He maintains the detemined purity and sanctity of his love AND makes it possible for himself not to withdraw his own love. He reveals his own self-consistency as a lover.
I would rather say: God's love is conditional, but God meets the conditions..
1 comment:
I've found DA Carson's little book The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God good on this. eg. "the love of God in our culture has been purged of anything the culture finds uncomfortable. The love of God has been sanitized, democratized, and above all sentamentalized." (p.11)
"Fourteen times in the first fifty psalms alone, we are told that God hates the sinner, his wrath is on the liar, and so forth" (p.79)
We understand the depth of God's love the more when we understand his holiness and justice. Your summary comment highlights the depths of his love as per Rom 5:8.
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