Does God Love Unconditionally?

justjess

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I like your God Todd, what kind of Christian denomination are you part of? This is the only description of the Christian God I heard that truly sounds like a just God.
Look into Unitarian Universalists, there are groups that specifically identify as Christian though they are sparse as well as the church on a whole.. not identical but very similar.
 

justjess

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I already know that if I tell you anything else, you're gonna become prideful of your own knowledge and be happy enough to continue proving your point and just ignoring my comments. Honestly, I see why eternal salvation was getting annoyed with you. We're done here, goodbye.
How would you know that? You just joined sunday... she hasn’t even posted since then?
 

Lisa

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if you have to change the order of the words "God" and "son", from the order used in the Bible to make your point (as you just did above) then you are manipulating scripture.
Not really because He is God the Son. He is also God.

Yes it is right there in Acts 3:21
I guess it is...

Okay. Still not sure where the bible says believing Paul is an apostle is a requirement for salvation though.
You still have to live in the truth and not be deceived...

No it's not. It's an esoteric interpretation derived from supposed revelation. The word Trinity is not in the Bible and the concept is not laid out as a doctrine by any of the authors of the Bible.
It is there. Many words that we use nowadays aren’t in the Bible i.e. the rapture..but its there all the same.

Posted and wasn’t done...I’ve heard of A.W. Tozer, Martin Luther and H.G. Wells...and I wouldn’t include HG Wells in a theology discussion honestly.

I wouldn’t call the Trinity ecumenical myself.
 

Todd

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I wouldn’t call the Trinity ecumenical myself.
Just because you wouldn't call it that, doesn't mean that isn't were it came from. But of course your modus operandi when you are confronted with actual facts, is to just bury your head in the sand and continue to spout your dogma and traditions of men.
 

Lisa

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Just because you wouldn't call it that, doesn't mean that isn't were it came from. But of course your modus operandi when you are confronted with actual facts, is to just bury your head in the sand and continue to spout your dogma and traditions of men.
I continue to support the Bible, yes.
 

Beloved

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But if everyone is reconciled to God, there would be no wickedness left either. So I get how you can interpret it both ways.
But what does God say? That the wicked will be destroyed - here one day and gone the next. He doesn’t say they will be reconciled.

He tells the righteous that they will see when the wicked are cut off. Read Psalm 37. He doesn’t tell the righteous they will see them be reconciled.

Psalm 37:37-38 ESV
Mark the blameless and behold the upright,
for there is a future for the man of peace.
But transgressors shall be altogether destroyed; the future of the wicked shall be cut off.
 

rainerann

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I think there are two ways to define the concept of unconditional love.

The first way is the common way it is understood. It is basically an action of persevering with someone in one way or the other no matter what they do. Having boundaries is not the same thing as having conditions. It just means that people are limited in the ways that they are able to correct the damage other people can inflict on their lives depending on what they do.

If someone steals something from me to buy drugs, I can only replace what is stolen up to a certain point. Therefore, I have to take this into consideration if I have a relationship with someone who is active in their addiction. It doesn’t mean I have placed a condition on them or that they have to earn my love by meeting certain conditions. It means that I am dealing with finite resources that I have to manage responsibily in this life.

The other way unconditional love would be defined according to how it applies to God is that unconditional love is pre-existent love. It exists before you do, so that it doesn’t matter if there are consequences for our actions. Our actions were never the motivation for God’s love to begin with.

This is demonstrated in how a parent’s love can feel different than love we have for others at times because it is also pre-existant. Before a child is born, most parents already love their children before they ever do anything good or bad.

This is also how the call to love others would be applied so that a distinction is created between the church and the world. We should seek to love others in a pre-existant way that is not based on making a good first impression.

And if we love someone before they do anything, we love them unconditionally in a spiritual sense.
 

Lisa

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The first way is the common way it is understood. It is basically an action of persevering with someone in one way or the other no matter what they do. Having boundaries is not the same thing as having conditions. It just means that people are limited in the ways that they are able to correct the damage other people can inflict on their lives depending on what they do.
Wouldn’t that be love and not unconditional love?
‭‭1 Corinthians‬ ‭13:4-7‬ ‭
Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.​

Therefore, I have to take this into consideration if I have a relationship with someone who is active in their addiction.
So you are then putting a condition on loving that person.

The other way unconditional love would be defined according to how it applies to God is that unconditional love is pre-existent love. It exists before you do, so that it doesn’t matter if there are consequences for our actions. Our actions were never the motivation for God’s love to begin with.
Jesus doesn’t say that God unconditionally loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, but that God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.

most parents already love their children before they ever do anything good or bad.
I think anymore we can say some parents...
Isaiah‬ ‭49:15‬ ‭
Can a woman forget her nursing child And have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, but I will not forget you.
And
‭‭Matthew‬ ‭24:12‬ ‭
Because lawlessness is increased, most people’s love will grow cold.
‭‭And I would say that a parents love would be considered a truer form of love, but not unconditional love.

We should seek to love others in a pre-existant way that is not based on making a good first impression
How would that happen?
 

rainerann

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It would be helpful if you expanded on this in direct response to what I have said rather that for me to go back to the beginning of the thread.

I will restate that I think unconditional love is a defined as a concept. Not as individual words with separate definitions. This is because languages like Greek used words that existed more as complex concepts rather than individual words. I would consider agape to be a complex concept that is translated using a combination of words rather than love as a singular noun.
 

Lisa

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It would be helpful if you expanded on this in direct response to what I have said rather that for me to go back to the beginning of the thread.

I will restate that I think unconditional love is a defined as a concept. Not as individual words with separate definitions. This is because languages like Greek used words that existed more as complex concepts rather than individual words. I would consider agape to be a complex concept that is translated using a combination of words rather than love as a singular noun.
But, you are asking me to reiterate my points, when I already stated them. If you want I can cut and paste my op?

Yet, we have for God so loved the world, not God so unconditionally loved the world, which He doesn’t unconditionally love the world. Love the world yes, but there is a condition on that love, to be reconciled to Him one must believe on Jesus. If not, thrown into the lake of fire where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.
 

Lisa

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@rainerann
Does God love unconditionally?

Does God love us unconditionally? Some people seem to think yes, He does, because they say that God is love. I think that God’s love is a different kind of love than ours. The real kind of love that dies for a sinner, not because the sinner deserves it but because God loves. Scripture tells us that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8) It may be that that is why people think God loves unconditionally, but I don’t believe that’s true..if God loved unconditionally then no one would have to die for our sins. We could keep sinning and sinning and have no problems with God, but that isn’t the case, we sin and we have problems with God who hates sin.

God hates sin so much that there is a place where sinners will go one day, after they die and that place is called hell. Jesus tells us that there is weeping and gnashing of teeth (Matt 13:42, Matt 13:50, Matt 25:30, Matt 8:12, Matt 25:41, Matt 22:13, Matt 13:28) there and that its a furnace of fire that people will be thrown into (Matt 13:42, Matt 13:50) aka hell. You don’t want to go there and He made is so you don’t have to, someone else paid that price for you.

If God loved us unconditionally, after we are saved, then God wouldn’t do any work on us at all, yet He does. We are told that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Jesus Christ. (Phil 1:6) He also tells us that anyone in Christ is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come. (2Cor 5:17) Since this is the case then God doesn’t really love people unconditionally.

However, that isn’t to say that one must clean up their lives to come to God. We can also say that you aren’t able to make your life clean on your own..sin stands in the way and you can only come to God as you are-a sinner. The Bible tells us for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (Romans 3:23)You don’t have to clean up your life to come to God, you can come to Him just as you are and God will give you rest. Jesus tell us we will find rest for our souls (Matt 11:29) But and this is big...God will not leave you the way He finds you and will start a process in your life whereby He takes out all the old in you and creates in you a clean heart. Eph 4:22-24, Ps 51:10.

Ezekiel‬ ‭18:32
For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone who dies,” declares the Lord GOD. “Therefore, repent and live.”
 

rainerann

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Technically, you are also asking me to reiterate what I just said too, and I just said it, and you have started a discussion with me in response to what I said. It is difficult for me to integrate what you are saying 11 pages ago if it is not restated as part of our conversation.

I don’t really feel what you cut and paste flows with our conversation very well either. I am still left with the same question. Based on what I just said, how would you respond to explain how god does not love unconditionally?

I guess I could also use the word transcendent rather than unconditional if that helps as well. To me unconditional love and transcendent love as a complex concept mean basically the same thing. But for you it seems that the definition of unconditional by itself is a real tripping point.

I think unconditional takes on its own meaning when combined with love. If you look in the dictionary, there are different meanings for just about every word based on context and in the context of unconditional love, unconditional doesn’t take on the same definition that it does by itself.

Kind of like how wormwood is a compound word that means something completely different than a worm sitting on a piece of wood or a piece of wood made up of worms or whatever, which could be the literal definition of the individual words that make up the compound word.
 

Lisa

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Technically, you are also asking me to reiterate what I just said too, and I just said it, and you have started a discussion with me in response to what I said. It is difficult for me to integrate what you are saying 11 pages ago if it is not restated as part of our conversation.

I don’t really feel what you cut and paste flows with our conversation very well either. I am still left with the same question. Based on what I just said, how would you respond to explain how god does not love unconditionally?

I guess I could also use the word transcendent rather than unconditional if that helps as well. To me unconditional love and transcendent love as a complex concept mean basically the same thing. But for you it seems that the definition of unconditional by itself is a real tripping point.

I think unconditional takes on its own meaning when combined with love. If you look in the dictionary, there are different meanings for just about every word based on context and in the context of unconditional love, unconditional doesn’t take on the same definition that it does by itself.

Kind of like how wormwood is a compound word that means something completely different than a worm sitting on a piece of wood or a piece of wood made up of worms or whatever, which could be the literal definition of the individual words that make up the compound word.
I agree that the word unconditional is a tripping point for me. I don’t see that anyone can love unconditionally really in the sense that unconditional love is defined. Everything that the Bible describes as love seems to be taken as unconditional love, so I don’t actually understand the view.

You asked..
So you’re basically saying god doesn’t unconditionally love? Why?
My answer is my op so I don’t understand what more you are looking for.



‭‭1 Corinthians‬ ‭13:4-7‬ ‭
Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.​

Is this verse talking about love or unconditional love or even transcendent love? It would probably fit the bill people think of as unconditional love, but still it is only love.
 

rainerann

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Well what kind of love do you think 1 corinthians 13 is talking about if it uses agape in the original Greek?

Have you ever listened to a sermon going over the different Greek words that were used for love? Agape, Phileo, etc.
 

Lisa

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Well what kind of love do you think 1 corinthians 13 is talking about if it uses agape in the original Greek?

Have you ever listened to a sermon going over the different Greek words that were used for love? Agape, Phileo, etc.
I think I have heard sermons detailing the different kinds of love..a long time ago.

When I was a kid, some church people..idk what denomination came by the house and sold a record..yes a record not vinyl..to my parents that talked about agapeland. I loved that album, had some good songs on it, I particularly liked the one about the flood. In parts it sounded like a storm..anyway...

I think that 1 Corinthians 13 is talking about love, what love should look like.
 
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