When the word love comes up, people often have a hard time explaining it or explaining what it means to them. Indeed, it is very hard to define. There are many different types of love. There is no where where this is more evident than in the Bible. In the original greek, the Bible uses the word for agape love when talking about God's love for his children. This type of love stands for unconditional love. You might be wondering why I am bringing this up.
That past several weeks, I have been able to see God's love more than ever with all the struggles that I've been going through. Along with that, I read something today that said that "God's love isn't unconditional." I think the Bible is very clear that this isn't true and it disturbed me. The Bible is very clear on false teachings. It is to not be tolerated. We are told to beware of it. What disturbed me the most was that it was saying that anyone who says that God's love is unconditional is preaching false doctrine. The Bible says that God's love is unconditional through its use of the greek word for agape love.
This went further to somehow equate God's love with getting to heaven. This is ABSOLUTELY false. The Bible is VERY clear on that. ("Jesus answered, 'I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.'" John 14:6) John 3:16 and 17 tells us that "God so loved the world that he sent his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him." It is through God's unconditional love that he sent his son to die on the cross as a sacrifice for our sins. It took someone who was perfect and sinless to be the ultimate sacrifice for our sins. It is through the forgiveness of Jesus, that we are able to get to heaven. That is not to say that we are are forgiven by doing whatever we want. We can deny Jesus' forgiveness in multiple ways. We can deny forgiveness of sins by not acknowledging that we are sinning, continuing to sin, or by continuing to brew on sins that we have already asked for forgiveness through. We are the ones who deny forgiveness. God's love doesn't change no matter what we do. It is UNCONDITIONAL. God's forgiveness doesn't change. It is always there for us. We just have to accept it through what we do.
This was a wake up call to me about how easily false teachings can spread. Please be careful to make sure that what you hear is true. Make sure it actually has a foundation in the Scriptures. If it contradicts the Scripture, it should be rejected because it is NOT of God because the Scripture is the true word of God.
Thanks,
Seth Pohle