Does God Really Love You Unconditionally?

This was a post on Facebook from one of my friends, Ralph Gray. 

One of the biggest lies ever told to us is "God loves you unconditionally".

Is this true?
Let's see.
"If you love Me, you WILL keep My commandments" John 14:15 emphasis mine.
"He who has My commandment and KEEPS them, he it is who loves Me; and he who Loves Me, shall be loved by My Father,and I will love him, and will disclose Myself to him." John 14:21 emphasis mine.
"You are My friends, IF you do what I command you." John 15:14 emphasis mine.
Jesus' love is very much conditional.
"The one who say ,'I have come to know him' and does not KEEP His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him" 1 John 2:4 emphasis mine.
Do you have the truth in you?

We get so self centered when we say "Jesus loves me."
Me, Me,Me its always all about me.
If you serve the unholy trinity of me, myself and I. 
You do not love God.
If you refuse to condemn sin and parrot "judge not". 
You do not love God.
If you do not have a humble and repentant heart.
You do not love God.
If you refuse to love your neighbor and your personal enemies.
You do not love God.
If you parrot the line "The law was nailed to the cross" and continue in sin.
You do not love God.
If you refuse to have HIS will on earth as the the Lord's prayer commands.
You do not love God.
If you haven't obeyed the command to be baptized for the forgiveness of sins in the name of Jesus. 
You do not love God.
These are all commandments of the Lord!
If you refuse to keep His commandments you do not love Him and According to His holy Word He won't love you.
What is sin?
Transgression of His law/ commandments. 1 John 3:4

Do not become one of those in Matthew 7:22-23 "Many will say to Me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?' " And I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS.'. Emphasis not mine but the Lords.
If you want Jesus to love you keep His commandments.
Make it all about Him, Him, Him. Not me,me,me.
The good news is you can repent of this. Humble yourself and obey Acts 2:38, Mark 16:16 and the many, many other commands to be baptized for the forgiveness of sins .
If you repent He will love you and forgive you and know you.

"And why now do you delay? Arise, and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on His name" Acts 22:16

I would only add this:
A lot of people have dead faith and no works. Works do not earn us salvation, grace which is unmerited favor shown to us by God through the crucifixion of Christ gave us an opportunity to gain salvation. That said, works are the EVIDENCE of salvation. If you do not have works, you do not have salvation. Too often we hear "God loves you as you are" without hearing that God also expects us to change. 

I loved my son when he could not even roll over, but I expected him to learn how to crawl, then walk and eventually be able to run. I would not have accepted anything less out of him because I know he is capable. God knows we are capable and because of that expects more from us. So, we need to do more. We need to not stop asking God what He can do for us but instead ask ourselves what more we can do for Him.

I AM A DAD!!

There are some roles in this world that we are given that we do not take nearly as importantly as we should. I know that Dad is one of those roles. The statistics for boys and girls that grow up without their father or a strong father figure in their lives in plain scary. The statistics for children that have their dads in their lives is reassuring.

Yet with all of the research out there )showing girls without fathers in their lives are 10 times more likely to get raped and 12 times more likely to be addicted to drugs as well as boys being 12 times more likely to drop out of high school and 20 times more likely to go to prison) we still have children that have no active dad in their lives. This has got to change. It is not only morally right, it is also Biblically correct:

1. Malachi 4:6, "And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the earth with a curse." 
2. Ephesians 6:4, "And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord."
3. Proverbs 22:6, "Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it."

As you can see from these scriptures, a father is vitally important in the lives of their children. I also think of my clients and the number of them who either did not have their father in their lives at all or had a dad who was in and out of prison. Those children have themselves grown up to be alcoholics and addicts after living through countless horrors: physical abuse as a child, being molested, raped, selling their bodies, going to prison and going from one violent relationship to the next all the while searching for that father figure they never had. 

In order for this to not happen, we need to become more active in the lives of our children. I want my son to hear about my past from me, not from the people around him. I want him to know my face because he sees it, not because he has been shown pictures. I want my son to learn right and wrong from me, not from somebody else. I want my son to learn how to treat a lady from me, not from his classmates. I want him to be educated on the dangers of drugs, alcohol and cigarettes at home by me and not during lunch behind one of the school buildings from his friends. 

But there is a catch! In order to teach him, I must be present in his life. That means that I must take time from my busy schedule and make him the center of my attention sometimes. It means that some years he may get vacations that he wants and I will not get the one that I want. It means that I may miss a game here and there on television. I have to spend quality time with him or all is for naught. But this should not be a problem, and this weekend my son reminded me why it is not a chore to be around him. 

This Christmas my son amazed me, as he often does. He saw the drum set he got for Christmas and squealed. He then proceeded to play for the next half hour. All I had to do was look at him and give him a thumbs up and the smile on his face set my heart on fire. How could anyone look at one of their children and not want to be in their lives. 

His smile made me realize that it is not only him that learns from me, but I have learned from him as well. He has taught me how to fully love unconditionally, a lesson that my father had taught me but I had somehow forgotten. Through prison, physical abuse, depression and addiction I had hardened my heart. I would let no one in. 

My son reminded me why I had to let people in. If I do not open myself up, then all that I have been through is for nothing. The devil has won. He has tortured me and tormented me and I will keep that to myself and not use it to help others who are hurting now. Thanks to him I remember that I need to love others even when they fail me. You see, for the first year of my sons life I failed him, and yet I am still his world. 

I love that little guy! Every day I thank God for the gift of my son to remind me what unconditional love looks like. Thanks to my son, I get to live a live worth living. Thanks to my son, I am a dad!!

Celebrate Recovery Lesson 1 DENIAL

Lesson 1 DENIAL

Principle 1: Realize I'm not God. I admit that I am powerless to control my tendency to do the wrong thing and that my life is unmanageable.

"Happy are those who know they are spiritually poor." (Matthew 5:3)


Step 1:We admitted we were powerless over our addictions and compulsive behaviors, that our lives had become unmanageable.

"I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out." (Romans 7:18)

What are you holding on to? Are we racked with guilt or shame? Do we not realize that these are the feelings that will keep us trapped by our past. We will remain unable to forgive ourselves and remain where we are instead of making positive steps forward. What is the answer? The Bible tells us what we should do when there are things that slow us down or keep us stagnant:


"Since we have such a huge crowd of men of faith watching us from the grandstands, let us strip off anything that slows us down or holds us back, and especially those sins that wrap themselves so tightly around our feet and trip us up, and let us run with patience the particular race that God has set before us." (Hebrews 12:1)

2 Points about the verse: 
1.) God has a particular race, a unique plan, for each of us. A plan for good, not a life full of dependencies, addictions, and obsessions. 


2.) We need to be willing to get rid of all the unnecessary baggage, the past failures, in our lives that keep us stuck

Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past" (Isaiah 43:18)

"The Lord is my Helper and I am not afraid of anything that mere men can do to me." (Hebrews 13:6)


"Where God's love is, there is no fear, because God's perfect love drives out fear" (1 John 4:18)

ARE YOU WEARING A MASK OF DENIAL?Before you can make progress in your recovery, you need to face your denial. As soon as you remove your mask, your recovery begins -- or begins again!

WHAT IS DENIAL?Denial is defines as a "false system of beliefs that are not based on reality" and a "self-protecting behavior that keeps us from honestly facing the truth."

EFFECTS OF DENIAL

Disables our feelings

Energy lost

Negates growth

Isolates us from God

Alienates us from relationships

Lengthens the pain


Disables our feelings When we repress we freeze our emotions. Understanding and feeling our feelings is freedom True test of freedom is not what am I free to do, but what am I free not to do???

2 Peter 2:19:  “They promise them freedom, while they themselves are slaves of depravity--for a man is a slave to whatever has mastered him.“


Energy lost A side effect of our denial is anxiety, which causes us to waste energy running from our past and worrying about and dreading the future. Change can only occur today

Psalms 146:7-8 “He frees the prisoners, He lifts the burdens from those bent down beneath their loads.”


Negates growth We are as sick as our secrets and we cannot grow in recovery until we are ready to step out of denial into the truth

Psalms 107:13-14 “They cried to the Lord in their troubles, and he rescued them! He led them from their darkness and shadow of death and snapped their chains.”


Isolates us from God God’s light shines on the truth, denial keeps us in the dark

1 John 1:5-7:  “God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.”


Alienates us from relationships Denial tells us we are getting away with it. We think no one knows, but do they?????? What is the answer?

Ephesians 4:25:  “Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one body and when we lie to each other we are hurting ourselves.”


Lengthens the pain We have the false belief that denial protects us from the pain. In reality, denial allows our pain to fester and grow and turn into guilt and shame.

Jeremiah 30:17:  “But I will restore you to health and heal your wounds,' declares the Lord, 'because you are called an outcast, Zion for whom no one cares.'

"Know the truth, and the truth will set you free" (John 8:32)

STEP OUT OF YOUR DENIAL SO YOU CAN STEP INTO JESUS' UNCONDITIONAL LOVE AND GRACE. THAT IS HOW YOU CAN BEGIN YOUR HEALING JOURNEY OF RECOVERY.

QUESTIONS TO ASK OUR SELF:

1.) Am I going to let my past failures prevent me from taking this journey?

2.) Am I afraid to change? Or, what are my fears of the future?