Characteristics of Love: Love is unconditional
Romans 5:8 But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
Romans 5:8(NLT) But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.
Introduction: Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised. We are kept by the power of God to see new month despite uncertainties in the land.
🙏 The Lord will continue to be gracious to us and our families in Jesus name
We should have known by now geat differences between valentine or worldly love in which dwellers of the world are familiar with, and God’s love in which very few exhibit because it requires revelations and faith in the word of God.
Many find worldly love as realistic and God’s love as unrealistic. Only few through revelation and faith in the word of God experience God’s love amidst existing worldly love.
❓Do you know why worldly love is popularly known and celebrated while God’s love is unpopular and unknown to many?
Matthew 7:13-14(NLT) “You can enter God’s Kingdom only through the narrow gate. The highway to hell is broad, and its gate is wide for the many who choose that way. But the gateway to life is very narrow and the road is difficult, and only a few ever find it.
You will agree with me that accepting and practicing characteristics of God’s kind of Love in this human nature is difficult and impossible for the flesh. That is why it is ONLY with God that it is possible but how many of us stay with God more than the world?
🛑 We cannot live after the flesh and understand the characteristics of God’s love but ONLY through the Spirit.
Matthew 19:25-26(NLT) The disciples were astounded. “Then who in the world can be saved?” they asked. Jesus looked at them intently and said, “Humanly speaking, it is impossible. But with God everything is possible.”
The 10th characteristic of God’s love we are looking at this week is: Love is unconditional
Describing something as unconditional simply means it does not require anything to be done by the receiver in exchange for the giver.
God’s love to mankind is given unconditionally. There is nothing that can be given to match with God’s gift of love. In fact, we were shown love when we had nothing to give.
Romans 5:8 But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
What is commonly found among human beings is where pain is received in exchange for love. That is why men consider God’s kind of Love as foolishness.
1 Corinthians 1:18(NLT) The message of the cross is foolish to those who are headed for destruction! But we who are being saved know it is the very power of God.
I have seen situation where uneducated young man sponsored his fiancée to tertiary institution due to love and the lady abandoned him for another man after graduation. You can imagine pain that this man would receive with unpleasant comments against him from friends and family. Will the man continue to be good to women or become wicked? If God considers wickedness of men, all humanity will not receive God’s love again.
Genesis 6:5-6(NLT) The lord observed the extent of human wickedness on the earth, and he saw that everything they thought or imagined was consistently and totally evil. So the lord was sorry he had ever made them and put them on the earth. It broke his heart.
God found Noah for Mercy and He started new generation of human beings afresh with Noah, yet human imagination continued to be evil.
Genesis 8:20-21(NLT) Then Noah built an altar to the lord, and there he sacrificed as burnt offerings the animals and birds that had been approved for that purpose. And the lord was pleased with the aroma of the sacrifice and said to himself, “I will never again curse the ground because of the human race, even though everything they think or imagine is bent toward evil from childhood. I will never again destroy all living things.
🛑 If God had ceased from showing unconditional love to humanity, then destruction will be inevitable. God therefore offered His only begotten Son as everlasting love for anyone who receives Jesus Christ.
John 3:16-17(NLT) “For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him.
❓What then is God’s expectation for us believers?
John 13:34 A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.
God’s kind of Love is unconditional therefore, we are expected to exhibit this kind of Love without condition.
Considering the experience of the man shared above, many Christians will not venture to show love to any other woman after disappointment and pain received from the fiancée. The truth is we are NOT better than that fiancée who abandoned her fiancé that sponsored her education if we are to be judged by God’s word.
❓How then can believers be distinguished from unbelievers?
John 13:35(NLT) Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.”
🛑 If believers exhibit conditional love, then there is no difference with corrupt unbelievers.
Matthew 5:46(NLT) If you love only those who love you, what reward is there for that? Even corrupt tax collectors do that much.
❓ What practical steps are we to take as we walk in love this week?
Do something out of the ordinary this week for your spouse—something that proves (to you and to them) that your love is based on your choice and nothing else. Wash her car. Clean the kitchen. Buy his favorite dessert. Fold the laundry. Demonstrate love to them for the sheer joy of being their partner in marriage.
✍ Finally brethren, if Christian spouses love each other unconditionally, blissful relationship will Not elude the home because God Himself will dwell among them.
1 John 4:16(NLT) We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love. God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them.
Peace and joy is surely found where God dwells.
One thing is sure, where a spouse loves unconditionally, though judged by men to be fool, God will abundantly reward such spouse in due course and put to shame those who see it as foolishness to love unconditionally.
It is a privilege to be a child of God.
1 John 3:1a Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God:
✋ Maranatha
