Love, grace, forgiveness

Love. Four simple little letters, that express so much meaning. Arguably the most powerful emotion, it has the power to lift us up and to bring us to our knees. And of course there are many different kinds of love, the love we have for our parents, that our parents have for their kids, and the love we have for our significant other.

It’s funny, because at each stage of my life, I thought I knew what it was to be in love, until I of course experienced it in a new way. Obviously, loving someone who at least like’s you more than a friend is different from thinking you are in love with someone who doesn’t care if you die on the spot. And loving and being truly loved in return is the most amazing thing I think a person can experience on this planet. Until I met my fiancé Sarah, I thought I had known what love was, but of course I hadn’t really. And everyday I find myself even more in love with her, as I discover more and more what an amazing person she is.

What is sad today is that many people believe that love has to be conditional. We are bombarded with conflicting messages everyday. On the one hand, most people would say ideally that love is unconditional, and that it has no bounds. We see this a lot in movies, especially in epic tragedies. On the other hand, advertisers would like to have you think that you have to earn a person’s love by doing things for them and buying them lot’s of expensive things (diamonds anyone?).

I think this is honestly a major problem for people in relationships today, and it can make life very difficult. It also makes it difficult to accept the idea of unconditional love from God, and the dying of Christ on the cross. I know I struggle with this daily in my relationship with Sarah, and with God. One of my major stumbling blocks to accepting Christ was the idea of unconditional love and forgiveness. I had trouble accepting a love that I know is completely undeserved.

This also comes into the concept of God’s grace, forgiveness for everything that has been committed if it is asked for. Without His unconditional love, He would not be able to forgive us for everything. This is shown most ably in Christ dying on the cross for all of humanity’s sins. Definitely food for thought.God_