I have loved you, my people, with an everlasting love. With unfailing love I have drawn you to myself. Jeremiah 31:3 (NLT)
God’s love is unconditional. What’s amazing is that His immense love toward us remains unchanged even when we mess up.
Now, that’s important to know, because love doesn’t work that way for many raised in legalistic religion. Rule-based religion carries rejection with it. The second we fail, fall into sin, hurt someone or slide back into an old bad habit, we think God withdraws His love until we get it right or somehow fix ourselves up enough to be worthy again. That’s called toxic love, and it’s the opposite of how God actually loves us.
Toxic love is a “love” that depends upon your behaviour. Maybe you had a parent who seemed loving when your behaviour was good, but backhanded you off the chair the minute you talked back or raised your voice. Some of us know friends who grew up tiptoeing around, trying to be perfect, afraid to do or be wrong because of the consequences.
Growing up with toxic love affects everything. In our businesses and relationships, we become afraid to make mistakes. So we learn to either argue to stay “in the right” or cover up our mistake so our “wrong” can’t be found out. We do this because toxic love conditions us to believe that love is withdrawn when we make a mistake.
But how differently we understand God’s love if we had a parent who said, “It’s okay. What you did wasn’t right, and we need to deal with it, but it doesn’t change how much I love you.” That’s what God’s love is like!
God loves you unconditionally, and there’s no rejection in His love.