Unity is a state of
oneness and harmony
All believers in Christ are united in Christ.
We are in a relationship
that unites us with Him and with
every other believer.
Jesus prayed for His disciples—all who
would believe in Him for all the ages--
“that all of them may be one,
Father, just as
you are in me and I am in you”
(John 17:21).
Scripture is clear that
all believers
are united with Christ
because of our relationship with Him
and with all other believers.
We are all in the same family,
even it at times we do not act like it.
Therefore, unity in Christ has
two aspects—one is
objective fact, and one is subjective experience.
God’s love for mankind, as described in the Bible,
is
clearly unconditional
in that His love is expressed toward
the objects of
His love despite their disposition toward Him.
In other words,
God loves
without placing any conditions on the
loved ones;
He loves because it is
His
nature to love
(1 John 4:8).
That love moves Him toward benevolent action:
“He causes his sun to rise on the
evil and the good,
and sends rain on the
righteous and the unrighteous”
(Matthew 5:45).
The unconditional nature of God’s love is
most clearly seen in
The gospel.
The gospel message is basically a story of divine rescue.
As God considered the plight of His rebellious people,
He determined to save them from their sin,
and this determination was
based on His love
(Ephesians 1:4–5).
Listen to the apostle Paul’s words from his
letter to the Romans:
“You see, at just the right time,
when we were still powerless,
Christ died for the ungodly.
Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man,
though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die.
But God demonstrates his own
love for us in this:
While we were still sinners, Christ died for us”
(Romans 5:6–8).
We learn that we have
all sinned and fallen short of God’s glory
(Romans 3:23)
and that none of us seek God; none of us do
what is right before His eyes
(Romans 3:10–18).
Despite the hostility and enmity we have toward God
(for which God would be perfectly just to utterly destroy us),
God revealed
His love toward us in the
giving of
His Son, Jesus Christ,
as the propitiation for
our sins.
God did not wait for us to better ourselves as a
condition of atoning for our sin.
Rather,
God condescended to become a man and
live among His people
(John 1:14).
God experienced our humanity--
everything it means to be a
human being--
and then offered Himself willingly
as a substitutionary atonement for our sin.
This divine rescue, based on unconditional love,
resulted in a gracious act of self-sacrifice.
As Jesus said,
Greater love has no one than this,
that he lay
down his life for his friends
(John 15:13).
That is precisely what God, in Christ,
has done.
The unconditional nature of God’s love is made clear
in other passages of Scripture:
“But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy,
made us
alive with Christ
even when we were dead in transgressions--
it is by grace you have been saved”
(Ephesians 2:4–5).
"This is how God showed his love among us:
He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might
live through him.
This is love: not that we loved God,
but that he loved us
and
sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins"
(1 John 4:9–10).
It is important to note
that God’s love is a love that initiates;
it is never a response.
That is precisely
what makes it unconditional.
If God’s love were conditional, then we would have
to do something to earn or merit it.
We would have to somehow appease His wrath
or cleanse ourselves of sin
before God would be able to love us.
But that is not the biblical message.
The biblical message--the gospel—is that God,
motivated by love,
moved unconditionally to
save His people from their sin.
To ignore God’s merciful love,
to reject the Savior who
bought us (2 Peter 2:1),
is to subject ourselves to God’s wrath for eternity
(Romans 1:18),
not His love.
Does God love everyone?
Yes,
He shows mercy and
kindness to all!
In that sense His love is unconditional.
The unconditional, merciful love God has for everyone
can bring us
to greater faith