Living in Response to Love

A lot of the toxic beliefs that I’ve gathered about the Christian faith throughout my life have come from one flaw in the order of things between me and God. This ‘flaw’ is best explained through an example — I’ll start with the Commandments…

I used to believe (and I don’t think that I’m alone on this one) that the Ten Commandments was a list of things that I had to do in order to be in good standing with God.

The order was as such…

Me => God’s Love/Acceptance

I saw them as obligatory statements. It was an ancient task list that seemed so simple but also impossible.

What’s the use?… Sure, I know this is all good stuff. I just wish I could actually live like that.

I mean, the big things like killing and stealing seem avoidable. But saying goddamnit or not honoring my mom and dad every once in a while… Those seem like such minor offenses. Why did God take the time to have poor old Moses scratch them into stone?

When I look at the Commandments as obligations from me to God, I immediately put up defenses against them. That’s the nature of the human condition. We are allergic to law — God’s Law, human law, and even the endless list of little things that even smell like law (ex: those Christmas gift exchanges that you feel like you have to spend money on and go to this time of year).

Now, the law is useful. Jesus knew all 600+ Levitical laws like the back of his hand. The Law serves as a mirror. Before the law, we are rendered inadequately powerless.

See those bolded words above? The ones that say, “…from me to God.” Yeah, that’s the root of the problem: when I think that I’m the first mover. When I believe that I have to do things in order to gain approval with God.

When Jesus showed up, he showed everyone how impossible it is to actually live this way. Jesus showed the world that God’s love doesn’t depend on us. We are not the first movers. God is. In Jesus, God’s love — in spite of how horribly we constantly break the Commandments — is greater than ours.

And Jesus wasn’t like me (shocking, I know). He wasn’t just a glib blogger/pastor wannabe who mused about this stuff. He was crucified to the law and resurrected into a new restorative way of life in Christ. He has blood to show for it.

Jesus reversed the flow to be as such…

God’s Love/Acceptance => Me

Jesus turned the Commandments into a list of freedoms. Instead of “You’d better do these things,” it became, “Now, with God’s unending love, you are free to do these things (though you’ll probably still mess up, but at least you’ll know you’re loved regardless).”

Here’s the good news…

God’s radical love, mercy, forgiveness, and acceptance don’t depend on us to make it true.

When we look at it this way, the 10 Commandments are more accurately written like this…

The 10 Non-Obligatory Statements of Christian Freedom

1. (When you remember My unconditional love for you…) you won’t have any strange gods before Me.
2. (When you remember My unconditional love for you…) you won’t speak poorly of Me because you’ll be too busy basking in your acceptance.
3. (When you remember My unconditional love for you…) you’ll be free to take a sacred day off to care for yourself.
4. (When you remember My unconditional love for you…) you’ll gain empathy for your folks and will be free to love them as imperfect as they are.
5. (When you remember My unconditional love for you…) you’ll be free from the desire to kill anyone.
6. (When you remember My unconditional love for you…) you’ll be free to honor the sacredness of your partner/spouse as imperfect as they are.
7. (When you remember My unconditional love for you…) you’ll be free from the desire of stealing from anyone.
8. (When you remember My unconditional love for you…) you’ll be free from the imprisonment of lying.
9. (When you remember My unconditional love for you…) you’ll be free from sexual objectivity and will only recognize the sacredness in your neighbor.
10. (When you remember My unconditional love for you…) you’ll be free from wanting stuff that you don’t need and that only leaves you empty after you get it.

Repentance and forgiveness

So much about Christian theology can be healed when we see God’s love for humans as the first moving principle. Take repentance and forgiveness, for example…

It’s easy to see repentance (confession) as something we have to do in order to receive forgiveness (absolution). But when we see it this way (as Law), we recoil from it. Who wants to do that?! It’s like when your mom/dad used to make you say you’re sorry (always with that condescending look on their faces — ugh!). Sure, we might do it out of sheer obligation, but the human heart hardens under this kind of scrutiny.

Again, we see God as the one who’s waiting on us. And that shit is no more since Jesus flipped the script. Now we can see God’s radical love and insane (yes, insane) forgiveness as the first mover.

When this is the case, God’s forgiveness comes first! Yes, as soon as we know we messed up, we look at God’s utter forgiveness for us. NOW, we can honestly repent from a humbled and softened heart. Now we can be raw, real, and humanly honest about our transgressions against ourselves and/or our neighbors so that we can heal more fully.

When we think we need to earn God’s love, we’re proclaiming that it isn’t currently there. When we live in response to it, we recognize God’s presence despite our individual human ways.

This works in the human realm too. Things go much better for us when we walk through life remembering that we’re loved in the very core of our being without having to change a thing rather than people-pleasing and trying to earn everyone’s love and acceptance.

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This post was previously published on Grace Incarnate and is republished here with permission from the author.
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