Can God love me just as I am, and simultaneously not want me to be just as I am? The revelation of God’s divine nature affirms that each one is wholly and thoroughly loved by God, and accepted by grace on the basis of faith, in whatever inward and outward condition is theirs right now. God’s nature also makes it unmistakably clear that our present selves are miserable and ruined, falling short of his holy and glorious nature.
Both. Welcomed and judged deficient.
Fully accepted and totally unacceptable!
When we declare that all may be accepted we say that on the basis of grace. When we confess that every individual is thoroughly unacceptable we are also speaking of grace. Grace is the activity of divine mercy for the undeserving which enables our acceptance and transformation!
God’s acceptance of all of us does not mean he is satisfied with the present condition of any of us. In the church we ought to declare clearly that all are welcome, but all need desperately to be changed! Not just some of us. Everyone. In more ways than we probably imagine. None may claim that his or her self, or any aspect of that self, has no need for redemption!
It is a deficient view of love that believes I am only loved in as much as my present condition is affirmed. To equate love with abandoning me to my present state is to imagine love that holds no hope beyond what I currently experience. We do not deny God’s love for any of us by insisting that God urgently seeks to transform all of us.
This paradox is symbolized in the cross. The cross shows how much God loves us just as we are. Enough for God to die for us. The cross also shows the lengths to which God goes to change us. Our condition is so bad that the death of God is needed to transform us. The cross shows that we are loved as we are, but unacceptable as we are.
We ought to contradict ourselves. To speak so enthusiastically about how God’s grace accepts us, as the sinners we are, that people should wonder if in fact we believe in any need to change at all. We should also insist relentlessly on the need for personal transformation, so that upon hearing it, people should doubt that we accept anyone.
In fact, God’s love for me is not at odds with how he wants to put me to death. Jesus knows that the me that needs to die stands in the way of the true me, the me God has always loved.
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