Unconditional Love Sucks

Finals are officially over and the semester has ended! I'm still on campus for Senior Week, as I'll be singing with the gospel choir for Commencement this weekend. Then, I'll be home for a short seven days, followed by my 65-day trip to Nicaragua!

So many wonderful blessings have been poured out on me over the past two weeks...and while I usually talk about how hard it is to praise God in the midst of suffering and pain, I feel like we overlook how hard it is thank God in the midst of so many blessings.

With a brand new job with Campus Ministry for next year, finishing the semester with all As and Bs, and receiving a sizable service scholarship from the University, sometimes it's easy to attribute these blessings to myself, to forget how much God helped me.

I've been talking with some friends recently about why God's unconditional love sucks.

Don't get me wrong. I'm thankful for it, but if I'm being blatantly honest, God's unconditional love pisses me off at times....

Some of you may disagree with me...the fact that we don't have to work for our salvation, that we receive this amazing and infinite gift, how could I not love that?

Well...there's this funny little thing called pride...

I like glory...I'd be lying if I said that I didn't enjoy being the center of attention, receiving recognition, honor, gratitude, praise...anything that makes me feel like I worked for something, earned something, deserved something.

Life, especially in America, sometimes seems like one big rat race...we're all chasing after the American Dream, all trying to be the best, competing with each other. I've worked hard to get good grades, to do so much community service, join so many extracurricular activities. And I'm obviously not alone...millions of students have worked their way up the social ladder, desperate to get to the top. Suzy Lee Weiss sums it all up in her WSJ post.

For me, it's why God's unconditional love angers me at time. We want to feel entitled to something. I can never declare that I have earned God's grace, that I deserve eternal salvation. All of that is open to absolutely everyone, and there is nothing I can do to prove myself worthy. Christ is the only one who can make us worthy.

I recently heard All Sons and Daughter's "All Praise to You" on Pandora, as they repeatedly declare:

"All Glory, All Honor, All Praise to You"

We're not saying "Glory and Honor and Praise to God", we're saying "All Glory, All Honor, All Praise to God"....meaning all that glory that I want? That all has to go to Him.

When we attribute our works to Christ, our achievements, our victories, our accomplishments, we're giving up our thoughts of entitlement, which is a hard thing to do. I completely understand that.

But...

When we give up that entitlement, we start finding more gratitude, and as I've been so often read, gratitude is what leads to true Joy. So be thankful for unconditional love...even if we didn't earn it, we still get true Joy from it.