The Square Peg

Bridget is hosting today's blog carnival. It's open to everyone; if you want to participate, go to her page and leave a comment with a link to your blog after you've posted your entry.

Love is the most powerful force in the universe. And from where I'm sitting, it seems there are 3 categories of 'love' we experience most often.

Casual - This is the kind of love we hear and see the most yet it has the shallowest meaning. It's never meant  in a deep, committed, or sacrificial kind of way.
"I love those shoes."
"I love your hair."
"I love to play golf."
"I love that song."
Casual love doesn't require us to do anything. We can use the word love to describe our feelings and not suffer any consequences when we change our mind. If you don't love those shoes any more, you just stop wearing them. Nobody cares and you won't be held accountable.  

Convenient - This is pretty straight-forward; as long as it's working, we love it.
I used to say I loved Arby's fast food until I lived in Wichita Falls, Texas. The only store in the city was located at the bottom of an exit off the freeway, didn't have a drive-thru and only took cash; no checks or debit cards. You had to really want Arby's to go there. After a few times of spending 30 minutes of my busy life trying to find a parking spot, walking inside and waiting in line, followed by sitting in traffic to get back on the freeway, I realized I didn't really love Arby's as much as I thought or claimed. The hassle wasn't worth the reward.

Sometimes it's convenient to love someone we think we can get something from...whether it's an inheritance, something he/she can do or provide that propels us forward at work, or gives us leverage, position, status or power.

This type of love has hurt me the most personally. Discovering I was convenient to love (and subsequently stop loving) cuts me deeper than being loved casually or conditionally for some reason and leaves me feeling like I've been sucker punched.

Conditional - This is closely related to convenient love but this is typically based on our performance (or lack thereof).
"You obviously don't have what it takes to be with someone like me"
"You called a few times but did you ever come over or offer to help financially?"
"If you can't try to understand me or what I need, then maybe we don't have anything worth fighting to save."

Since no one is able to perform the right way all the time, this type of love is extremely frustrating and typically unfair. It's pretty easy to spot though, because it doesn't take long to rear its ugly head.

Much of the time people who are love casually, conveniently or conditionally aren't even aware of it.

But there is another kind of love. And it also starts with a C.

It's Christ's love. But His love isn't anything like the ones I listed previously. In fact, His love is the polar opposite because there's nothing casual, convenient, or conditional about His love for humanity. He's committed to us. He's all in. He's true blue.

But I think we sometimes try to put His love in the first three categories because we have a hard time grasping it. If I don't love you unconditionally, it's pretty easy for me to assume that God doesn't love me unconditionally, either. But that's so wrong...

If you have only experienced the first three types of love I listed, please hear me: God has crazy love for us and it's not affected by our performance, lack of faith, mistakes/failures, accolades we've received, our ability to study/teach His text, or make money.
He loves us because we exist.
And anyone who tells you otherwise is lying to you.