Well, the title of my message today is “God’s Unconditional Love.”
And, I love the Centering Quote that’s on the front cover of your program today. It’s from Saint Augustine, and it says:
“God’s love is unconditional. Be sure that yours is, too.”
It’s right in line with the commandment that Jesus gave at the Last Supper, when he said: “Love one another as I have loved you.”
We, my friends, are called to love another just as God has loved us: unconditionally!
The word “unconditional” means “without conditions.”
We are to love people without placing any conditions on that love.
Sadly, however – even though that is our Christian calling – many Christian churches do place conditions on people.
Some churches place conditions on who can receive communion at their church. For example, you may remember I told you about my aunt (my mother’s sister) who was no longer able to receive communion at her church after she became divorced.
Some churches place conditions on who can serve as leaders at their church. For example, in some churches women are not allowed to lead, as the Bible says, “women are to be silent in church.”
Some churches places conditions are who can receive sacraments. In many churches, LGBTQ people, for example, are not permitted to be baptized or married in the church.
Religious institutions also placed conditions on people back in Jesus’s day.
Samaritans and lepers and tax collectors and Gentiles were all considered ‘unclean’ and ‘unworthy.’
During his ministry, Jesus got in trouble with the religious authorities, because his followers were made up of people who were considered ‘unclean’ and ‘unworthy.’
Jesus loved the marginalized and the outcasts and the oppressed. And, he said that in his Kingdom that they (“the last”) would be first. That in his Kingdom, the “least of these” would be considered the most important.
And, that’s what the gospel reading from today’s lectionary is all about. In it, the disciples ask Jesus what the Kingdom of Heaven will be like, and (as Jesus often did) he didn’t answer them directly. Instead, he told them a story, a parable.
Today’s gospel reading is known as “The Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard.”
As we just heard, a vineyard owner hires some workers to work in his vineyard for one denarius, a sum of money.
Some workers worked in the vineyard all day. 10 hours! Others worked only 5 hours, and some worked for only 1 hour.
But at the end of the day, they all received the same wage: the same equal amount!
Now, that seems really unfair to us, doesn’t it?
But Jesus’s whole point with this story is to let people know that God loves all people equally. God’s love isn’t based on who’s more deserving or worthy.
In God’s Kingdom, all people are worthy and deserving, because God’s love is unconditional. It isn’t based on conditions.
Now, believe it or not, some Christians don’t like hearing that. They think that’s unfair. They want the Father’s love to be based on conditions…just like the Prodigal Son’s older brother did.
I’m sure you all remember Jesus’s famous “Parable of the Prodigal Son”: how the Prodigal Son runs away and spends all of his inheritance? When he returns home, his father doesn’t punish him, but throws a big banquet for him. He wraps him in a silk robe and puts an expensive ring on his finger!
And, the older brother is upset by this. He says, “Dad, I stayed here and did the right thing. I was faithful to you. Where’s my party? Where’s my ring?”
But, again, Jesus’s point with that parable is the same: God’s loves all of us equally.
You don’t have to do anything to earn God’s favor or to win God’s love, because you already have it. Unconditionally!
And, you don’t need to do anything to ensure your place in heaven, because your place in heaven is already assured by an all-loving and all-forgiving God.
That’s what people should be hearing at church. Not that they’re bad, broken, unworthy, and in need of fixing before God can love them, but that God already loves them unconditionally. Just as they are.
That God loves them beyond their wildest imagination!
But, again, many Christians don’t like hearing this. They want God’s love to be conditional. They want salvation only for a select few, and they get upset when pastors preach otherwise.
The Episcopal Bishop, Rev. Eugene Robinson, once said, “It’s funny isn’t it? That you can preach a judgmental and vengeful and angry God and nobody will mind. But you start preaching a God that is too accepting, too loving, too forgiving, too merciful, too kind… And then you are in trouble.”
And, the bestselling Christian author, Rachel Held Evans (who passed away a few years ago) said: “Some Christians are more offended by the idea of everyone going to heaven than by the idea that everyone is going to hell.”
I am so glad and grateful that there are places like the United Church of Rowayton where all people are truly welcome and accepted, just as they are.
A place to experience God’s extravagant and unconditional love.
As we begin our new church year, my friends, may we continue to people of extravagant welcome and unconditional love.
And may we continue Christ’s work of building the Kingdom of Heaven here on earth, drawing the circle ever wider and inviting more and more people to the table…just as they are.
For all are worthy and all are one.
May it be so.
Here are three follow-up questions for reflection and/or journal writing:
- Where in your own life do you find it difficult to love someone unconditionally—and what might it look like to see that person through God’s eyes instead?
- Have you ever felt “unworthy” or as though you had to earn God’s love? How might your life change if you truly embraced the belief that God loves you completely and unconditionally, just as you are?
- Who might be standing outside the “circle” of welcome in our community, and what could we do to make that circle wider and invite them to the table?