The Myth of Unconditional Love
(Or Why God is a Behaviourist)
Many well-meaning persons believe that the ideal state of love and relationship between two persons is one that is unconditional. This is simply referred to as Unconditional Love and what is meant by a person subscribing to this belief is simply that: No conditions are attached to my loving you wholly.
This is complete hogwash.
The whole notion of unconditional love is a popular fallacy. The term actually is a bastardization of a therapeutic technique developed famously by the psychologist Carl Rogers. Rogerss technique, which he called Unconditional Positive Regard, basically involved a lot of passive listening to his patients and had to do with reflecting, non-judgment and allowing the patient to uncover her own problems. When the popular culture began to discuss Rogerian therapy (combined with the free-love, anything goes atmosphere of the 1960s) this notion of unconditional love between persons was born.
Now persons left and right say that the ideal situation is to have unconditional love for each other. Some say that this is a natural state of the parent-child relationship. Nonsense. Unfortunately, too many parents have no affection for their children (and this is not a mere mental illness, abnormality or symptom of post-partum depression or other factor). And as for interpersonal relationships these should NEVER be unconditional.
What happens is we easily sympathize as parents with our children. We naturally understand that there should be some love between us. We also understand that no matter what the childs behaviour, whether they displease us, commit some large error or sin, those familial bonds are tight and therefore we mistake what is really loyalty and natural affection with unconditional love.
AS sinners, we perhaps optimistically hope that God will likewise exercise such unconditional love towards us. Why do we do this? Because we see that LOVE is not just pure affectation but it manifests itself in behaviour! You cannot have LOVE without corresponding behaviour in some form. They are intricately wrapped together. God loves us. That is the feeling He has for us, but we KNOW he loves us from his actions. Because Love is known by action, likewise action indicates Love. Simple.
Lets review.
God loved Adam and Eve and created them perfectly and set them in paradise to live forever. No strings attached remember his love for them was UNCONDITIONAL right? Wrong. We clearly see from the Bible that he told them the conditions of his approval and love for them namely obedience, i.e. dont eat of the fruit of the two trees he specified.
His LOVE for mankind in addition to all creation impelled him to make a provision of Christs sacrifice in order for us to obtain again what are parents, Adam and Eve lost.
God in dealing with his called nation of Israel was a behaviourist through and through. Did he have unconditional love for them? Could they do anything and not cause his heart to be sad, not displease him, not incur his wrath. NO. God used the most effective means of communication in the world, the IF-THEN contingency again and again, saying things like: IF you do not leave off from serving me, THEN I shall bless you, etc.. This is expected behaviour and resulting consequence. Simple and clear. It is plainly conditional love.
Can any sinner gain salvation? NO! It is open to all but God has a very real condition in order to receive his love. Salvation is only to be found by one who embraces the sacrifice of Jesus and acknowledges him as saviour and who also walks in Gods righteous ways. The Christian scriptures tell us again and again that walking in Gods righteous ways and accepting the sacrifice of Christ are the conditions for Gods grace. No unconditional love here.
What about between persons? Jesus laid out the very simple and only guideline we need to be concerned with. Love your neighbour as you would love yourself. Is this conditional or is it unconditional? Surely it is conditional.
The love we therefore have for each other, for our neighbour, even for our family is highly conditional. Just as we have love for ourselves conditionally do we not?
A healthy relationship is one that is balanced, it is built upon mutual trust, respect and expectations. Expectations are conditions we expect to be met. A healthy relationship is not exploitative. It is the myth of unconditional love that has kept too many women in relationships with men who are abusing them. It is the myth of unconditional love that has let children grow up to be killers, or at least dysfunctional in one way or another. If you think your child doesnt want limits and doesnt want conditions to be placed upon them you are wrong. They expect to get your love when they please you, when they obey you, when they excel or surprise you and when they make you proud. Likewise, they expect to have your love withdrawn (again love is manifested by ACTION) when they disobey you, or fail you, or dont live up to what you know they are capable of. You can say, well the feeling remains, love remains, even if actions or consequences, i.e. conditions are imposed, but again this is a mistaken confusion of family affection and loyalty with the myth of unconditional love. Make no mistake, God does not get confused in this way. God is a behaviourist and he has very definite conditions established for the receipt of his love. Do not reject his love by rejecting his Son or you will learn this first hand.