I doubt that it's necessary to extensively qualify the extent of my relationship with Christianity, but let it be known that the experience runs deep. I have feared Hell and clung to a savior as tightly as any child clings to a loving parent in the face of crippling pain and uncertainty. I have judged myself for being unworthy of God’s love and others for being the same. The worst judgment, appropriately, went to those who didn’t reject their sinful nature (as much as I rejected mine). And yes, I knew to love my neighbor, I knew to be of service, and I tried … but it wasn’t my job to be perfect, because I had a savior for that.
Let’s fast forward a few years: past when I went overseas to join a volunteer service and lost my religion and became agnostic for over a decade, past the initial fear and freedom of having no God to pray to or feel apologetic towards and past the slow spiral into depression/crisis-of-meaning and eventual spiritual awakening. It seems that the journey always comes back around to the message of love. This is where I find myself now.
I must say, it’s scary to lose your religion. I still have a lot of family in the church and, being in the midwest, I have a lot of friends who are there as well. Some embody the idea that God is love and live by that principle, and others that God is a judge, and they live by that one. It makes for quite a fearful, hateful life to view others as evil and as mulipulatitable by dark forces. I have young children who are hearing conflicting stories from their loved ones that they’ll go to Hell for not attending church or believing in Jesus so I really have had to think about this. I stopped believing in Hell a good while ago, but how could I defend my right to believe this way in the face of such concerned loved ones. Then this came to me….
(4) Love is patient and kind; love doesn’t envy. Love doesn’t brag, it is not proud, (5) Love doesn’t behave itself inappropriately, doesn’t seek its own way, is not provoked, takes no account of evil; (6) Love doesn’t rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; (7) Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. (8) Love never fails....
Anyone who believes in God on any level can agree that God is Love, and real love is unconditional. Therefore, God is unconditional love or, at least, loves unconditionally. Unconditional love is known as affection without any limitations or love without conditions.
While God’s act of having sent his son to Earth to die for our sins, from a Christian perspective, can seem like the ultimate act of loving sacrifice, it is not without conditions. This arrangement seems to be conditional upon the fact that one believe in Jesus’ death and God’s sacrifice as His contribution. One must give credit to God and Jesus for having done this and to reject it is to reject salvation and, therefore, to choose Hell.
This presents two opposing conclusions: 1. Jesus didn't die for our sins because the reward of Heaven is completely conditional upon our belief in the act or 2. Everyone is saved from Hell because the act was one of unconditional love.
If Jesus was to have died in an act of unconditional love so great “that others might not perish, but have everlasting life”, then it is reasonable to suggest that everyone who has ever lived is “saved” by this act. Unconditional means without the conditions of time, or belief or even knowledge of the sacrifice. Unconditional means that He would have done this even if nobody ever knew it happened because He loved everyone so much. Everyone in all of existence, in every religion (or of no religion) and who has committed any terrible “sin” is saved from Hell because that is the nature of unconditional love.
If everyone is spared from Hell then there is no reason for it to exist because NO ONE will actually go there.
Who would want to?
I dare say that Hell never existed at all because an Unconditionally Loving God would not judge anyone anyway. Hate is not the opposite of love, judgment is. Unconditional love, means that we are loved just the way that we are in this moment. This is not to say that we aren’t to put in the work to be as unconditionally loving as we can be (starting with ourselves), but there is no reason to judge others because it is not asked of us in any way. It is no one’s job. When we die and “face judgment” it is not from God, but from ourselves. We are the only ones with the desire to judge and until we evolve past judgment of ourselves (and others), we’ll be patiently given as many lives and opportunities to master it as we wish. Love is patient and kind. Everyone will eventually get there and we have all the time in the world to work towards it. In fact, since time is linear and only exists in 3D reality there is only the Infinite Now anyway, so it’s safe to assume that at another point on the space time continuum we’ve already evolved completely into unconditional love - and forgiveness of ourselves for having ever believed we were anything less.
Having said that, I sincerely hope that you are enjoying your journey at this particular point in the space time continuum.
It’s all good.
Much love,
April