unconditional love

not such an easy concept to grasp. i was once told that it is impossible for anybody to have unconditional love for someone except for Jesus. i beg to differ. now, i'm not by any means saying that we are capable of the same love that Jesus gives to us 24.7 but i am saying that we are still capable of loving someone unconditionally. i may be wrong. but it is just what i believe. i think parents come the closest to loving someone unconditionally. everybody hears the saying "well they are my child, i have to love them." but i also know of parents that did lose the love for their child for whatever reason. although, i have seen a parent love unconditionally when their child has neglected them. it was my grandma krusen. one of her sons, my uncle, left iowa and never looked back. he still loved his family but that all turned around one day. it happened when i was little and i still don't understand the situation fully but, for whatever reason he began to hate my grandma and completely stopped communication. when my grandma got diagnosed with cancer when i was in 6th grade my dad gave my uncle a call to tell him and his response was "so, what am i suppose to do about it." it completely crushed my dad. to all of our surprise he actually came to the funeral when she had passed away a year later. i remember one day and i don't think i will ever forget it. it was before my grandma had passed and i was up there just spending time with her and i asked her, "does it hurt you that benny doesn't talk to you anymore?" her response was, "it always hurts when a child doesn't talk to their parents but you know what pumpkin, i will always love him and nothing will ever change that." wow. i was completely shocked. she still loved him even though he turned his back on her and the rest of the family. oh the love of a child from a parent. if that doesn't scream unconditional love, i don't what does. now, thats just one example and i'm sure there are parents out there that do not love their child unconditionally. sad. but true. there is also an unconditional love from the child to their parents. and the rest of their family but again there are exceptions.

but what about friends? i really want to say that it is possible but i don't think it is. friends come and go. there are a select few that stick around your entire life. you might be lucky and have the same friend that you have had since childhood throughout your entire life or you may not have any of the same friends you had in your childhood, middle school, and high school. the love for a friend will never compare to the love that a parent has for a child. i don't know how it could. it might come close to the love that a child has for a parent but even that is sticky. so where do friends rank on the love scale? when i think about my friends i would love to sit here and say that i have unconditional love for them. but i would be lying. i could sit here and think of situations that would happen that would wipe away my love for them. there is only one friend in my life that i just might have an unconditional love for. i can't say that i do. i wish i could and i want to say that i do but i think unconditional love becomes sticky when it comes to friends. i think i like the idea of being able to say that i have an unconditional love for her but i don't really know what the future holds. i know in my heart that our friendship will never end but does that mean that i have an unconditional love for her? i don't know. she is the only friend that i think i would actually take a bullet for if it really came down to it (i would for every single person in my family) but is that enough to say that there is an unconditional love? the answer is: i have no idea. i have no idea what unconditional love is. i do when it comes to my family but to friends, i am clueless. i know that God will love me NO MATTER what. He is the only example of a true, pure, unconditional lover. no one can even come close to that. maybe it is just because i want to say that i have an unconditional love for someone other than my family? maybe i want to say it to prove that my part of the friendship isn't going anywhere. or maybe it is because i do have an unconditional love for my best friend. Proverbs 17:17 says that a friend loves at all times. and in Proverbs chapter 18 verse 24, it says that a man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother. maybe she is the friend that sticks closer than a brother?

i feel like i'm rambling and i am sorry for that! but it is just something that i have been pondering because i cannot and will not fathom how much love Jesus has for us no matter what we may do. we punch him in the face every time we sin and it is on a daily basis yet, he has an unconditional love for us. amazing. thats why we always have to remember that God is LOVE.