I’ve found that after a lot of those passages that read like condemnation, there’s usually a verse or two that says something to the effect of, “This is how you once were; but thankfully–through God’s grace–this is not the case now.”, or there’s instruction/direction on what is “good” (if you will) to God (sort of a “first, here’s how you were/are, or what not to be like”, followed by “and now here is your remedy, or what to be like”).

Grace is undeserved favor and that means that God’s love for us will never be based on how well we perform. That doesn’t mean he wishes for us to choose poorly. The best example I can give is my own children. Nancy & I raised four beautiful human beings. At every step of the way in their raising we told them that regardless of the choices they made we would never stop loving them or accepting them. They all made some great choices and they made some real dumb choices and all four turned out wonderful in our eyes.

God’s absolute unconditional love for us is the power that allows us to move from one degree of glory to the next and eventually we will all see his glory in its fullest.

Verses like these do not give me encouragement. In fact, a lot of what Paul & the other NT writers wrote don’t encourage me; they make me feel inadequate & condemned, to be completely honest. Sure, we can argue that if a verse here & there condemns us, we’re just not looking at it right; but, you’ve got to admit there is a lot in the NT that does not give you a “Everybody is OK in God’s eyes” perspective.

Jason