I received an email question from Tim: “Does God love everyone equally?” He went on to express his ideas: “God obviously loves the whole world (John 3:16), but are there degrees to His love that He gives to different people? Does He love the righteous more than the wicked?”

Those are great questions. Great care must be taken as we examine the Scriptures on the subject since it is possible to misinterpret verses. If we put too much weight on a single verse, we end up misinterpreting other verses on the same subject.

The reason these questions are so practical is that we want to know whether God’s love for me fluctuates depending on how I am living.

I am going to limit my initial discussion to God’s love for believers. I will leave out, for the time being, a consideration of His love for unbelievers.

Does God love some believers more than others? If so, what does that look like in our lives?

One view is that God loves all believers equally. That means that His love for individual believers never fluctuates, whether we are in fellowship with Him or not.

Based on what I can tell from online articles, this is an extreme minority position. The people who hold this view are the hyper–grace people who say that believers are always in fellowship with God and that God always loves believers.

The other view is held by most Calvinists and Arminians. For example, the Gospel Coalition, a Calvinist website, has an article titled “Does God Love Everyone the Same?” in which the author, Jeff Robinson, says that God does not love all believers equally (see here). Obedience is necessary in order to experience God’s love.

John Piper has a talk with transcript titled, “Is God More Happy with Other Christians Than Me?” His answer was yes (see here).

We will look at the Scriptures next.

Jude 20-21: “But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life [emphasis added].”

Brad Doskocil in TGNTC writes, “The primary instruction is to keep (tēreō, ‘to keep unharmed or undisturbed’) yourselves in the love of God; that is, to keep from being harmed by the false teachers’ sinful conduct and false teachings. The best place to avoid such harm is in the love of God” (p. 1245).

John 15:9-10: “As the Father loved Me, I also have loved you; abide in My love. If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love [emphasis added].”

John 15:14: “You are My friends if you do whatever I command you [emphasis added].”

1 John 3:24: “Now he who keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in him. And by this we know that He abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us.”

Romans 8:38-39: “For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

The us in Rom 8:39 refers to overcoming believers, faithful believers, believers who are suffering with Christ (Rom 8:17b). It does not refer to all believers, for if we do not abide in Christ, we will not abide in His love.

What about God’s love for unbelievers?

John 3:16 shows that Jesus’ incarnation (v 17) and His death on the cross (vv 14-15) demonstrate that God loves everyone. He wants everyone to be saved (1 Tim 2:4).

Matthew 5:45 shows that God’s love for unbelievers is demonstrated in the sun and the rain that God sends to all.

But those things are independent of obedience.

Does God give special blessings to unbelievers if they obey Him? If so, does God have a special love for some unbelievers?

While I realize most disagree, I would say yes. Cornelius in Acts 10 and Paul’s comments in Rom 2:14 suggest as much. I think these would make an excellent study and would be good questions for discussion in your Sunday school or Bible study.

In closing, what should we do to keep ourselves in the love of God? The answer is obedience, but how do we obey God? We obey by mind renewal, not by legalism.

We are to be transformed by the renewing of our minds (Rom 12:2). If we are, then we will not fall prey to false teachers, and we will remain in the love of God (Jude 21).

Legalism, however, is antithetical to remaining in the love of God. See the book of Galatians.

It is crucial that you are in a solid Bible-teaching church. If you are not, then start one in your home. You can also get solid Bible teaching via blogs, podcasts, online sermons, etc. But you need person-to-person fellowship in addition to solid teaching, hence the need for a local body, even if it is very small.

Keep grace in focus and you will keep yourself in the love of God.