Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.  (1 John 4:8)

The noun ‘love’ translates: ἀγάπη; agapé; this word denotes love or goodwill that comes from moral preference.  It occurs 116 times is the New Testament in every book apart from the Gospel Mark and the James’ encyclical.

Love is then a disposition, God is disposed to love and chooses to act upon it:

For God so loved (apapeo) the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.  (John 3:16)

In sending his son to redeem creation, God expresses that good will.

Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.  (Luke 2:14)

This is more than a salutation but a statement of love, specifically aimed at sinful humanity.

However, it is important to separate human ‘love’, an emotion, from God’s love, an act of the will.  In fact, apapeo, is best understood as a righteous decision.  This is best illustrated by Jesus’ teaching, here in the Sermon on the Mount:

‘You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love (apapeo) your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven…’

(Matthew 5:43-45)

If you are warmly disposed to an enemy, he is likely no longer an enemy.  Loving an enemy means deciding to embrace someone who would actively and viciously do you harm at any given moment.  Jesus says in this circumstance it is natural to hate, but he commands to love, not only that but pray for them.  And all this is a condition of adoption.

None should be surprised at this because prior to adoption, all were enemies of God.

For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.  (Romans 5:10)

Jesus is not sent for the sake of the righteous but for sinners, enemies who God chooses to love.  This is necessarily so for the human condition is woebegone:

For we have already charged that all…are under sin,as it is written:

‘None is righteous, no, not one’… (Romans 3:9-11)

God is gracious and restrains himself from judgment:

The Lord is not slow to fulfil his promise as some count slowness, but is patient towards you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. (2 Peter 3:9)

There is a ‘but’ – and here is the important qualification – while He is love and merciful, He is also righteous and just.  His love is not unconditional.  Peter continues:

But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed…’ (ibid 3:10)

The Day of the Lord is when all are brought to judgment, and it is a false and heretical teaching to suggest that God loves everyone – if by that one is given to understand that his disposition to love will override his wrathful judgment.

God is love, but it is not possible to say that God loves everyone, or at least in the worldly understanding.  He expresses His love as undeserved favour, but not at the expense of his righteous judgment – indeed, He could not be perfect love without being righteous and just.  

It is thus heresy to suggest that a loving God will not judge or condemn.  While he desires that none should perish, to eternal regret, many will.  The condition of mortality interposes eternity and literally provides time to make a choice.  Believing God loves does not secure salvation.  God desires that a person decides to love Him, believing Jesus is His son whom He sacrificed so that when the faithful are judged the penalty is already paid.  That is agape love, that God spared not His son for the sake of humanity.

Many Christians believe the Gospel is best in expressed in John 3:16, and offer it evangelistically. But the passage needs full quotation:

‘For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.  For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.  Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.   And this is the judgement: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil…’  (John 3:16-19)

God is disposed to choose us, that is a given, but are we disposed to love God? That is the temporal question with eternal consequences.