I’m always suspicious when I hear people say that they “love God” more than they love their spouse or children. More often than not that means they love their idea of God more than they are willing to do anything that translates as ACTUALLY loving if it threatens that idea.
When I hear someone saying they love God more than they love their spouse or children, I hear someone saying they’re willing to throw me and their loved ones under the bus for the sake of their notions of what the divine “wants.”
I love the people I love because I see and recognize the divine IN them, and because I know that what the divine “wants” is for me to love others and myself because it is a part of us. What’s that verse? Love is the fulfillment of the law.
I love even if that love requires me to change my mind about ideas I used to have about God, or take risks, or draw boundaries, or do something I never thought I would do. There’s literally nothing more important to me than loving people, THEREBY loving God.
And I think that’s the main distinction I’m trying to draw. We don’t love people best by loving a disembodied idea of “God” first & then letting that inform how we love others. We love people best by ACTUALLY loving them and—SURPRISE!—turns out we were loving God the whole time.
And here is a spoiler alert: ACTUALLY loving people will require you to change your mind. It will require you to change your theology. It will require you to do better. It will require you to question your long-held assumptions. There is no getting around this.
If you want to know how you can love others better—especially marginalized groups or those you have hurt—but you’re not willing to change your mind or examine your theology (ALL of it, not just “secondary issues”) you’ve got a long road ahead.
TLDR;
It’s not, I love God THEN I love people.
It’s, I love people THEREFORE I love God.
It’s not, I love God THEN I love people.
It’s, I love people THEREFORE I love God.
