“Grace means there is nothing we can do to make God love us more… And grace means there is nothing we can do to make God love us less.”
Many Christians are familiar with this quote by Philip Yancey. Yancey’s definition of grace can be a great comfort to those who understand it and believe it. But, deep down, many of us struggle to really accept this is true, and we struggle to realize how it can apply to our lives.
When we are in the thick of a trial and suffering deeply, it is easy to believe the lie that God doesn’t really love us. We may think thoughts like, “How could God really love me if He is letting this happen to me?” Some simply have a hard time reconciling the suffering we see in this world with a loving God. Others have an intellectual understanding of God’s love, but find it difficult to understand his love at a heart level. And still others may feel that they are too rotten and unloveable at their core for God to forgive them, let alone love them.
We struggle with fully grasping God’s love for us because, simply put, we are not God. We tend to think of love only as giving and never withholding. If we love someone, we rightfully want to lavish our love upon them through good gifts, kind words, and acts of service. We want goodness, success, and comfort to come to that person. It’s a narrow, though well-intentioned, approach to love. It does not make sense to our finite brains when we see God permit unfavorable experiences or when people he loves do not experience comfort and success.
We also look at our own hearts and know how unlovely we can be. We doubt that God could really love us when we have such darkness hiding within. We may think things like, “How could God actually love a sinner like me?” But again, we are not God, and His ways are greater than our ways.
Elyse Fitzpatrick focuses on the counterintuitive nature of God’s love in her new book, “Unloved: The Rejected Saints God Calls Beloved” (Lexham, 2025). As Fitzpatrick states in her opening chapter, many of us assume God would act like us – like a parent negotiating a reward for good behavior or like Santa Claus giving gifts to good little children. Fitzpatrick says this misconception causes people to try to earn favor from God by proving we are lovable. “Unloved” shows the reader that the good news of the gospel is lost if we see God as either a negotiator or a celestial Santa Claus, for we could never earn enough of his favor to be loved on our own.
Fitzpatrick reminds her readers of the truly good news of Jesus Christ: that he was perfect and credits his perfection to us. Because of this, the name Beloved is extended to us. Through a variety of Bible stories, “Unloved” beautifully shows that God really does love the seemingly unloved. However, readers may be uncomfortable at times with some of Fitzpatrick’s assumptions and interpretations of Scripture.
Fitzpatrick, author of more than 25 books, holds a master’s degree in biblical counseling. In “Unloved,” she has masterfully intertwined her counseling experience with her scriptural knowledge. She helps us see familiar stories – such as the story of Gomer and Hosea and the story of David and Bathsheba – with fresh eyes. Fitzpatrick has probably counseled many people who struggle to see that God truly loves them so she highlights several examples from Scripture where we see evidence of God’s great love for people who may have believed they were beyond God’s love. These examples are a great encouragement to those of us who may struggle to believe that God really loves us, too.
“Unloved” is written with a warm, encouraging tone. Like a good counselor, Fitzpatrick reminds her readers of gospel truths throughout her book. She reminds us that we, like so many figures in the Bible, are frail and tempted to doubt God’s love for us, and yet we are his beloved.
Fitzpatrick recognizes that her readers may see themselves in the lives of Bible characters, so she reminds us that the Lord exalts those who are weak and discarded. And Fitzpatrick ultimately reminds her readers that Jesus is the only person who has ever loved us perfectly while truly knowing us.
Fitzpatrick clearly and thoughtfully proclaims the gospel throughout “Unloved.” She highlights some common misunderstandings and shows why those misunderstandings are not good news at all. She correctly identifies Christ’s active and passive obedience, pushes back on seeing Bible characters as mere “heroes” to emulate, and highlights the pitfalls of the prosperity gospel. Overall, “Unloved” is a very readable, thought-provoking treatise of God’s great love for his people.
While this book offers much hope and encouragement, discerning readers may take issue with Fitzpatrick’s occasional use of conjecture and modern colloquialisms while she retells well-known Bible stories. Throughout her chapters, Fitzpatrick imagines what the Bible characters might have been thinking or feeling, which she usually notes with comments like “perhaps…” or “even though it isn’t specified in scripture…”
However, at times she states some of her assumptions in a way that could lead readers to believe they are explicit facts instead of the author’s speculation. While it might be helpful to consider how someone may feel in a given situation, it forces the reader to discern when the author is transitioning from exposition to speculation.
Overall, Fitzpatrick’s “Unloved” is an uplifting read for Christians who struggle to believe that God truly loves them. Though readers should read it with a discerning mind, to separate scriptural facts from Fitzpatrick’s assumptions, there is much value to be found in the pages of “Unloved.”
Fitzpatrick highlights the beauty of the gospel and clearly shows how God’s love is displayed throughout history in the lives of his people. She also connects the dots to show us that if God could love such unlovely characters in Scripture, then he can also love all of us who feel unlovable as well.
Allison Van Egmond serves as women’s ministry coordinator at New Life Presbyterian Church in Escondido, California.