Our home church had quite a discussion about the reasons that our English translations of “love” do not do justice to the Greek word, “Agapè”, which is the key word in describing how God’s children relate to one another.
This love is distinct because it is “goodwill arising from a personal moral good rather than attraction”.[1] In every other kind of love, we are free to focus on a select group (family, friends, marriage) based on what they mean to us. However, in agapè love our interest is the good of all people.
This message is a synopsis of what God has taught us in I Corinthians 13 about what agapè love is like, and the conclusion, “Let all that you do be done in love.”[2] This can only apply to this distinctive expression and experience of God’s love, and so we must understand the way God is working this into our lives.
The fact is that we cannot do everything in family-love because not everyone is family. We can’t limit our expressions of goodness to friends because then how would we ever love our enemies as Jesus taught us? And we certainly can’t have self-centered marriages where we only care about the person we are married to because we are part of the body of Christ and have something we have been given to minister to others.
In this conclusion to our “Love is…” series, the ultimate life of love stands out very clearly, and invites us to trust God to make it as real in our lives as he would like. He wants us to know the joy of being just like him in his love.
© 2019 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517, Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8
Email: in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.)
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