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Agape Love
What Is Agape Love in the
Bible?
By Jack Zavada
It is the highest of the four
types of love in the Bible.
This
Greek word, agápē, and variations of
it are frequently found throughout the New Testament.
Agape perfectly describes the
kind of love Jesus Christ has for His Father and for His followers.
Agape
is the term that defines God's immeasurable, incomparable love for humankind.
It is His ongoing, outgoing,
self-sacrificing concern for lost and fallen people.
God gives this love without
condition, unreservedly to those who are undeserving and inferior to Himself.
"Agape love," says
Anders Nygren, "Is unmotivated in
the sense that it is not contingent on any value or worth in the object of
love. It is spontaneous and heedless, for it does not determine beforehand
whether love will be effective or appropriate in any particular case."
A
simple way to summarize agape is God's divine love.
Agape Love in the Bible
One important aspect of agape love is that it extends beyond
emotions. It's much more than a feeling or sentiment.
Agape love is active. It
demonstrates love through actions.
This
well-known Bible verse is the perfect example of agape love expressed through
actions.
The all-encompassing love of
God for the entire human race caused him to send His Son, Jesus Christ, to die
and, thus, save every person who would believe in him:
“For God
so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him
should not perish but have eternal life.” (John
3:16, ESV)
Another meaning of agape in the Bible was "love feast," a
common meal in the early church expressing Christian brotherhood and fellowship:
“These
are hidden reefs at your love feasts, as they feast with you without fear,
shepherds feeding themselves; waterless clouds, swept along by winds; fruitless
trees in late autumn, twice dead, uprooted;” (Jude
12, ESV)
Jesus
told his followers to love one another in the same way sacrificial way he loved
them.
This command was “new”
because it demanded a new kind of love, a love like his own: agape love.
What would be the outcome of
this kind of love?
People would be able to
recognize them as Jesus’ disciples because of their mutual love:
“A
new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved
you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you
are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John
13:34-35, ESV)
“By
this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down
our lives for the brothers.” (1
John 3:16, ESV)
Jesus
and the Father are so "at one" that according to Jesus, whoever who
loves Him will be loved by the Father and by Jesus, too.
The idea is that any believer
who initiates this relationship of love by showing obedience, Jesus and the
Father simply respond.
The oneness between Jesus and
His followers is a mirror of the oneness between Jesus and His heavenly Father:
“Whoever
has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me
will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.” (John 14:21, NIV)
“I in
them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may
know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.” (John
17:23, ESV)
The
Apostle Paul exhorted the Corinthians to remember the importance of love.
He wanted them to show love in everything they did.
Paul exalted love as the
highest standard in this letter to the church in Corinth. Love for God and
other people was to motivate everything they did:
“Let
all that you do be done in love.” (1
Corinthians 16:14, ESV)
Love
is not merely an attribure of God, love is His essence.
God is fundamentally love. He
alone loves in the completeness and perfection of love:
“Anyone
who does not love does not know God, because God is love.” (1
John 4:8, ESV)
Pronunciation
uh-GAH-pay
Example
Jesus lived out agape love by sacrificing Himself for the
sins of the world.
Other Types of Love in the Bible
·
Eros is the word for sensual or romantic love.
·
Philia means brotherly love or friendship.
·
Storge describes the love between family members.
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