Love Month!

Love is, Love Does

How do you define LOVE?

Main Topic

LOVE IS - Definition of Love

LOVE DOES - the practice of Love

In the Bible, God wants us to experience true love; but many times we fall into the trap of counterfeit love which the world defines as

“a feeling of deep affection or fondness for someone typically arising from a recognition of attractive qualities”

Oxford English Dictionary

However, the Bible gives us different Greek translations for love:

ἔρως (eros) - erotic love

φιλέω (phileō) - brotherly love

στοργή (storge) - love of parents to children

ἀγάπη (agapē) - an unconditional commitment; it is a sacrificial love; a giving kind of love and was made popular by the early Christians.

How then should we define LOVE?

Love is an unconditional commitment, towards imperfect people, to seek their highest good, which often requires sacrifice, resulting in God’s Glory!

1 John 4:7–11 ESV

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

Love is an unconditional commitment

Oftentimes, the hardest people to love are the ones closest to us. We know their flaws, lapses, and mistakes. God shows us that love is a choice that He makes (Deuteronomy 7:7-8). God’s love comes with complete knowledge our flaws, lapses, and mistakes; yet He loves us still with an everlasting love even before we were born (Jeremiah 31:3).

Deut:7:7-8 “It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the Lord set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but it is because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.”

Jeremiah 31:3 “the Lord appeared to him from far away. I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.”

Jesus loved them to the end - John 13:1 “Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.”

Jesus “…loved them to the end” (John 13:1) including Peter who later denied Him 3 times, Thomas who doubted the resurrected Christ, James and John who fled away upon Jesus’ arrest along with the rest of the disciples. He loved them INSPITE OF; the love of God is an unconditional commitment.

This love is supernatural - Rom 5:5-6 “and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.”

This love is supernatural (Romans 5:5-6), given to us by God through the Holy Spirit. We are able to love because God’s love is poured out into our hearts!

True love is from God - Gal 5:22-23 “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”

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

Towards imperfect people

Mark 12:31 “The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.””

Rom 5:6 “For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.”

NO ONE IS PERFECT. God commands us to direct our love towards imperfect people because love is not mere sentimentalism (Mark 12:31). Since LOVE IS from God, we ought to follow Him in how He loves us (Romans 5:6). 1 Peter 3:1, though directed to wives, cites an example for all of us of the transformative power of true love!

To seek their highest good

Heb 12:6 “For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.””

LOVE IS also purposeful. It seeks the highest good of the person being loved as modeled by God. This kind of love is not all sentiment or feelings but includes discipline (Hebrews 12:6)! An example of this is when parents do not spoil their children or give in to every whim or cry. It seeks for what is best because love aims for the highest good of the other. We can place our confidence in God’s love because it has sought for and continues to seek our highest good. If we have received this kind of love and are experiencing the joy of being accepted, forgiven, loved, and led to what is good; then we will be able to love others just the same!

Which often requires sacrifice

Romans 5:8 “but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

1 John 4:10-11 “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”

Resulting in God’s glory

John 13:34-35 “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.”

We ought to be God-centered when it comes to loving. John 13:34-35 introduces us to a new commandment. The newness is HOW we are to love one another. We must emulate the kind of love Jesus has given to us. All men will know that you are a follower of Jesus IF YOU HAVE LOVE FOR ONE ANOTHER.

Let’s revisit the main verse again

1 John 4:7-11 “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”

What did you like about these verses?

What did you learn about God?

What did you learn about people?

What did you learn about following God

How have you experienced God’s kind of love lately?