Agape: the Best Way to Overcome
My loved ones, let us devote ourselves to loving one another.
Love comes straight from God, and everyone who loves is born of God and truly knows God.
Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.
1 John 4:7-12 The Voice
As I sat down to write this article, I was wrestling with an appropriate focus. Yesterday was Human Relations Sunday. Today is a national holiday to honor Martin Luther King Jr. and to recognize the needed ongoing work of racial justice. It is also the inauguration of President Trump. At the same time, on February 14 we celebrate love. For me, the mixture of all these foci seems an odd combination. The culture in which we live desperately needs the focus of coming together as Human Relations and Martin Luther King Jr. observances highlight rather than the devaluing of persons and the rhetoric and acts perpetuating the division of people and cultures.
I get that antibias and anti-race work, even when valued and desired, can be hectic, frustrating, confusing, and hard. Decisions have to be made to keep a sense of order which may not be accepted or acceptable. With it comes directions that some are okay with … for a while. Before long the directions are received as an imposition on personal desires and space instead of maintaining order and loving relationships. As humans we don’t always get it right. As Christ followers we can strive to be like Jesus and still mis the mark. Still, if we would exemplify the foci of Human Relations Sunday and Martin Luther King JR. Day, can it happen void of love? And what does this love look like? So I ask that you forgive me if this meditation seems familiar or too obvious to be beneficial to us.
As you are all aware, several Greek words are translated as “love” into English, which is unfortunate. We “love” that new casserole recipe. We “love” the book we just finished. We “love” in a sensual, romantic, way. We “love” hanging out with our friends. We “love” our spouse. Each use of the word “love” has a different purpose.
There is one Greek word we translate to “love” that is the foundation necessary for true reconciliation and the obliteration of the racism and bias that is rampant in our society: Agape. Agape is a self-sacrificing, selfless love that is passionately committed to the wellbeing of others. John, describing agape in our text states, “This is love: not that we loved God, but that God loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” Agape is what God so perfectly, uniquely, and wonderfully demonstrates.
Often defined as undeserved love, Agape might better be described as an intentional response to promote well-being to that which has generated ill-being. Is that not what God did? God could have but did not walk away from his creation when humankind disobeyed, and sin entered into the world. Instead, God intentionally responded with a plan. God is so passionately committed to our wellbeing that in self-sacrificing love God sent Jesus. Paul says it this way: “God demonstrates his love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). God is the true standard of what love is and how love should be expressed.
On our own, we can only exhibit a poor model of agape. Something wonderful happens, however, when we believe in Jesus as our Lord and Savior, we are not only given to live in God’s agape but also to love with God’s agape. The outcome for the one who has been born again should be to exhibit that same love which God gave to us, possible, as John says, because “God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.” We can now love with “self-sacrificing, selfless love that is passionately committed to the wellbeing of others” because God lives in and loves out of us. This is how we must address the biases in our own lives and how we work to address the issues of race and bias in the society around us.
It is not in our nature to intentionally respond to promote well-being, especially in situations of ill-being. Which is why several times throughout this letter John implores his readers to love one another as if we need to practice God’s agape love. And we do. Thankfully this radical love is not something that is accomplished merely by our will or we would fail. As we put this love into action and it becomes part of our nature, it is God living in us; our intimacy with God grows as we build an environment of agape love.
As I considered this, I remembered my daughter Anika’s Senior Exit Portfolio, a requirement for her Youth Ministry major in college. She had sent it to me to look over since she took this major from a different perspective than most students, desiring to relate with youth and young adults rather than become a church youth director. One section, while focusing on youth, expresses well what God’s radical love for and with all persons should look like. She wrote:
I had a doctor I had never met before hear I was “into youth ministry.” A casual conversation turned intentional as he stopped examining my broken foot and looked at me. “Good. I’m glad. Do me a favor. Don’t be willy-nilly about something so important as the hearts and lives of young people. It’s about more than games and pizza, I think. Teens just want to be heard and understood and cared for…if all you did was that, you would change the world.” The complexity and intensity of what seemed to be a straightforward statement blew my mind and challenged my perceptions. And, drawing off of these insights, I came to this conclusion: the true “art” of youth ministry, of building a relationship with any one of the human species really, comes down to listening, loving, serving, and being consistent about it.
It’s that simple…and not that simple. Because you can’t just listen. You have to hear and respond. You have to have ears for what isn’t being said. You have to pay attention to their heart as well as their words. As the listener you need to be prepared to be the keeper of secrets, the mentor, the counselor, occasionally the emotional garbage bag, and almost always the friend. And you can’t just serve. People get all confused when it comes to serving. “Anyone can serve…” is a great slogan if you’re out to serve just anyone. Individuals aren’t just anyone and servant leadership isn’t about serving in your most comfortable capacity out of your greatest capabilities and smallest inhibitions. Quite the contrary, the heart of a servant leader is seeking constantly, restlessly for the ways in which the other needs to be served, needs to feel served. Service is about humility. And humility is about being and pointing to the very nature of Christ (see Philippians 2). How low are you willing to go? Because tied directly to service is love. You show love by who you freely serve. The ones you truly and freely love – those will be the ones you serve.
So again, how low will you go? John 15 says that no greater loves has a man than that he lay down his life for his friend. Are you willing to lay down your life in love for the people in your care? Physical death in this day and age is rare…but what about your time? Your resources? Your pride? What about that life? How much of it is up for grabs? And consistency may be the hardest of all. Anyone can listen for a time. It’s not hard to serve someone the way they need to be served once. And love finds its way to being conditional. But to be the person who does not step in and out of the life of someone who most desperately needs to understand and know The One who never steps in and out, The One who never leaves, never forsakes…now there is an impact which brands itself onto lives.
Servant leadership, youth ministry, building relationships, and changing lives…it isn’t actually about burning yourself into the ground. It’s not about making yourself endlessly support every bad decision, poor choice, unhealthy relationship. And it’s not about becoming their savior…but it is everything to do with looking like and pointing to the Savior; it is about is living and loving like Jesus.
We can only live out the essence of what Human Relations Sunday and Martin Luther King Jr. Day when we commit to self-sacrificing, selfless love that desires passionately the wellbeing of all persons. Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God.
Partnering with you to bring people to Jesus,