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Recommended: The Concept Of Love
Love is one of the most important elements in Christianity. Although there are many different definitions of the word love, people use the word to mean a strong desire or liking, romance, benevolence, giving, or even sexual intercourse. In Christianity, the word love includes serving the welfare of others. Such love is often called an agape love. Some people often recognize it as “Christian love.” Agape love, in the Greek language, means to act consciously and to choose to love someone without expecting anything in return from them, even though the result of the action may bring inconvenience, discomfort, or even death to the giver (Love Feast (Agape), n.d.). In other words, agape love is also a sacrificial love. This love is not an emotional or impetuous love but rather a more purposeful love. This kind of love is the kind Jesus referred to in Matthew 22:39, and it is the kind he wants us to apply to our daily life by loving others. …show more content…
In Luke 10:30-35, Jesus described how a good Samaritan helped a Jewish man who was robbed, beaten, and left half dead while on his way to Jericho from Jerusalem. Although the Samaritan did not have any responsibility to stop and help the Jewish man--as the Samaritans were the enemies of Jew--he stopped and risked his own life to help him. He even helped the Jew at a level beyond anything that might have been considered usual care. The Samaritan brought the Jewish man to an inn and asked the inn keeper to take care of the Jew. Furthermore, he promised the inn keeper to pay all of his treatment costs. The story shows the meaning of loving others as ourselves. The Samaritan man demonstrated agape love. He loved the Jewish man as if he would want to be treated in the same circumstance; he loved the Jewish man as if he was part of his own
In The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis addresses a position on love that is seldom heard, yet universally felt. Screwtape makes a very clear distinction between his ideal of love and true love. If we take what Screwtape thinks love is, and reverse the teaching completely, all that is left is the love that God approves of. The purest and most sought after love is God’s. Love has been divided by C.S. Lewis into five ways. One way, taught in The Screwtape Letters is “being in love”. The other four ways is taught through The Four Loves: Affection, friendship (philia), romantic love (eros), and Agape love. Understanding the difference between the lo...
That love sent Jesus Christ to Calvary for you and me. It is that kind of love that Jesus displayed as He went about healing and teaching. It is that kind of love that God wants to be manifested in you and through you by the Holy Spirit, because that kind of love is a character trait of one who has been purchased by the blood of Christ and is living for Him.
In the Old Testament God seems to be a very merciful, loving, and understanding God. In the New Testament the Lord shows his wrath a bit more often. I truly believe that the Lord is always forgiving and merciful growing up in a Christian/Jewish family. When I was younger I went to private school, studying and knowing the bible almost verse by verse. When I was around 12 my parents became Messianic Jews, meaning that they believed in old parts of the bible, mainly the Old Testament and the Torah. My parents called God, Yahweh, meaning,
middle of paper ... ... The Agape love style shows unselfish concern along with physical sacrifice and nurturing for others. Nowhere in either of these two relationships could it be said that there was an Agape love style shown. In truth, it appears that no relationships that occurred in Random Family, whether it be with a significant other or within a family unit itself, had the aspects of an Agape style love in them.
“Christianity Begins with the starling statement that the center of human reality is love” the central issue here is what love is, how the gospel of John brings to the Johnnie community? And how do we understand the Word “Love” and its reality. Obviously John portrays love as synonymous to Jesus the Son of God
[...] understanding, redeeming good will for all men. It is an overflowing love which is purely spontaneous, unmotivated, groundless, and creative. It is not set in motion by any quality or function of its object… Agape is disinterested love. It is a love in which the individual seeks not his own good, but the good of his neighbor. Agape does not begin by discriminating between worthy and unworthy people, or any qualities people possess. It begins by loving others for their sakes. It is an entirely “neighbor-regarding concern for others,” which discovers the neighbor in every man it meets. Therefore, agape makes no distinction between friends and enemy; it is directed toward both. If one loves an individual merely on account of his friendliness, he loves him for the sake of the benefits to be gained
In Christianity, the emphasis is placed on love of God rather than on obeying his will. People must believe that God is merciful and loves them as well. As a reflection of God’s love, people must also love other people (and the whole humanity in general) and forgive their enemies. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus endorses agape, or selfless love (in contrast to eros, or possessive love), which consists of dedication to another person’s good, even at the expense of our own good and happiness. People should practice peace and nonviolence, return good for evil and love for suffering (“turn the other cheek”).
The apostle John declared: “God is love.” In the Koine Greek, Agape love is that not only that love is from God, but that it is of God. God Himself loves. Love is one of the moral attributes of God Agape love is self-sacrificing. The LORD Almighty loved the world so much that He sent His only son, to death; death on a cross. .
What is love? I remember a time when “I love you” was the hardest phrase to say to the person you really had feelings for because you knew when you said those words it would change the course of your relationship forever. But what is the true meaning of love? “The dictionary defines love as a feeling of strong personal attach-ment induced by sympathetic understanding or by ties of kindred; ardent affection for one’s children; man’s adoration for God; strong liking; fondness; good will, al love of learning; love of country.” (Bell, pg. 10) According to Bell all of these definitions convey the outward appearance of love. He says that when looking at love that we need to take an inventory of our feeling to find out if we are truly displaying the type of love that God calls agape love. Bell says we need to ask ourselves the following questions: Do I return love? In any relationship love is a two way street. A marriage or relationship will not last very long if only one person is showing love and the other is not responding in kind. As a matter of fact, a spiritual relationship works in pretty much the same way. The bible says that God first loved us, but if we do not return that love to Him the relationship may diminish. As a Christian we must first love the unsaved person just enough to go to them and share the good news of the gospel. Then after that person has received the gospel of Jesus it is then up to them to accept it and return the love by giving their life to Christ. “Ministry is the first stage of this exchange of love.” (Bell, Pg 11)
.... The robbers beat him up and stripped of his belongings. Three individuals separately passed him: a priest, a Levite and a Samaritan. Neither the priest, nor the Levite chose to help him. But the Samaritan gave him mercy and went out of his way to make sure he was fully healed. He first poured “on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him. And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’” (Luke 10:34-35.) Then within the quote when Jesus asked who should he be and the lawyer then knew whom in order to achieve eternal life; he had to treat his neighbors, just like how the Samaritan treated his. The point of the story is that when you see someone in trouble; treat them how you would treat yourself.
darkness. The Bible tells us that we do not have to live as slaves but
This type of love is the love that God has for His own children. This type of love is what was displayed on the cross by Jesus Christ” (Crier, 2015). The New Testament says multiple times that God is agape love, showing that God is the ultimate, most self-sacrificing love. Throughout the Bible God provides for His children out of love and even punishes them out of His love for His children. “Much is made of God's wrath and punishment in the Old Testament, but when God punishes, it is with reluctance… In fact, God often pleads with the Israelites to stop doing wrong and repent so that he may bless them” (God’s love, n.d.). Love is discussed hundreds of times in the Bible, both showing God’s love and in command to love others as God has loved
We have been given a command to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. In Mark 12:30 says that, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with your all mind and with all your strength”. Christian’s renewed mind holds a vital role in His conquest of loving Jesus truthfully. On the other hand, this must be taken into a serious account that in order to experience the Kingdom blessings and to purposefully transform into the image and likeness of Christ our minds must be constantly renewed (Romans 12:2).
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.” These scriptures clearly point out God’s love. In George W. Peters book A Biblical Theology of Missions says this about God’s love, “Divine love is that impelling and dynamic quality in which God moves out of Himself and in which He relates Himself in all His beneficence and sufficiency to His creation. His love motivates Him eternally to communicate and to impart Himself to the object of His relationship” (59 & 60). Peters notes, love is: outgoing dynamic relationship (Romans 5:8), sacrificial active relationship (John 3:16), comprehensive relationship (John 3:17), and finally love is manifold relationship; which he says manifolds according to the character, conditions and needs of its object” (60). God is love. Also God is relational; Peter says on page 57, “God is a God of relationships”; the book of Ezekiel 37:27 says, “My dwelling place will be with them; I will be their God, and they will be my people” and Jeremiah 32:38 says, “ They will be my people, and I will be their God.” From these scriptures it is clearly known that God the Father desires intimate relationship with His people. The
What is it that motivates you to look forward to each day as you wake up? What is it that gives you energy to stay up late and get up early? What are you creating that is so in tune with what stirs your heart and soul that you can hardly wait to do it? It is your passionate attachment to what you are doing that fire you up. It may be your work, your family, your career, your hobby, your community service, and it is the devotion with which you pursue what you love that drives you to achieve it.