Happy New Year Abner Baptist Church Family,
In an old song by the J. Geils Band, the songwriter recollects his failed attempts at love and at one point states:
“I’ve been through diamonds, I’ve been through minks, I’ve been through it all, Love stinks!”
J. Geils Band
Our culture has largely lost the concept of biblical love. I remember wondering a few years ago how Jesus could command me to love another person. It takes time for love to develop, and some people are not very loveable. It just did not seem fair to command me to love someone.
Affected by my culture, I understood love in the context of romance (such as between husband and wife) or relations (such as between friends), but God’s Word has a third aspect of love called AGAPE. I’ve always felt that Philippians 2:3-4 richly defines this biblical concept of love. With all humility, we are to selflessly look after the needs of others and sacrificially meet them as we can. Certainly AGAPE contains a developmental dimension, but we can all start immediately applying it to our relationships
God reached out to us with AGAPE love by accomplishing what we could not do for ourselves. He sacrificially offered up the life of His only Son for the forgiveness of our sins. As such, God can justly ask us to AGAPE others, even our enemies. Seeking the welfare of others is the holy approach to life. Seeking vengeance and wishing others harm will corrupt our hearts. Let us exhibit more AGAPE love in 2024.
Bro. Dale