The unbeliever cannot love this way because he either doesn’t know or doesn’t acknowledge God’s great act of love toward him. He has no starting point. The only thing he has to go on is the way he is treated by other humans, which often isn’t very good. But Christians can love with agape love because God has loved us far more than what He calls us to do to others.

Today is Super Bowl Sunday (in case anyone hasn't noticed!) People all over this nation will gather in front of their TV sets this afternoon to watch the big game. As you know, we here in the Northwest have a special stake in it this year - the Seattle Seahawks will square up against the Pittsburgh Steelers in Super Bowl Forty. The winners will receive the Vincent T. Lombardi  trophy. The media has highlighted nearly every aspect of the game already for all you diehard football fans, so I can add little to what has been said except to say that in the final analysis, the focus of the entire game will be on moving a 14 ounce genuine leather oblong shaped ball with an inflated rubber bladder pumped up to 13.5 pounds per square inch toward the end zone of either the Steelers or the Hawks. Competition will be brutal. Players and coaches will be strained to the limit. The winner goes into the Super Bowl Hall of Fame. The loser goes home in disgrace. (All you Steelers fans may now exit the auditorium to get your crying towels... Just kidding, of course.) The struggle in the Super Bowl will be intense.

There is an intense struggle revealed in our Bible text this morning also. This will be the second Super Sunday we've looked at this passage. I say "Super Sunday" because I believe that for the Christian, every Sunday is super because it’s the Lord’s Day! Galatians 5:16-24 is where we will spend our time. Please follow along as I read it.

Did you pick up the struggle there in verse 17?

The opposing teams here, if you will, are the flesh and the Spirit. The object of the struggle is not a football. The object is you and me. At this very moment you and I are moving either toward the goal post of the flesh or toward the goal post of the Spirit. Which side is winning in your life? That is some of what I want to talk about.

Last Sunday I began to lay out how you and I can bring about victory on the side of the Spirit. "You Can Be a Fruitful Christian" was the title of my message. If you didn't hear that sermon I hope you'll pick up a manuscript or tape before you leave this morning.

For the balance of this series we're going to go through each of the items Paul listed as the fruit of the Spirit in verse 22:

This morning we'll talk about love and I'll ask and to keep us on track I’ll ask and answer three simple questions: What? Where? How?

What is this "love" Paul referred to as the fruit of the Spirit? Perhaps you think you already know but I caution you.

There are times when our English language is insufficient. I’m told that in the Gaelic language, if a boy loves a girl, there are 20 words he can use to tell her so. In English we have only one word to cover many situations and occasions.

In the language of the New Testament there were four words for love.

There was eros which referred to the physical side of the relationship between the sexes. It had to do with sexual desire. Our English word "erotic" is derived from it. In its truest meaning, eros is solely concerned about physical attraction.

We don’t find this word in the Bible at all, although we do find it exemplified both negatively and positively. In the negative sense we find it to be the driving force behind three of the words in our text in Galatians: immorality, impurity, and sensuality. In the positive sense we find it in the Old Testament book that we call Song of Solomon. Eros is not wrong in itself. God created us as sexual beings and placed a strong attraction in each of us for the opposite sex. He designed our bodies to be capable of responding to the same. I like to tell young engaged couples that they need not be ashamed of sex in order to be good Christians. God invented it. It’s just that He also has placed limits on it. He wants sexual relations confined only to marriage – and in this day I suppose I must qualify that by also saying marriage between one man and one woman.

Eros is not a part of the fruit of the Spirit. Anyone at or beyond the age of puberty, believer or unbeliever, is capable of this kind of "love." Paul’s word for "love" in our text was not eros.

A second word for love in the language of the Bible is storge. This word refers to what we could call "natural affection." It refers to the kind of love that typically exists between a parent and a child. I say "typically" because as people drift father and father away from God this natural affection can diminish in many. Sometimes it even disappears.

When Malachi foretold of the coming of John the Baptist, the forerunner of Christ, in Malachi 4:6, he wrote: "And he will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the land with a curse." Generations and cultures that desert God suffer for it in the area of natural family affection. In fact, when Paul wrote in Romans 1 of those who "did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer," (Romans 1:28) he said they were, among other things, "unloving." (Romans 1:31) The word there is astorgos. It is the negative rendering of storge. It describes those who are without the natural, familial affection. Strong renders it "hard-hearted toward one’s kindred." If you’ve wondered why the family is in trouble today, the bedrock reason is that we are deserting our Creator and when we do that, family affection is something that can go out the window. Fathers desert their wives and children and mothers farm their kids out for someone else to raise.

Storge is a good word, but it is not the one that Paul used to describe the fruit of the Spirit. People who do not have the Spirit of God in their lives are fully capable of storge. A Mafia Don, guilty of ordering the murder of multiple people, can still have family affection for his young son.

A third word for love in the Greek language is philia. It is the most prominent and common word for love in the Greek language outside the Bible. It is also used in places in the New Testament. It means "warm, tender affection." It is often used in the context of friendship. The city of Philadelphia is called "The City of Brotherly Love." Its name is derived from the Greek word philia. Philia often exists where there is something attractive or interesting about another person. It describes a kind of love that desires to be with someone because they are pleasant and fun to be around. Philia is a good word. It describes a good kind of love that all of us like to have.

But philia has a weakness. It is conditional. Philia loves as long as there is something lovable about the object of its affection. William Shakespeare once said, "Love is not love which alters when it finds alteration." That is the weakness of philial love. It loves, often strongly, when there is something lovable about the object of its affection. But if the object of affection changes (the "alteration" that Shakespeare referred to) philia can go away.

An example might be a marriage based only on philial love. A woman marries a man because he is popular, is a big man on campus, and star of the football team. Besides that he’s very handsome. Then he has an accident that leaves him in a wheelchair. No longer is he big man on campus. He cannot even care for himself adequately. His muscles begin to sag. He loses his good looks. Suddenly his wife doesn’t "love" him anymore. This is the problem with philial love. "Love is not love that alters when if finds alteration."

Philia is not a bad word. In fact, it is encouraged by the word of God. Martha told Jesus when she informed Him of the illness of her brother Lazarus, "The one whom you love (phileo) is sick…." Jesus had a warm, tender affection for His friend Lazarus.

Philia is a good word, and we would hope that there would always be plenty of it in our world and in the church. But philia is not the word Paul used in Galatians 5:22. It is not the "love" that is part of the fruit of the Spirit. Any unbeliever, not possessing the Spirit of God, is capable of philial love.

The word Paul used in our text is agape. Greek scholar R.C.H. Trench said of this word: "Agape is a word born within the bosom of revealed religion." What he meant by that was that the word agape isn't found very much in the language of the first century outside of the writings of Christians. It originated, for the most part, with the teaching of Christ.

Agape is not dependent upon being loved in return. It does not need to be rewarded to continue to exist. It is a love that issues from a commitment deeper than self. Perhaps the clearest statement of it is in John 3:16: "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life."

The majority of the world didn’t love God when God gave His Son. The majority of the world was in rebellion to God and hated Him. The same is true today. Had God required that we first be lovable, Christ would never have touched down on this earth. But God loved the world even though it was unlovable. Paul wrote in Romans 5:8: "But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."

Agape can love even when its object is unlovable. It can continue even when he goes bald or she loses her figure. It can continue when her millionaire goes broke or his movie star isn’t being called by producers anymore. But perhaps we can better grasp the concept if we ask the second question of this sermon:

Where is this kind of love, this agape, seen? Where does it apply?

In Matthew 5:43-47 we read Jesus’ words in the Sermon on the Mount:

Jesus’ words "love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you" show us that this is not the kind of love that depends on a warm, fuzzy feeling. Few people have warm sentiments toward enemies or those who persecute them.

Those words in verse 46 further clarify the meaning of agape:

Anybody can love people who love them. That’s no challenge. It’s nothing special. But a love that can love an enemy is something different indeed. Agape love is patterned after God Himself Who, according to verse 45, "causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous."

I chuckle sometimes when I hear unbelievers say things like, "God never did anything for me!" In perhaps a way that betrays my lack of perfection in this area, sometimes I find myself thinking, "I surely wish God would cut off his blessings from that person for just 5 seconds. He would never speak so brashly again!"

This kind of love is what is supposed to exist in marriage. Paul told us in Ephesians 5:2, "Husbands, love (agape) your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her…."

A husband says, "Well I would love my wife if she were just a little more loving or understanding or cooperative or whatever." Yet such talk betrays the husband’s lack of agape love. He is confessing that his love is conditional. It depends upon his wife’s behavior. There are no rewards from God for this kind of deficit love. In the words of Christ in the passage in Matthew 5:47: "Even the Gentiles do the same."

Agape is the kind of love is what should govern our dealings with those around us, too. Jesus said in Matthew 22:39: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself."

I have "good" neighbors and I have "bad" neighbors. How about you? Which ones am I commanded by God to love? I’m commanded to love them all. But how can I do that? That brings us to the third question of this message:

How can I love those who don’t return anything to me? How can I love those who return evil to me?

I have sometimes heard Christians ask, "What is really the difference between a true Christian and some of the good people around us? After all, we’ve all seen people who care nothing for Christ but are very loving and happy and peaceful."

My answer is this: "How many of them love their enemies and stay committed to those who persecute them? How many of them honor their commitments even when the strain becomes very difficult?" That’s where the real divide comes because agape, this kind of love that loves in spite of what it receives in return is something that only comes as the fruit of the Spirit. It doesn’t just "happen" and it isn’t based on feelings first.

One of the things I showed you last time was that fruit production in the life of a Christian involves collaboration. It is a partnership between God and the Christian. God does His part through His Spirit. We must do ours. Love, for instance, while it is something that comes in the life of a Christian due to the presence of God’s Spirit is also something we must pursue. Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 14:1, right after the famous "love" chapter that we are to "Pursue love…." While agape is a part of the fruit of the Spirit, we have a part in its development. So if we just sit around waiting for it to happen, we will never love as we should.

We will never have this fruit of the Spirit if we are sitting around waiting for our feelings to change toward those we find difficult to love either. Movies and novels make much about "falling in love." You might fall into sexual attraction. You might fall into deep affection for someone who lights up your life. But you don’t fall into agape!

"Well then how can I love a nasty neighbor or a nagging wife or a lazy husband? I can’t control my feelings, turning them on or off at will." That’s why I clarified that agape is not a feeling first.

Agape love begins with God. That’s the reason that unbelievers don’t have it. In fact, every item on Paul’s list of the fruit of the Spirit begins with God and our relationship with Him. Let me explain how it works.

Every true Christian, before obeying the gospel, has to come to the realization that he or she is a sinner and, as such, has become an enemy of God. We are mortgaged up to our eyeballs with the effects of sin. In fact, because all sin brings the death penalty, in God’s eyes we are condemned criminals who deserve to be executed. But the penalty is even more serious than that. The penalty is eternal banishment from God to a place of torment called hell. Yet before we ever came to the realization of these things, we see in the Bible that God was reaching out to us. He was planning to bring us to the knowledge of the death of His Son so that we could have a way out of our condemnation. God loved us in spite of our evil. He gave His only begotten Son for us while we were still sinners. We’ve been saved from eternal damnation that is more serious than anything another person could ever do to us on this earth.

Now that we’re saved, this God to Whom we own our very lives and a huge debt of gratitude, tells us to love our neighbors. "But my neighbor doesn’t like me. He’s a jerk! He doesn’t deserve to be loved!" Yes, he probably doesn’t. But neither did you or I deserve to be loved by God! My friends, we owe so much to God that a command to love our neighbors is but a tiny request by comparison. God has every right to call on us to love those who are not loving in return to us.

The apostle John put it this way in 1 John 4:19: "We love, because He first loved us." Let me paraphrase that. "Because God first loved us, we are able now to love others."

The unbeliever cannot love this way because he either doesn’t know or doesn’t acknowledge God’s great act of love toward him. He has no starting point. The only thing he has to go on is the way he is treated by other humans, which often isn’t very good. But Christians can love with agape love because God has loved us far more than what He calls us to do to others.

If God loved me enough to allow His only Son to die to pay for my sins, the very least I can do is love my neighbor, or my spouse or my enemy. In this way, God’s love empowers our love. God gives us the ability to do what we can never do on our own!

"But how can I develop a warm feeling for somebody who makes a portion of my life miserable?"

You can’t - at least not initially. But remember, agape isn’t a feeling first. Warm feelings are associated with those other kinds of love that the world is capable of having. When God so loved the world that He gave his only Son, do you think he was having any warm feelings? Do you suppose he was reveling in the warm fuzzies as they were nailing Jesus to the cross?

Agape is not rooted in feelings. Agape is a commitment to do what God has commanded for the well-being of another because of what God has done for us.

"Well if love isn’t a feeling, how can I know when I have it?"

Agape love is seen in giving. "For God so loved the world that He gave…." That is our model.

"But how does it fit where I live?"

In our lives agape love it is also seen in giving. Remember Jesus’ description of the great judgment in Matthew 25? How did He describe those on the right who inherit the blessings? He said in verses 35-36: "I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger, and you invited Me in; naked, and you clothed Me; I was sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me."

But remember how they asked Him in verses 37-39, "Lord, when did we see You hungry, and feed You, or thirsty, and give You drink? And when did we see You a stranger, and invite You in, or naked, and clothe You? And when did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?"

Jesus’ answer was in verse 40. He said, "Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me."

We serve Christ when we serve others.

Let’s see if we can put this all together. God loved us first. He gave to us the ultimate sacrifice when we couldn’t help ourselves. That formerly unheard of act of agape love motivates us to love and serve Him with a willing spirit. How do we serve Him? We do the same thing for others that He did for us. We give to them. That is what agape love is. It does not depend upon the responses of others. It depends upon our love and gratitude for God. That’s why John said in 1 John 4:20, "If someone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar…."

"But what about our feelings?" someone asks. "It still seems like there ought to be some feelings involved in love."

There certainly can be. Jesus said in Matthew 6:21, "Where you treasure is so shall you heart be also." When we give away part of our treasure to someone besides ourselves we give away part of our hearts. Very often, when we give as love demands, we are tied up emotionally with those to whom we give.

But always remember, agape love, by its very nature, does not depend upon feelings. It depends upon obedience to God rendered willingly, out of gratitude for His love for us. John 4:19 says it well: "We love because He first loved us."

The fruit of the Spirit is agape love. Unbelievers won’t have it – they cannot have it - because they will not acknowledge its source. But we believers won’t have it either if we do not consciously pursue it. Want to get started today? Look around to those who are needy and begin to give to them. Don’t be deceived by thinking that you must whump up a warm fuzzy emotion about doing it. The good emotions come later, after you’ve done what God says. Just do for them what God has done for you.

You can be a loving Christian!

Dave Redick is Minister of the Hwy 20 Church of Christ in Sweet Home, Oregon and Editor of The Preacher's Study. He may be reached at pstudysupport@comcast.net.

Copyright © 1996-2008 by The Preacher's Study. Permission is granted to subscribers to use this document in total or in sermon preparation in the context of the local congregation only. Publishing it in a book, on the Internet, or anyplace beyond the local congregation is prohibited.

All Scripture quotations and references are from the New American Standard Version unless otherwise stated.

[Archive]    [Home]   [Comments]   [Search]