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Love Never Fails, Like Never
Mar
1 Corinthians 13:8 “Love never fails.”
All love comes from God. He is love; He is love in its purest form. Because of Him, the world, even in the darkest parts, still has access to love.
Let’s look at four Greek words for love: Eros, Storge, Phileo, and Agape.
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Euros can be defined as sensual or erotic love. This is the love between a husband and a wife. It is a free giving of oneself sexually. Now don’t get squirmy, I’m not gonna stay on this one for long but it’s important to know that this love functions in the physical realm. As with all love, giving is required in euros love. Euros means the giving of one’s body to another.
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Storge is an affectionate love, one of belonging. It’s the type of love one has for a family and good friends. It’s an unforced natural love. Siblings don’t always express this love, but it’s there. I can remember having a friend who was from a large family. They fought all the time about silly things and then they got over it. But, don’t you dare fight with any of them because you will then be fighting all of them….they had a natural storge love for one another and outsiders do not have the same belonging as the natural family does.
- Phileo can be defined as a love of brother. This is a love that most often exhibits in close friendships. It’s a generous affectionate love where the two seek to make the other happy. This love is developed through time and friendship, it does not just occur. But, when it is developed, it is oh so sweet between friends. I Samuel 18:1-318 “After David had finished talking with Saul, Jonathanbecame one in spirit with David, and he lovedhim as himself. 2 From that day Saul kept David with him and did not let him return home to his family. 3 And Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as himself.”
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Agape love is what we will focus on because this love is love in the highest form.
Agape love a superhuman source that is energized by a good God in a complete way. Agape is only available to manifest if you first have Holy Spirit within you because God is the sole source of this type of love.
We all probable know Mark 12 but did you realize this is what agape is?
Mark 12:30-31 TPT
“You are to love the Lord Yahweh, your God, with a passionate heart, from the depths of your soul, with your every thought, and with all your strength. This is the great and supreme commandment. And the second is this: ‘You must love your neighbor in the same way you love yourself.’ You will never find a greater commandment than these.”
1 John 4:16-21 KJV
“And we have known and believed the love (agape) that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. We love him, because he first loved us. If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also.”
When I have it in order, love God, love me whom He created, loving my brother is so simple!
Agape is a mirror of God’s own ceaseless love for us. The result of this love is a capacity to love others.
12 Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering;
13 Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.
14 And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness.
Colossians 3:12-14
The more we grasp that our identity comes from the author of pure love, the more we are able to impart this type of love to others. Agape is the love that transforms relationships because even if it is not reciprocated it still changes even the air around us. Agape sees the Christ in you, the Christ in others, and Christ love in all it does.
The other day we were told about a home that was being sold. It was in a neighborhood some may describe as “rough”. As we approached the porperty, we could see the 100 plus tires all over the yard, the old cars, the trash piles, the tumbleweeds and somewhere -through the mirage of piles- there was a beat up house. Now, we peronally like buying these kinds of houses so this was right up our alley. As we drove around it it few times, we noticed a women working on the porch. She was putting clothes in a washing machine that sat on the front porch. Its source of water was the water hose strung across the yard. She displayed no joy on her face as she noticed us circling the property. Jeremy stopped in front of her laundry facility and asked her if he could ask her a question. as she approached our car I heard in my “heart”, “hold her hand”. Well based on what my physical eyes could see she was not looking to be my best friend, she was hurt, angry, in pain, but I’ve never let that stop me from loving on people in the past and I was gonna let it stop me this time, I just had to wait for the moment. J asked her a question but as she answered he interrupted with words that brought her to tears, “Hey, you are worthy.” that was is, just love filled, life filled words that took her from a shadow hovered place to a place of tears and release. As she began to pour her heart our, I gently grabbed her had and held it. She didn’t not refuse the touch. At the end of our conversation he concluded, “your life is changing now. You are on a new path.” We heard the Christ within, saw the Christ in her, and sent forth Christ love to her. I am so thankful to have been at that place, at that time, with those people!
II Corinthians overflows with the who/what/when/how of Agape! Love in all of these verses can be translated “Agape“.
I Corinthians 13:7 The Message Bible
“Love never gives up. Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have. Love doesn’t strut, Doesn’t have a swelled head, Doesn’t force itself on others, Isn’t always “me first,” Doesn’t fly off the handle, Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others, Doesn’t revel when others grovel, Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth, Puts up with anything, Trusts God always, Always looks for the best, Never looks back, But keeps going to the end.
8-10 Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end; understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth, and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.
11 When I was an infant at my mother’s breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew up, I left those infant ways for good.
12 We don’t yet see things clearly. We’re squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won’t be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We’ll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!
13 But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love.”
