In one of my favorite movies, Princess Bride, the character, Miracle Max, declares, “True love is the greatest thing in the world.”
That’s true. But what does true love really look like?
Much of what Hollywood portrays as love is really lust.
Lust comes from a scarcity mindset, “I lack ____ and you’re here to give it to me.”
Also, the word love can have many different meanings depending on the context in which it is used.
I can say, “I love chocolate, and I love my parents,” but does love mean the same thing in each case? No.
In order to understand what God means by true love, we need to consider definition of the Greek word, Agape.
Agape is shown when I set aside my self-interests to serve the best interests of another no matter how much it costs me and no matter how they treat me in return.
Let’s break this definition down.
The first step is to consciously set aside my self-interests.
The Flesh will fight against this hard, so we need to put off the Flesh… “this is not about me.”
Next, it takes the mind of Christ pairing with our minds to hear the answer to:
- Lord Jesus, what’s best for _____?
- Lord Jesus, what do You want me to do in this situation?
- Why do You want me to do this?
- What else do You want me to know about this?
Sometimes, the Spirit will have us stand down and not intervene. Why?
He wants them to come to Him for rescue instead of to other people.
Agape comes with a price.
It costs us to love others in this way.
It’s great to know that Jesus set the example for us in that He gave up His Life to buy ours back.
Keeping this in mind, helps us pay the price of Agape.
That last part is the hardest, because when people don’t respond with love, it’s really hard to continue to love them with agape.
The good news is that He is right there to exchange any pain they inflict with His healing peace as we forgive and release the pain to Him.
It takes resting in the sufficiency of God’s agape for us to agapao the people around us.
Jesus loves all of us with agape all the time.
So, receive His agape by faith and let Him show His agape for others through you for His glory.
Blessings!
Robyn Henning