Hello friends!!! This past weekend was amazing and so refreshing. I got to spend quality time with my family, clean house and get in some good time with my Lord. I have to be honest and confess that these past few weeks I have totally slacked on reading my bible or just spending any time with Him period. It was no wonder I was feeling so out of sorts, sick (emotionally!), and tempermental! I was not living in the Spirit. So I had to change that.
Praise God that He is a God of renewal and second (or third or fourth) chances! This week I reopened my study with Beth Moore "Living Beyond Yourself: Exploring the Fruit of the Spirit". Guess what God decided to speak straight into my heart about?
Agape.
Do you know what Agape is? I thought I did. I had heard the phrase used so many times before whether in jest or in conversation or study. But truly, I needed to understand what that word means in context. What it means in relationship to Jesus and to me and to others.
My friends, what I am about to reveal is EYE OPENING! If your heart is not impacted by this....then you need to ask yourself why.
Beth asks us to read 1 Corinthians 13...you know the LOVE chapter. At first I groaned. Because I had read this verse a million times and heard it recited a million times before at weddings (haven't we all?). But when I replaced it with the word Agape...it started to take on a different meaning and put a new perspective on a familiar verse. Humor me as I type this out for you:
Love (Agape) is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails." (1 Cor. 13:4-8)
What is agape? Beth broke it down for us as to what Agape is and I hope that these definitions help you gain a better understanding of the first quality listed in the fruit of the spirit.
Agape is a divine capacity to love. Only God is capable of Agape
Agape is more a response than a feeling
Agape is fueled by the needs rather than the desires of self or others
Agape is expressed through me when I surrender to the empowerment and temperment of the Holy Spirit
Agape is always demonstrated.
Did you catch all that? Only God is capable through Agape. It more of a response. Can only be expressed through us through the Holy Spirit. Always demonstrates.
Beth had us read 3 different scriptures that showed us agape in action:
Romans 5:8; 1 John 3:16; 1 John 4:9.
I'll type out one:
"This is how God showed his love (agape) among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through Him." (1 John 4:9)
It has already been demonstrated for us. And then we read John 17.
I am going to type this out, but please know this is very long (for a blog at least). I just felt that it must be typed out because I wanted so badly to share with you what I have learned about agape and what that truly means. Plus, if you have ever doubted Jesus's love for you, may you truly know here in His prayer for us.
"Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you. For you granted him authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him. Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began.
I have revealed you to those whome you gave me out of the world. They were yours; you gave them to me and they have obeyed your word. Now they know that everything you have given me comes from you. For I gave them the words you gave me and they accepted them. They knew with certainty that I came from you, and they believed that you sent me. I pray for them. I am not praying for the world, but for those you have given me, for they are yours. All I have is yours, and all you have is mine. And glory has come to me through them. I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name- the name you gave me- so that they may be one as we are one. While I was with them, I protected them and kept them safe by that name you gave me. None has been lost except the one doomed to destruction so that Scripture would be fulfilled.
I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, so that they may have the full measure of my joy within them. I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. Santify them by the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. For them I santify myself, that they too my be truly santified.
My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe you have sent me. I have given them the glory that ou gave me, that they may be one as we are one: I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.
Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. I have made you know to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them."
Did you read all that? He loved us that much to pray for those then and for us now. I have to admit I literally cried after reading this. Studying the word agape has opened my eyes to just how much God truly loves us and how He demonstrated that to us. And now He commands us to demonstrate that SAME AGAPE to others. "Love (agape) the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love (agape) your neighbor as yourself." (Matt. 22:37-39)
God is so good to teach me these things. He has shown me that I often do not love as He loves me. I don't often demonstrate agape towards my husband or my family. How sad is that? My heart has been dissected and He is reshaping me and molding me more and more to be more like Him. To have a heart like His and renewing my mind to yield to the Spirit. Oh how God is so good to reveal His heart to me.
Blessings everyone,
Tiff~