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Agape & Love Today is the day after Valentine’s Day. Next year it will be on a Sunday and it could be very special for us as a church to offer those who are in committed relationships an opportunity to reaffirm their commitment to each other. The first representation of Saint Valentine appeared in the Nuremberg Chronicle, (1493); alongside the woodcut portrait of Valentine the text states that he was a Roman priest martyred during the reign of Claudius II, known as Claudius Gothicus. He was arrested and imprisoned upon being caught marrying Christian couples and otherwise aiding Christians who were at the time being persecuted by Claudius in Rome. Helping Christians at this time was considered a crime. Claudius took a liking to this prisoner -- until Valentinus tried to convert the Emperor -- whereupon this priest was condemned to death. He was beaten with clubs and stoned; when that didn't finish him, he was beheaded outside the Flaminian. Many of the current legends that characterise Saint Valentine were invented in the fourteenth century in England, notably by Geoffrey Chaucer and his circle, when the feast day of February 14 first became associated with romantic love.[9] Yesterday we celebrated with the rest of the wider community Romantic love as we set up a display in Windsor Reserve for Valentine’s Folk in the Park. Yet I wonder what we understand by this term love. I’d like to do a little exercise: Define love in one sentence. Share your definition with those sitting near you. Perhaps your definition alludes to love as a synonym of like; or a friendship; or parental love; or romantic love; or very likely as you sit in this church with your mind on heavenly things as the kind of love that we receive from God. I’d like to take a few moments to offer some background to the Biblical understanding of Love. Love is a word that the writers of the New Testament chose to fill with fresh meaning. At least three Greek words for love were available to the writers of the New Testament.
The New Testament adopted this third word and transformed it by using it as the defining term for God’s attitude toward human beings as expressed in Jesus. It expressed the determined choice of God to act for the benefit of every human being even at the cost of the life of his own Son. God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only son into the world so that we might live through him.” 1John 4:9 God’s commitment to reach out to saints and sinners alike in Christ, forever transformed the concept of love.
The New Testament speaks of three love relationships:
In each case the meaning of ‘love’ is defined by God’s expression of His love in the gift of Jesus Christ. In each case love is a conscious commitment to benefit another whatever the cost. How does this expression of God’s love impact our lives and the way we live them as Christ followers? Where does this kind of love fit into our world view? “Beloved since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another” 1John4:11 As Christ followers it is our vocation to reveal Christ to the world, to be his hands and feet, Now it follows that If God is revealed to us through love, then surely we reveal God to others when we love. The love that reveals God is the giving, self-sacrificing kind, the unconditional kind. The passages which we have chosen for today’s service offer wonderful insights into the love of God and into the value that God places on love as a means of expressing his care and concern for the human race. At our most recent Vestry meeting, Patrick Kelly took the devotions and he used the opportunity to share with us the means by which he draws closer to God. He explained that it was not by looking at the stars in the night sky with all their vast expansiveness that made him feel close to God. These served merely to remind him of his own insignificance in the grand scheme of things. Looking at the stars in the universe served only to make him wonder how God could possibly care for him personally. I know what he means. Instead Patrick reflected, it was through people, the love he received from them and the love he was able to give them that made him feel close to God. This view is in line with the readings for today which tell us much about love and more specifically about God’s love. Let’s have another look at the reading from 1 John. In this is love not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins” v10 Here we learn that love is a giving action. It is a decision It comes from God In verse 7 we read Everyone who loves is born of God and knows God Because God is love. We learn in verse 9 that God’s love was best revealed by the sending of his son through whom we are given eternal life. We love because God first loved us verse 10 and 19 That if we love one another God lives in us verse 12 And though we cannot see God we experience God when we love and are loved. Love brings joy and bears fruits which last. Most challenging of all we learn that the defining characteristic of those who truly love God is that they love others. “If you love me keep my commandments” verse 21 and what are the commandments Jesus calls us to keep? Only 2: to love God and to love one another. Loving acts thoughts and words are the fruits of those who truly love God. Love is central to the Christian faith and is the challenge of discipleship. Think about what this means. Glance over your life this past week. How often has it been so much easier to opt for a less than loving response to those around us. Today’s passage makes no bones about the fact that when we are unloving we are disobedient to the commandments of Jesus. Yikes! how can we become more loving? Jesus is a hard act to follow. In the movie Evan Almighty there is a delightful scene where Evan talks to God about wanting to be more loving. God says if you ask me to give you love what are you expecting? Lots of warm fuzzies, complements, favours etc. Let me explain, if you ask me for more love I will give you more opportunities to be loving. I will test and exercise your ability to be loving with the most trying circumstances, the most difficult people. As you rise to these challenges you will become more loving and so have more love in your life! At this time when the secular world is reflecting on eros, romantic love which we all know comes and goes with feelings and circumstances, let’s not forget, as Christ followers, to reflect on Agape, the love of God which comes from a decision to obey God’s call to give to others in an unconditional, self-sacrificial way. For it is only in doing so that we will fulfill the Church’s mission which is after all simply to obey Jesus’ command to reveal God who is AGAPE, by loving our neighbours, whoever they may be. Let us pray: Gracious and loving God Teach us to love unconditionally as you love us. When people are unreasonable, illogical, ego-centric call forth from us a loving response. when we are misjudged, misunderstood, overlooked, call forth from us a loving response. When our friends disappoint us, turn on us or betray us, call forth from us a loving response. Help us to give the best we have to give with integrity and honesty. Help us to risk being vulnerable in order to help others Help us to do good for the sake of goodness but most of all in all things and all circumstances call forth from us a loving response that in loving we may grow into Christ and leave a 'Jesus print' wherever we go. |
