… But the greatest of these is love.1. Corinthians 13:13

In the thirteenth chapter of his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul had a great deal to say about Love. Love is above all other virtues, even greater than faith and hope and so love must also hold first place in believers as fruit of the Spirit. Love is neither an emotion nor an abstraction since it’s demonstrated in very specific ways.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, 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. Corinthians 13:4-8

Jesus’ unfailing love for the Father and for others was undoubtedly the most visible fruit. Jesus fulfilled the commandment in Deuteronomy 6:5 to “love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your strength” to the uttermost. From the temple to the cross, He yielded to the Father out of love. When a lawyer tested Jesus as to which was the greatest commandment, Jesus quoted Deuteronomy, including the corollary “to love your neighbor as yourself.” The Torah already commanded the Jews to love Yahweh, but then Jesus took that commandment to love to an entirely new level, the level of His own heart. Those who study these things believe that the Greek word agape was not used very often in the first century until Jesus manifested a love unknown in the Roman world. The unconditional, sacrificial love of Jesus even to His death on a cross was such an extraordinary love that the writers of the Gospels needed a new word to try to describe it. Christ’s agape has upset the world ever since.

I came of age during the 60’s where it was all about love – (as well as “Peace, Man!”). From the Beatles to just about everyone else, music’s singular theme was “all we need is love, sweet love. Love is all we need.” I do not remember that time as a season of love at all. I don’t recall a love that never failed or that was patient and kind. There was plenty of eros loving going around and the vapid filios, brotherly love offered by the flower children. But I do not recall love which served others first, dishonored no one and forgave all as Jesus taught. I do remember a hedonistic culture of drugs, rage and violence, of sexual promiscuity and Eastern gurus who taught how to empty the mind instead of filling the spirit with the Word of God. When everything is pleasurable and equally valued, love becomes as meaningless as clanging gongs, .

Eros and filios are human attributes; agape is divine. When the 60’s declared God to be dead, there was also an implicit rejection of the love of God. Scripture tells us in the first few verses of John that God is love. To reject God is to reject the very essence of who He is. God’s love can’t be separated from God’s completeness. Take agape away and the world’s without any substance at all.

What’s love got to do with it? Simply everything. What the world needs now desperately is the love of God in Christ Jesus as written in John 3:16. For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

Here is the real answer. God loved us first. That love sent His Son to die for our redemption. Jesus’ sacrificial love paid a price for sin we never could pay. Why? So that no one should perish; so that we could have eternal life. While we have breath, God never stops offering His agape love to us. How desperate do we need to become before we yield to the Lord of the Universe who loves us so?