DIFFERENT LOVES
Now we are going to go through different loves.
One reason there is confusion about this, is that the Greek and English Languages are just different.
It’s interesting that the Greek has several words for love, where we only have one. But in other areas we have several words, where they only have one word. You would think they have to have more than one word, but they don’t.
Begotten and born are the same word in the Greek, they only have one word. To conceive a child and for a child to actually be born or birthed is the same word - same word.
But when it comes to love, we only have one word, and they have a bunch of them or several. I mean some of them are words we have, too. They have words for friendship and to be fond of and so on. It’s just that the translators, translate most of those love too, but they don’t need to. There are English words that will fit, ok.
Now Jesus Christ said, “And you shall love [Gk: agape] the LORD your God with all your HEART, and with all your SOUL, and with all your MIND, and with all your STRENGTH: this is the first commandment.” (Mark 12:30)
The word there agapáō, is from the word agapē. You hear some people say agapē, I rather think it’s agapā or agapáō.
Some people think this is the ultimate love and that love starts down here somewhere and it builds up to this one agape, because it says in 1 John 4:8, that “God is love,” the word is agape, God is agape. Now that’s the noun, but if you use it as a verb, it’s agapao.
So here the commandments says, "you should agapao the Lord your God, with all your heart and all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength, this is the first commandment."
That should tell us right there, that this word agapao is not all inclusive by itself.
If agapao meant this ultimate pentacle of love, why then did Christ say you have to love with all the heart, soul, mind, and strength, why do you have to do that, if the word contains all that. Well it’s because it doesn’t.
When we apply words to ourselves, the same words with the same meaning, but the intensity changes.
If I talk about the same word, like my strength, that’s one word, right, but if I talk about God’s strength, that’s the same word, are we talking about the same thing? Hardly, same word though.
Agapao from the noun agape - love, can be intensified by doing it with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul, and all your strength. See intensify it, make it greater than what the word itself means, important point.
Now, He doesn’t talk about the second commandment, the same as this. As you shall love your neighbor with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your strength, no, it doesn’t say that. No, that is not what He said.
Listen to me, I say this at every meeting we have virtually and I say it in my papers,
you have to pay attention to the words.
You can’t believe how much is missed in the Bible, when people don’t look at the words. They think they know what it says, they missed it, they missed it in verse after verse, in hundreds of scriptures, they missed it, why? They don’t pay attention to the words. They just read a bunch of words and think, I know what that means, no they don’t, not if you don’t pay attention to the words.
He didn’t say, love God this way and love your neighbor, in the same way.
He said you love God (same Greek word agape/agapao), agape your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength and might.
Agapao your neighbor as yourself, whoopes what happened there, what happened there, that’s different.
Let’s assume you have nice neighbors, I have nice neighbors.
When we moved here our neighbors brought us a big bowl of cookies, and we share cups of sugar with our next door neighbor over here, Tammy. But you could have a neighbor who is a wife beating, drug dealing, God hating, you know, monster for a neighbor.
Now, does God want you or tell you, that you have to love that wife beating, drug dealing monster, with all your heart, with all your mind and soul, does He tell us that? NO, but I can see some self-righteous preacher giving a sermon saying, well yes you have to do this. No you don’t.
Well, how are you suppose to love your neighbor? As yourself. You put yourself in the equation.
Oh well, I wish my neighbor would give me a million dollars, well then you have to give your neighbor a million dollars. You got to love them as yourself. But I don’t expect my neighbor to give me million dollars, or even ten dollars. And for that reason I’m not going over this afternoon and give him ten dollars, can’t you see that.
But I might want to go over there and borrow his ladder, because I don’t have a long ladder. Just like he comes over here and borrows some of my electrical drill stuff, and that’s good, it’s good we do that.
But if you don’t know what your talking about, you can get stupid with this.
Now then, you run into contradictions in 2 Cor. 6.
2Cor 6:14 Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness?
v. 15 What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever?
v. 16 What agreement has the temple of God with idols?
People always use this as referring to a wedding, don’t be unequally yoked together with somebody who doesn’t believe in God. Well, that would fit.
But that’s not what it’s talking about.
That’s just one application of it, don’t be unequally yoked together with people like this.
Well, my next door neighbor, is not a wife beating, drug dealing, you know, monster.
So I can be yoked together with him, right. No
He doesn’t believe these truths.
My neighbor told me one day, if he caught, a particular race of people, stealing something, how he would dismantle their body with a baseball bat. Now I thought whoa, this man could get to be a little rough, you know. If he just caught someone in his backyard.
That’s not me, I don’t think like that. I’m not going to be yoked to that, so we don’t go out together. No, we don’t go out to bars together or out to dinner together, and you know, I don’t get into his crowd. I have no intention of going out with him, why?
Don’t be unequally yoked together.
Then how can you love him as yourself?
Contradictions isn’t it? No, it’s not.
How can I have nothing to do with him and love him as yourself? I’m going to show you.
And believe me, I’m not trying to say, I can exhaust this subject. This topic could go on for days, there’s a lot, you don’t even know how much is in this topic. I’m going to try and make it simple, but it is a little involved.
In the Old Testament, the words for love is, 'āhēbh, 'ahăbhāh. Basically it is a very simple word. It just means to give, ok, or I give. I love you, I give, that’s nice, that’s simple, good and profound.
That’s spiritual, love - I give.
In the New Testament, we have the word agápē.
We have a little different explanation for that; a complex emotion arousing appreciation or delight in and desire for the presence of it’s object; as well as to please and promote it’s welfare.
Now, I got this out of the Concordant Keyword Dictionary, because it’s so much better than all the other dictionaries and Dr. Strong combined.
I mean I’ve gone over definitions of this word, agapao and agape, for many hours and it’s really difficult to nail it down. Dr. Strong in his Exhausted Concordance, translates agape one way and then translates agarao the verb, differently, like it’s two different words.
And I contended for so long with this thing of, aion and aionios and that no adjective can take on a different or greater meaning than the noun, from which it is derived. And yet they take the word aion, which means an age, and turn it into eternity. It’s stupid, it’s grammatically wrong. You don’t take the word hour and then when you say you work hourly, you mean yearly, no, it still means hourly. It doesn’t change just because you change it from a noun, to a adjective or a verb, an adverb, or something else, ok.
So, but now I can see some better distinctions. It, agape, is a complex emotion, arousing appreciation or delight in and desire for, the presence of it’s object; as well as to please and promote it’s welfare, ok.
Now here is the word phileo. We understand the word Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love - Philadelphia. It means to be fond of, responsive, affection based on approval and regard.
That’s a little complicated, basically it’s this.
God of love-agape, is a one-way street, God loves, He gives, ok.
It’s not based on whether the ones He gives it to, loves Him back, ok.
While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us, right. Why?
Because He loves us, “for God so loved the world,” that includes all these drug dealing, wife beating, God defying people.
He so loved the world, did they love Him back? No, very few people love God back.
It’s a one-way street, He loves. He’s the One that loves, not getting anything back for it, He loves.
But phileo love, is where two people are fond of each other, and they’re responsive to each other.
It has to do with affections, based on the approval of the one you’re giving out to, you see.
Why are people friends? Because they reciprocate, right.
Bob and I go to lunch once a week. If we didn’t reciprocate, in how we think and talk to each other and build up each other when we are down. Then I think that would come to an end rather quickly.
Seriously, when you have a close friend, is that somebody that never shows you close affection? I don’t think so.
A close friend, a phileo, a friend that reciprocated, it’s a two-way street.
And although God is agape, you would say that’s the ultimate.
But it is not as intimate as phileo. All my life I heard this pyramid of love. At the top there was this agape, the ultimate, is it really?
A couple of things, I have a very important note here: There are two kinds of love, for two kinds of people.
Love is what God is.
It is a love that has the welfare of all others at heart, regardless of how evil they are, or how badly they may treat us.
It is the kind of love that the good Samaritan showed for the man who was wounded by the side of the road, when he was befalled by robbers, and they beat the living daylights out of him. You know, the Levite came by, the Priest came by, and they said, that’s to bad, look at that, he’s bleeding to death and went on their way. And then a Samaritan came by, He used a Samaritan because they despised the Samaritans. The Samaritans were of the northern tribe of Israelites. The good Samaritan came by and he tended to him. He bound up his wounds, carried him to the village, put him under the hospices of somebody there. He had someone take care of him, nurse him back to health, and here is money and I’ll be back in a week or two and I’ll stop by to see if you need more money and I’ll give you more money.
Now that is agapao love.
That’s not phileo love, that’s not brotherly love, that’s agapao love.
Did he expect to get anything back from that person? No.
Did he know him? No.
Did he like him? No.
Did the man even thank him? It doesn’t say.
Does anybody think, they became good friends, later in life? I don’t think so, I really don’t think so. This man was just passing through, maybe he was on business, just passing through, I don’t think they became friends.
He helped just for the shear reason, that this is a fellow human being and needed help. He provided not only help, but a lot of help, good quality help, and that’s agapao, that’s not phileo.
Now here’s one thing that interested me.
With all this said, God is agape, He loves agapao with the agape love, you got the noun and the verb.
But does God phileo love or is God in this ivory tower, where He just has this great spiritual love and He doesn’t get down on our level.
Now, this is very interesting, in John 3:35, it says that God agapao His Son, Jesus Christ.
That means His welfare, and everything that’s good for Him, as a Son, that’s always in His heart and mind and so on.
Ah, but He also phileo His Son, in John 5:20.
God does both, He loves His Son like a friend, like a brother, like some one you put your arm around, give a hug, or whatever.
Now, does God love us that way? Yes He does.
He loves us with this agape love, John 16:23, and He also loves us with the phileo love, this affectionate love, like a friend, you see.
Jesus Christ and His Father are One, they’re one Spirit. You have the Father and you have the Son, but they’re one.
Now what did Christ say regarding His disciples? He said I call you friends.
But what did the Father say? The same thing, because they are One.
Whatever Christ says, the Father says the same things, because they have the same Spirit, because they are One. One Spirit, they say the same, whatever Christ says, thinks, or does, that’s what the Father is, same thing. They do the same thing, because they are One, Father and Son are One.
Now Jesus, it says loves John.
I looked up the first scripture on that, John 19:26, and it says agapao, oh no, don’t tell me, as close as they were, that it was agapao love.
This was formal legalistic, you know, needful like a king loves his subjects. Like President Bush loves Americans, he doesn’t know them all, he just loves them as a nation. As a nation he loves, not individually, he doesn’t even know them all, but as a nation, see.
So I’m saying, oh no Jesus loves John agapao.
But never stop looking, and then we come to John 20:2, and we have phileo.
He loved them, both.
He loved him in that He was going to see him into the kingdom of God, and his destiny was going to be fulfilled. But He loved him like a friend and brother too, ok.
Now we come to the question --
It is also on the forum and everybody is going crazy about it.
But does God love everybody the same way He loves His Son, and the same way He loves us?
Most of us, would say absolutely (by us, I mean the elect, that’s us, not the world, I’d say the whole world, but we are not suppose to be of the world anymore).
And they would give as a proof scripture, “God is not a respecter of persons,” Acts 10:34.
No He doesn’t, in fact God hates things and people.
Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, defines hate as - intense hostility and aversion, although in the Greek the word hate can mean - to love less, not to have a passionate, vindictive type emotion towards somebody.
God doesn’t have that.
When He has a hostility or an aversion for something, it just means He is going to judge it and punish it and clean it up, that’s all.
You can’t think that God has human emotions, like we do, even though He expresses human emotions, like we know He does. But no, He doesn’t.
Even this thing of love agapeo, and phileo brotherly love.
When God talks about His wrath and His anger, it’s not that He can’t control His emotions.
He talks to us so we can understand from a man’s prospective, what these emotions are, see.
But you can’t tell ministers of the world, that this is not literally the way it is.
They think that God almighty has finger nails, and therefore He must trim them. I wonder what He does with the trimmings, maybe He saves them. It’s just nonsense.
God does not have two eyes. This Kenneth Copeland, he said God the Father is a 6 foot man. I’m laughing saying this guy is insane.
Listen, if God is a man then He has two eyes and that means He can’t see behind His head. Who’s so stupid to say, God can’t see behind His head, come on. God doesn’t have hands and arms or fingers and toes or hair. This is all anthropoid.
If He were a man, He would do this by the strength of His arm.
But He’s not a man, He’s God, and He’s spirit. Spirit is everywhere.
He talks about those, sitting on His right hand and His left hand. It’s spiritual, He has no right hand and left hand. He means if He were like a king on the physical earth, those that sit on His right hand, would be of a greater elevated position, than those on His left.
He’s talking spirit, it’s a spiritual analogy.
God doesn’t sit on a throne. God is everywhere. God is Spirit and God is invisible. Now that’s what He is.
And there is one other major thing that God is, this invisible Spirit is agape - love, concerned for the welfare of His whole creation, that’s us, and the whole world.
Alright now God says, “And I will execute vengeance in anger and fury upon the heathen, such as they have not heard,” (Micah 5:14).
Well, it sounds like a man, so anger He is out of control, you know.
No, if you were to picture, as to God being a man, this is the way it is.
But He is not a man. He’s in total control of His emotions.
Now you say God loves everybody the same.
Rom 9:13 As it is written, "Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated."
Now, there the Greek can mean to love less by comparison, but it’s a quotation from Malachi 1:2, and in the Hebrew it means hated, get it.
Proverbs 6:16-19, “These six things does the Lord hate,” and then it list a proud look and a lying tongue and so on.
But then He says, “a false witness,” and that’s a person. A false witness is a person, you see, that speaks lies and he that sows discord among the brethren, those are people that do that, ok.
But He doesn’t hate, like we hate, because He doesn’t have a carnal mind, and we do.
When we hate, we hate with our carnal mind.
God has no carnal mind, so you can’t draw the same analogy.
When I say I want to do something with the strength of my right hand, you know how limited that is. I can pick up one of these 5 gal. water bottles, that’s about what I can pick up.
But when God says, I’m going to do something by the strength of His right hand, are we even in the same universe, no.
Well, if you can see that, why can’t you see it then, when He talks about things that appear to be human emotion, like anger, My fury, wrath, and all of that.
So we have contrast here now, there are 2 verses that could be at variances with one another, you know.
Esau I hated, I hate a false witness, I hate those who sow discord among the brethren.
But “for God so loved the world,” wait a minute does that include Esau? Does that include the false witness, or the one that sowed discord among the brethren? I thought He just said He hated them, now He says He loves them.
Is this a contradiction?
We’re getting into some deep stuff here.
So is that a contradiction, I hate Esau?
I love him so much that I gave My own Son for him, what is that, is that a contradiction?
No, it’s really not. But you do have to understand it.