John 15:13 Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.
 
Alright, let’s review.
 
1. True love begins with care. You can’t have love without care, makes sense. What stands in the way of true love is unresolved hurt and anger. This has to be dealt with or you will not have true love, except for the possibility of a fleeting sense of it from time-to-time.
 
2. Care, when employed consistently will produce the second facet of true love, and that is trust. This also makes sense. How can someone trust you if you don’t care about them? Trust is super important in developing true love. What stands in the way of the crucial development of trust in our relationships? The answer is fear. Fear also has to be dealt with for trust to flourish.
 
3. Better together is the third aspect of true love. Better together is the growing vision of what people can do together that they cannot do alone. Better together desires to see things done in unity. In this facet of true love there is a genuine excitement and appreciation to see others excel and be satisfied. What stands in the way of better together? The answer is self-reliance, makes sense, right? The idea that I do not need anyone, and I can do it better myself would keep me from caring and trusting, wouldn’t it?
 
So, we have come to the final stepping-stone to what I would call true love. Now, there are other kinds of love that exist, but the kind of love that you and I were specifically made to bathe in for eternity is true love.
 
There is a physical attraction kind of love that is exciting and wonderful, albeit, dangerous and can at times become our brains. Not good when that happens, not good at all. We can lose our sensibilities and forfeit so much for what we think is true love.
 
There is a love that looks and feels a lot like kindness. And it is healthy and fills the churches and families across the world. With high regard, we make our lives open and ready to serve others and bless them. This is such a stable and beneficial form of love that is a blessing that comes from God’s heart. Yet, even as wonderful as this is, there is a deeper kind of love that Jesus is speaking of in John 15:13.
 
The deeper kind of love is not what you would consider warm and fuzzy. It is not filled with swirling passion and excitement. This kind of love does not calibrate itself on another’s behavior either.
 
I want to help with a distinction of the various kinds of love that we enjoy. Some forms of love prompt me to feel a certain way. But, there is one kind of love that prompts me to do things differently.
 
When in an intense worship time where the body of Christ is gathered and we sing our hearts out to God, do you ever feel your love and devotion for the Lord growing and swelling? Yes, it is wonderful!
 
There is a greater love than this. Well, let me put it another way. There is more in the way of love that God is desiring from you.
 
The kind of love God has for you, which He wants you to adopt, is a very predetermined and calculated love. It bypasses how others feel and what they think. This love wakes up in the morning determined to help another before the need is even present.
 
This is the love that believes that another is more important than oneself; and is willing to sacrifice agenda and time for them. Jesus, even says, laying down our life.
 
Koinonia love brings us to the church gatherings and agape love should drive us out. Koinonia love causes us to have respect and admiration for others. Agape love requires that we enter in and know and be known by others to the degree that their dreams can come true in Christ.
 
Koinonia love says, “We can work together!” Agape love says, “I serve your needs.”
 
This makes sense, doesn’t it, “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.”
 
I wonder what our world would be like with a bunch of people who understood true love and lived it?
 
Father, teach us to have the kind of love that You have. Thank You for physical affection love. Thank You for brotherly and sisterly love that blesses us so much. Lord, this other type of love that goes even deeper, that prompts us to love others beyond what is beneficial for us is the kind of love that drew Your Son Jesus to the cross. We will marvel about that forever, as we should. Lord, we want to love that way.
 
Blessings,
Pastor D