Day Seventeen
”…THOU ART MINE, AND I AM THINE.”
Today’s Scripture Reading
Dear friends, let’s love each other, because love is from God, and everyone who loves is born from God and knows God. The person who doesn’t love does not know God, because God is love. This is how the love of God is revealed to us: God has sent his only Son into the world so that we can live through him. This is love: it is not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son as the sacrifice that deals with our sins.
Dear friends, if God loved us this way, we also ought to love each other. No one has ever seen God. If we love each other, God remains in us and his love is made perfect in us. This is how we know we remain in him and he remains in us, because he has given us a measure of his Spirit. We have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son to be the savior of the world. If any of us confess that Jesus is God’s Son, God remains in us and we remain in God. We have known and have believed the love that God has for us.
God is love, and those who remain in love remain in God and God remains in them. This is how love has been perfected in us, so that we can have confidence on the Judgment Day, because we are exactly the same as God is in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear, because fear expects punishment. The person who is afraid has not been made perfect in love. We love because God first loved us. Those who say, “I love God” and hate their brothers or sisters are liars. After all, those who don’t love their brothers or sisters whom they have seen can hardly love God whom they have not seen! This commandment we have from him: Those who claim to love God ought to love their brother and sister also.
1 John 4:7-21
Reflection
Relationship experts will tell you that what matters most for healthy, enduring relationships, particularly marriages and families, is a combination of factors, such as commitment, faithfulness, generosity, patience, forgiveness, trust, proximity and time, communication, and selflessness. The mutual connection two or more people share is dependent upon each person’s willingness to graciously give to the other without expecting anything in return—this is community.
Community, from the Latin, communitas, literally means “with gifts.” The individual members of couples, families, or small groups realize that all of who they are and all of what they have is meant for the sake of the others. When this notion becomes practical, or real, no one is in need. This, of course, is the story of the early church as we understand it from Acts, such as in chapter 2 and 4. Those particular passages describe a community in which “there were no needy persons among them” (Acts 4:34). Acts 2 and 4 give us a beautiful image of a loving community. Love is not only the impetus for such sharing and intimacy found within the communities of the very early church, it is also the outcome, producing a virtuous cycle in which to orient our lives.
Unlike the English language, which is limited to one word for love, the Greek language provides us with at least four words. These four words are eros, storge, philia, and agape. You’ve probably heard of these words. Eros is love on a physical level. Storge is love on or at the familial level. Philia is personal affection or love on a friendship level. Agape, however, is considered by many as a different kind of love, a different dimension of love altogether. Where eros, storge, and philia are natural ways to describe our emotional connection and heartfelt response to one another, agape love is more of a person’s quality than it is a different kind of love.
Agape love comes from God. It is a perfect love.
Agape love comes from God. It is a perfect love. In fact, we can only agape because God first agape(d) us. This fatherly love of God, the kind of love that drives out fear and makes us perfect, is on display in God’s longing to be in relationship with humanity and to restore creation to wholeness. Agape love orders our lives, develops and defines our character, and yields a mutual connectedness to one another that drives our selfless actions toward others. First Corinthians 13:1-13 is likely the most well-remembered passage about love (along with John 3:16) that gives us a clear picture of what agape love is:
If I speak in tongues of human beings and of angels but I don’t have love, I’m a clanging gong or a clashing cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and I know all the mysteries and everything else, and if I have such complete faith that I can move mountains but I don’t have love, I’m nothing. If I give away everything that I have and hand over my own body to feel good about what I’ve done but I don’t have love, I receive no benefit whatsoever.
Love is patient, love is kind, it isn’t jealous, it doesn’t brag, it isn’t arrogant, it isn’t rude, it doesn’t seek its own advantage, it isn’t irritable, it doesn’t keep a record of complaints, it isn’t happy with injustice, but it is happy with the truth. Love puts up with all things, trusts in all things, hopes for all things, endures all things.
Love never fails. As for prophecies, they will be brought to an end. As for tongues, they will stop. As for knowledge, it will be brought to an end. We know in part and we prophesy in part; but when the perfect comes, what is partial will be brought to an end. When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, reason like a child, think like a child. But now that I have become a man, I’ve put an end to childish things. Now we see a reflection in a mirror; then we will see face-to-face. Now I know partially, but then I will know completely in the same way that I have been completely known. Now faith, hope, and love remain—these three things—and the greatest of these is love.
This particular part of the Wesley Covenant Prayer, “thou art mine, and I am thine,” is deeply personal. While the prayer pertains to groups of all sizes, it is meant to establish the friendship between the pray-er and God, individually. To pray, “thou art mine, and I am thine,” is to honor and celebrate the affection that God has for us and that we have for God. Additionally, to pray this portion of the prayer is to admit reliance upon God for initiating the relationship, to highlight that it is God’s agape love that shapes the pathway of our lives, as love is the dominant theme to the Christian ethic, and to esteem the truth that in God we are loved unconditionally and entirely. This truth creates an enduring mutuality.
Today’s Challenge:
REFLECT AND INVITE
Take a moment to reflect on the community in which you find a safe, secure, and welcoming place. As you identify the community(ies) where you belong, be sure to send a text, email, letter, or make a phone call to tell those in your community how much they mean to you and the impact they have in your life. Take the challenge to another level by seeking someone you know who is in need of community and invite the person to join yours.
Personal Reflection
•What matters most to me in my relationships?
•Where do I find community? What’s my role in helping others find community?
Group Discussion
•What about experiencing community is most important to you?
•Why do you think agape love is considered more than a kind of love and a quality of a person?
•In what ways do you seek and find companionship with God?
•Do you agree that love is the central theme of the Christian life? Why or why not?
Departing Prayer
May our lives be known for agape love—the kind of love that drives out fear and is complete. Order our lives accordingly. Make us the selfless people you desire us to become. In the name of your Son Jesus’s name, we pray. Amen.