The Christian Job Description Is Love

Love is everywhere in Christian talk, but John forces a harder question: what if real love is not something we produce, but something that proves where we’re living? We lean into John’s intense focus on Agape, the divine love that starts in God, forms us as the beloved, and then moves outward as a natural overflow rather than a strained performance.

We read slowly through 1 John 4:7-12, 19, and sit with the line that reorders everything: “We love because he first loved us.” From there, we trace how John frames love as communal and concrete, especially for a church under stress. The call is not private self-improvement; it is “let us love one another,” a shared practice that becomes visible evidence that God dwells within a people.

Then we move to John 13:34-35, where Jesus sets a breathtaking standard: "love one another as I have loved you." John insists the world recognizes discipleship through love, not through doctrine debates, church programs, or moral scorekeeping. We also look at the early church pattern of generosity, unity, and endurance, and ask the better question: how do we abide in the love that produces that kind of life?

We close with a simple contemplative practice focused on one difficult relationship, naming the difference between the Protective Self and the Beloved Self. 

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If you want to go deeper on this journey, visit www.tcbcl.org to learn how we’re walking this path together through biblical coaching, spiritual formation, and the ROOTED Global Movement. 

Transcript

Why John Defines Divine Love

Donald E Coleman 0:00

All right. Welcome back. Welcome back. I hope you've had some time to listen to the last two episodes where we talked about, you know, Agapow movement in the book of Acts. And then we went to take a little survey of what Paul's writings, Agapow and Paul's writing. And in this episode, we're going to focus on the Apostle John, Agapow as the evidence of abiding. And here's something I want to I want to put up front right now. And then you don't ever think about it, but let me read my statement and then I'm going to share with you because I I did this research today and it kind of blew me away because I never thought about it. John is considered the apostle of love. And now we know that John was the one that rested his head on Jesus' chest. But when you think about it from this perspective, no New Testament writer uses the language of agape and agape with greater frequency, tenderness, or theological precision. In fact, John uses agape and agape a hundred and let me, I think I just got it, a hundred and six times in the New Testament. One hundred and six times. Now, let me finish. Let me read one hundred and six times in the Gospels and in his letter, combination. I mean combined. What John consistently makes clear is that a Godow is not an achievement, it is the evidence of abiding. And why is this important for us? Let's first talk about 106 to about 319, over 300. So a third of the uses of agape, agape, agapitos, the four divine movements that we get to see, John is actually takes a third of it in the New Testament. And I want to compare that to Paul wrote two-thirds of the New Testament. So he has more writings in his epistles than John. But yet John uses agape and its derivatives more than any other writer in the New Testament. That's pretty profound. And what is that going to tell us tonight? And what is that going to tell us in this episode? Because it's important for us to truly read it. So I'm going to read first from 1 John 4 7 through 12, and then I'm going to jump down to verse 19. And it's important for us to see this because there are a number of things that John is saying. Now, this is this is the epistle, this is the letter.

Reading 1 John On Love

Donald E Coleman 3:20

Now, John is he's older now. He's mature. He's probably in or about his 80s or so, late 80s, early 90s, and he's writing to the church to people that are being persecuted. So that's the context of 1 John 1, 2 John, and 3 John. So let's see what he has to say here. And it says, Dear friends, do not believe. Oh, wait, I said I'm gonna read from verse 7. I'm sorry. Strike that from there. I got ahead of myself. So verse 7, it says, Dear friends, or agapitos, right? That's what he's saying. Agapitos, let us agape one another, another another, right? So let me just read it in English first. This is exciting for me because I'm really seeing what he's saying. He said, Dear friends, let us love one another. For love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Wow, what a profound statement. And it says, Whoever does not love does not know God because God is love. This is how God showed his love amongst us. He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love. Not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Verse eleven. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God. But if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is made complete in us. And then I want to read verse 19. Okay. We love because he first loved us. Now I can go back and I can say the Greek and all in this, but I just really want you to understand every time love was being pronounced, he's revealing to us the depth of what God was saying. It is divine love. It's the four movements agape, agapeos, agapitan, and agapeo. It's the four movements of divine love. Love as the source, agape tos as us being beloved. He starts out with the first verse, verse seven. He said, Dear friends, agape tos, let us agape one another. For agape comes from God. In the first sentence, he's revealing three aspects of what God is saying. And he says, in this next sentence, I might, I mean, in verse seven, I'm sorry, in the second sentence to be part of verse seven, he says, everyone who agape has been born of God and knows God. I mean, just think about that. In the first, these, this first verse of verse seven, he's breaking down three of the four aspects of God. So, and and and it's implied here. Look what's implied. Because he said, Everyone who loves has been born of God. So that is the agape tone. You have been formed and shaped. So that's even implied. So in verse seven, the four movements of divine love is revealed to us right here. And it's important for us to grab a hold of this because the whole New Testament, all of Christianity is rooted and grounded in love, not a superficial love, not a human love, but a love that comes down from heaven. He said it. He sent love to us that we might what? Live, right? Verse nine says, This is how God showed his agape amongst us. He sent his one and only son into the world that we might live through him. This verse ten, this is agape. Not that we agape God, but he, but that he agape us, right? Or agape us. God loved us and sent his son. Do you see how all of this is interconnected? And the moment we start to realize that it's not a human love that the world needs, the world needs divine love. It needs the carriers of divine love to be emptied so that God may fill us and allow his love to flow through us. So I want you to think about the text that I just read. As a matter of fact, I want to read it again. And as I'm reading this, I want to do something different tonight. I want to do a lecto, a sacred reading. I just want you to listen to the verses as I'm reading it, right? Listen carefully. So if you're driving in a car, pause this and just wait till you stop. Give it about two

Lectio Divina With 1 John

Donald E Coleman 10:11

minutes or so and just listen to these verses. And I want you to think about a word or a phrase that pops out for you amongst these verses. So here I go again. Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love amongst us. He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through Him. This is love. Not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God. But if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete. Now I'm gonna read verse nineteen. We love because he first loved us. Just give that a moment just to sit with that. And I'd love to hear what your word of phrase is. Just let me know. We love because he first loved us. This single sentence is perhaps the most compressed expression of the entire four movements of divine love in the New Testament. This sentence, we love because he first

Love As Overflow Not Striving

Donald E Coleman 12:41

loved us, is the most compressed, the most full expression of the entire four movements. It tells us that Agapao, our active, outward moving love, is not the starting point. It's the response, it is the overflow, it is what happens when agape is received into identity of agapitos and formed into agapeton. Can you see how the world needs this? Can you see how the church needs this understanding? John also says love comes from God, no other place. Not from our spiritual discipline, not from our moral effort, not from our willingness. It comes from God. And when it comes from God, it moves through us into others. You gotta get this. The vessel, the conduit, the person so formed by agape ts, by our identity, our belovedness in God, that agapau naturally flows. You see, agapho is not, it's not a striving of love. It is the natural flow of God flowing out of us. It's the God just bursting out of us. Has nothing to do with us. It has everything to do with God. We are just, we are, I was gonna say we are just the vessel, but we are the vessel. All of humanity has the potential to be a vessel for the divine love of God to flow out towards someone else. And here, and notice the communal framing where he says, Dear friends, look how he calls us. He called them in the letter. He said, Dear friends, let us love one another. Wouldn't that be interesting to say these words today? And all of the strife and everything that's going on around the world, dear friends, let us love one another. John was facing the same situation. The church is being persecuted, they're in distress, they're stressed out. But the key here is that in these moments of being stressed and stressed out, this is where agape becomes a greater assurance. It becomes the thing we hold on to while we go through. So no, and again, it's let us love one another. John is not writing to individuals about their private spiritual state. He's writing to a community, calling them into a shared practice. I mean, if we wanted to say it like this today, he's writing to the global church. Every believer that reads these verses, he's writing to us. Every time we read it, God is saying, Dear friends, let us love one another. The beloved community loving one another as the visible, tangible evidence that God dwells among them. And also God dwells within them. And let me tell you, if you've ever experienced authentic agape, you know the difference between something that is manufactured and then something that flows naturally. And I want you to truly understand this because it's extremely important that we grab a hold of this. And I'm gonna just I'm gonna jump over to John 13. So I gave you his letter first, because this is the latter part, and now I want to go to John 1334, and I want you to see how he writes in the gospel, right? So you can see the difference,

A New Command To Love

Donald E Coleman 18:23

see the difference on how he shows up. So John 1334, and let's see if we can notice a change in his tone or how he actually begins to speak, right? And what does that speak? What does that speaking look like? John 13, 34. Let me read it here. Now we know what this is. This is the I'm gonna jump here, but I want to give it. Jesus predicts Peter's denial. So he's already talked to Peter about his denial, right? And now look what look what's coming up. He says, a new command I give you. Love one another as I have loved you. So you must love one another. By this, everyone will know you are my disciples if you love one another. Do you see? You see how this is popping? I know you can see the difference. He's saying, A new commandment I give you. Agapow one another, as I have agapowed you. So you must agapo one another. By this, everyone will know that you are my disciples if you agapow one another. See that, see, notice it. It's it's God flowing out, it's not an effort. Because we've been shaped in this already, and we've been flowing in it, and because we are shaped in it, it it naturally flows out of us. It's not by an effort, and that's the key. I want, I want people to understand that this love flows out as a out of a key. Out of, I mean, it just flows out out of us. Not something that we have done. It's something that God does. And let me read that again because I made a mistake. Verse 35 is agape. So let me let me read this and again, and I just want to read it. 34 through 35, just so that you can hear the Greek and understand the movement of what John is saying here. 34. A new command I give you, agape one another, as I have agape you. So you must agape one another. By this, everyone will know that you are my disciples if you agape one another. I want you to see that. Verse 35 is agape. So you see the love and action, and he's just really starting to flow into this. Either way, agape how agape, we know from the root perspective that it's all God. God is at work within us. And here's the key here Jesus does not say by our doctrine, by our programs, or by our attendance, or by our moral performance. The world will know you are mine, he says, by your agapao for one another. I just want you to think about this. We've been on this journey. If you've been with this podcast long enough, we've been on this journey since 2020. And this podcast, Daily Living for Christ, is an expression of a God pow. Had no idea when we started this podcast that this is what God was, where God was taking us. But now that we're in this, we have experienced a pow, a love of God flowing out of us to you, and you flowing back to us, love flowing back to us by listening to the podcast, by sharing it with others. That is the key. And here's the key. And the standard that Jesus sets, that John sets here, well, Jesus is writing here through John's writing. It says the standard he sets is breathtaking as I have loved you. Jesus came, right? If we go to John 1 and 1, in the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God, right? And then verse 14, and the word became flesh, right? So we see Jesus came as the word of God in flesh and bones in the incarnation, so that we could see love in flesh and bones. So he told us through his life and he showed us through his life that we can have the capacity that we can and we do have the capacity to live as a vessel for agape to become agape. Because here's what the world is saying: everybody wants to be seen, they want to be heard, and they want it to be, they want to be love. Or they want to belong. And God is saying, I've already seen you, I created you, I already know you, and you are you belong. And

Becoming A Vessel Of Agape

Donald E Coleman 24:39

better than belong, I have a purpose for you. And the overall purpose of every believer, beyond whatever gifts God places in us, is to become a vessel for agape so that we can become the gap out. So if you want your job description, every Christian, listen to me right now. If you want your job description, a Christian job description is to become agapitan that we that agap that agape may flow out of us. So our job description is to be agapitan. Well, let me correct that, is to as the agapitos, we are to become the agapitan that agape may flow out of us. So we are to be a vessel for God's unconditional love to flow out of us. That is our job description. The first and only job description. As a former Marine, that would be general order number one. That's the order that you take and you run with it. We don't need to debate this anymore. We don't need to search for what our purpose is. A purpose is to be molded in shape, to become Christ-like, the ultimate vessel of agape. Yep, I hope you're getting this. The ultimate vessel of agape. That's what our job description is. So now look what he's saying. It says, at the end the standard he sets is breathtaking. He says, I have loved you, not as a moral aspiration, not as a deviation. Love the way I have loved you. Meaning, let my agape, which flows from agape tos, become the source from which your agape flows towards others. This is what Jesus is saying to us. Through John's writing, he's telling us exactly how it flows. He said, Let my agape, let the love that I have in me that's flowing out to you, us believers, from the place of being beloved, right? Jesus was God's beloved. He showed us, he shows us the process to become the source from which our agape flows out to others. This is the full form movement arc in a single command. God's agape flows unto us. We receive it as agape tos, as the beloved. We are formed into agapitan, the vessel. And then agapeo moves through us towards one another, and the world watches and recognizes something it cannot name, but has always been longing for. The early church knew this. I want you to get this, man. The early church knew this, and the world could not look away. I just want you to really kind of flow with this. I want you to see what's happening here. The world could not look away. And the pattern is across the early church. And as we step back and we look at the whole picture, Acts, Paul, John, and I think even if I throw Peter in there, maybe at the next episode, I'll bring Peter in just so that you can see this. A consistent pattern emerges. The early church did not set out to model a superior way of living. They set out to abide in the love that had found them.

The Early Church Love Pattern

Donald E Coleman 29:47

And from that abiding, Agape flowed. Agape had found them. And from that place of agape finding them, Agape flowed. And all of the persecution and the struggling and all of the things that the early church went through and the church goes through, it's all to shape us as the vessel that is worthy to be called the Agapeo, the carriers of God's love to another. And I want you to think about this. Throughout the early church, it says it flowed in practical generosity, selling possessions, meeting needs, leaving no one without. It flowed in communal unity, one heart, one mind, held together, not by an agreement on every matter, but on a shared rootedness to Agapitos, to our belovedness. It flowed in suffering. Paul's communities endured persecution not but not by hardening, but by returning again and again to the unshakable declaration that nothing could separate them from agape. And it flowed in quality, patient, kind, not self-seeking, not record keeping of wrongs, not because they were better people, but because they were more deeply rooted people. This is what the early church shows us. Agapau practiced communally is not a moral achievement. It is the natural, visible, embodied consequence of a community that is learning imperfectly together to live from Agapitos, from our belovedness. Now, the question for us is not how do we love like the early church? That is not the question. The question for us is how do we abide like they abide in the love that produces that kind of a GAPO? That is our question. So now I just want to slow down here. I want to go into a contemplative pause like we've been doing. I want you to take a couple of slow breaths. I just want you to for a moment, I want you to think about agape. Agapitos, agapitan,

A Practice For Loving Difficult People

Donald E Coleman 33:30

and agapau, agape, agapitos, agapitan, and agapau. The four movements of divine love. The very love that lives and breathes inside of you. The very love that was the creator of all things that sustains all things. Now, what I want you to do is I want you to think of one person in your community, your church or in your house or circle of friends who is difficult to love consistently. Not with shame, but with honesty. Moving now. Think of that one person, but not with shame, but with honesty. Now I want you to ask when I am most depleted of loving that person, what is the root? Am I loving from agape tos? From the overflow of a heart settled in the father's love? Or am I loving from the protective self? From a place that needs something in return. And as you inhale, here's what I want. I want you to think about this as we inhale. God's love for them is the same as God's love for me. That's on the inhale. Let me say that again. God's love for them is the same as God's love for me. Now I'm gonna throw the Greek in there if you don't mind. God's agape for me is the same as God's agape. I'm sorry, God's agape for them is the same as God's agape for me. And on the XL, from that shared agape, I can offer what I could not manufacture. Now you get to see it. It's all about God's love shaping us. We we have we participate in this, but we don't generate this love. And this is why it is so important for us to really start to grab a hold of this. This is why this love of God that's moving amongst us, and most people aren't catching on to it. This is why we are where we are, as the world is. This is exactly where God wants us to be, so that agape can be seen, heard, and felt amongst all the noise, amongst everything else. Now, as I get ready to close here, here's what I want. So we have now seen agapeo in three dimensions in its linguistic precision in the life of Jesus and in the early communities of believers. We have seen it as it always

What Comes Next In The Series

Donald E Coleman 37:19

overflows, always rooted in agapitos, and always more than any single individual can produce alone. And in the next couple of episodes, we turn to kind of my heart of the series, the pastoral heart of this series. The next couple of episodes that name what so many believers have been living in without having language for it. We will sit directly with the distinction between the protective self-doing and beloved self-doing. And we will do it with compassion because the protective self did not develop from nowhere, it developed for reasons, and the path out of it is not shame. It is always, it is always only return. And until then, carry this with you. You are not created to love alone, you were created to love from within a community of the beloved, of the beloved, and when that community abides together in Agapitos, what flows from it changes everything around it. So be blessed until next episode. Keep living daily for Christ.