LOVING GOD AND OTHERS IS JOB ONE
Tuesday – August 5, 2025
Video link: https://youtu.be/vv11I8SonMg
Today we will continue moving forward with our study of my book titled “Awake, Arise, and Triumph – Be Love”. This study is not about love as the world or even much of the Church defines or fails to define it. The love we are talking about is Divine love, of Divine origin and resident in the spirit of the born-again Christian. This love, like the other fruits of our spirit, are in an infant stage and must be developed by our will. Although these fruit are in an infant stage, they are the same as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are and express. They are love and express love and so do we. This is true for all of the fruit.
This Divine love (agapē/agapaō) is at its core obedience to Scripture; it is selfless in motive and walks cognizant of Blood Covenant with the Father. I briefly discussed eight different Greek words translated to English as love but are not the love we are talking about and developing in our lives. Absent an understanding of this love, we cannot love God as He loves us, we can’t love our neighbor in a Scriptural way, nor can we love ourselves.
Now let’s pick up once again with the love (agapē/agapaō) chapter.
1 Corinthians 13:4-8 (KJV)
4 Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up,
5 Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil;
6 Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth;
7 Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.
8 Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.
With these things in mind one possible paraphrase of 1 Corinthians 13 might be as follows. Because of love I will put up with stuff a long time, I will be kind, I will not envy others, I will not boast of myself or be proud. I will not behave in an unbecoming (the Lord) manner, I will not seek my own way, I will not be provoked (I am impossible to offend), I will not jump to evil conclusions, I will not grin, and repeat reported or witnessed sin, but I will rejoice in the truth. I chose to never stop being patient with people, I refuse to stop believing in people, I will continually hope and never give up on people because God never gave up on me. We are so privileged to be a recipient of this love, and we have a responsibility to shed this love abroad by our observable lifestyle. Think about this Old Testament verse for a moment.
Hosea 4:6 (KJV)
6 My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.
Focus in on the last phrase “seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children”. What is “the law of thy God”? The verse doesn’t say a law or some laws but “the law”. It is the law of love (agapē/agapaō). Consider what Jesus had to say.
Matthew 22:36-40 (KJV)
36 Master, which is the great commandment in the law?
37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
38 This is the first and great commandment.
39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
Loving God is number one but right on its heels is loving our neighbor (other people). Not much about me in there except to treat my neighbor and love my neighbor at least as good as myself. In other places it tells us that when we walk in love, we will fulfil all the law (Romans 13:8, 10, Galatians 5:14, James 2:8). Dying yourself is a full-time job but it is the only way to walk fully in the Blood Covenant.
Hebrews 9:16-17 (KJV)
16 For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator.
17 For a testament is of force after men are dead: otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator liveth.
Jesus died and rose again doing His part. We are not called to die physically and certainly not spiritually but we are called to lay our flesh, our will aside to walk in love fulfilling all the law and fully activating the Blood Covenant in our lives. Love (agapē/agapaō) has everything to do with the exercise of our will to be fully submitted to Scripture, have selfless motives, and walk in the Blood Covenant. This has nothing to do with emotions. Emotion may be a byproduct but has no part in the foundation of this kind of love.
TAKE HOME:
- This Divine love (agapē/agapaō) is at its core obedience to Scripture; it is selfless in motive and walks cognizant of Blood Covenant with the Father.
- We are so privileged to be a recipient of this love, and we have a responsibility to shed this love abroad by our observable lifestyle.
- Love (agapē/agapaō) has everything to do with the exercise of our will to be fully submitted to Scripture, have selfless motives, and walk in the Blood Covenant. This has nothing to do with emotions.
Lord willing, I will resume right here tomorrow. Remember, we love you, the Lord loves you, and there is nothing you can do about either one.
By: Dr. David R. Wood, Bible Teacher, and Prophetic Voice
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