Loving with Agape

Text: Mark 12: 28-34

Have you ever been asked to define love? It's a tough proposition. So many different aspects seem to accompany that concept. There is physical attraction, emotional connection, intellectual stimulation and even elements of the “unknown” or “inexpressible.” I am told that many pages of many books, many stanzas of many poems, and many thoughts of wise women and men have been devoted to investigating the idea and expression of “love.” But what is love anyway? Why is it so difficult to understand, yet so easy to “feel.” Why does it appear that there are never the “right words” to adequately capture and communicate the emotion we possess inside? With all these questions about love, how can we possibly be expected to love God when we can't even grasp that notion between two humans? So today, with the help of Mark's passage, we might try to construct an idea of love that will not only properly describe our relationship to God, but that might inform our understanding of how to interact with those around us.

I once heard an interesting story about two people who seemed to be in love. A young man, still in school was dating a young woman who, after finishing her studies, had began a nursing career. Because she considered their relationship to be quite serious and because she loved the young man so, she offered to help pay for his collegiate expenses. Thus, her income was used to repay the college loans that the young man had taken out to pay for school. As their relationship developed, discussions of engagement and marriage prodded the young man to consider asking his lovely girlfriend to marry him. Unfortunately, this young man did not have the funds to purchase an engagement ring despite his grandest desires to give his loving girlfriend something special. However, there did seem to be one solution.

The young man had been managing his school loans and each additional loan he had needed to take out his girlfriend willingly payed. Thus, the young man thought it quite brilliant to take out an additional “school” loan to acquire the needed cash to pay for an engagement ring. He simply put that additional loan on the list of school loans his girlfriend payed for and “voila”... he now had an expense free gift for his girlfriend to bind them in commitment to one another.
Unfortunately, this “brilliant plan” was concocted without the knowledge or approval of the girlfriend. Needless to say, she was quite impressed with the expensive engagement ring that her boyfriend gave her, never realizing she paid for it herself.

As funny as this circumstance is, it does lead us to a few important questions. Is this a demonstration of love? Would you, in the girlfriend's position, consider this to be an expression of love or a deceitfully sly maneuver to remain financially afloat? Is there something missing from this gift? I hope that despite your chuckles you see through this young man's error to realize that true Love requires sacrifice. There is something about “doing it the easy way” that detracts from the young man's gift. The uneasiness we have in accepting this method of acquiring such a gift is rooted not solely in the lack of honesty, but in the mirage of this ring as a “gift.” The engagement ring was not a gift because it was not the young man's to give. The dishonesty surrounding the ring stems from the very fact that the young man used someone else's money to provide the ring, and thus did not sacrifice himself for it.

The love that the young man signaled to the young woman through the ring does not seem complete. Yet, we cannot deny that the young man probably possessed an attraction and friendship with her. I think this story begins to hint at the downfall of the English word for Love. You see, in Greek there existed several distinct and different words for love: eros, philia, and agape. Eros, the root of our English 'erotic', means passionate attachment. It was narrowly understood to be a recognition of beauty. However, the connotation surrounding eros was physical. Usually it was employed to describe physical, romantic love.

Philia, found in words like Philadelphia (“city of brotherly love”), meant the love between friends. This bond of “friendship” was often considered to culminate in the mutual recognition of compassion and loyalty between two people. This kind of love might be understood as the bedrock of all other notions of love, for it provides the foundation by which any relationship can be cultivated. Yet, in itself, philia is not the totality of love. For there is yet another form: agape. This third way of expressing love is considered self-giving, for it is a sacrificial compassion. Although Philia culminates in compassion agape requires compassion to be more than a feeling, but an action. The self-giving nature of this compassion is almost entirely idealistic; meaning that it is difficult if not impossible for us to attain. Yet I believe this is the distinction we make when we say: “Do you love her, or do you love her?” I think that agape was left out of the equation in our story of the young man, thus making his love seem incomplete.

Now, let us return to our text this morning and investigate how God asks us to love by understanding the type of love to which God calls us. To give us some context, we need to remember that Jesus had been approached by the Sadducees on the issue of the Resurrection. Now what is important to understand here is that the Pharisees and the Sadducees are not exactly two loving arms of the same religion. The Jewish religious landscape at the time of Jesus was splattered with divisions much like Protestant Christianity is today with denominational divide. The Sadduccees were the protectors of the temple cult, meaning they administered sacrifices at the temple. The Pharisees were more concerned with the strict obedience of the more rigorous “oral law”. This was an additional system of laws outside the Torah. The Pharisees believed that if a Jewish person were to follow the oral law, they would naturally obey the written law. The Sadducees rejected this notion of the oral law as well as other teachings of the Pharisees. One of their biggest disagreements was about the nature of the Resurrection.

The Pharisees adamantly maintained that there would be resurrection of the dead, but the Sadducees vehemently denied this. Thus, when the Sadducees approached Jesus on the issue of the Resurrection, they were more or less testing out his theological beliefs to discover if he aligned with their understandings. In Jesus' response to them he supports the idea that God is the God of Resurrection. Naturally, the Pharisees would be very happy with this response. And it is described just that way. Look at verse 28.

A scribe, one of the Pharisees, found that Jesus answered well. He agreed whole-heartedly with Jesus' rejection of the Sadducees theological beliefs. Thus, this scribe genuinely asks Jesus a question, not out of contempt or trial, but out of interest. And Jesus answers him very succinctly. First Jesus offers to the scribe what was known as the shema. This is found in Deuteronomy Chapter 6, verse 4 and can be what we might call a Jewish “statement of faith”: “Hear , O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is One” (v. 29). Jesus then continues to quote the fifth verse of Deuteronomy 6 by saying how it is that we are to love God. Finally, Jesus quotes Leviticus 19:34 when he offers the “second” commandment: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (v. 31).

The very concise view of the entire Law that Jesus provides is not necessarily original to Jesus. Rabbi Hillel, a contemporary of Jesus, offered similar understandings when he was quoted as saying: That which is hateful to thy self, do not do to thy neighbor; this is the whole law and the rest but commentary. Go and learn.” But what Jesus does uniquely here is not simply sum up the law into basic propositions, but he provides insight into how we go about those basic propositions.

The key passage is in the idea of loving God with your heart, soul, mind, and strength. Jesus tells the scribe that the most important things is to love, but not with any kind of love, with a specific type of love. This is a love of the entire personality. It covers the mind, the emotions, and the will. The “heart” in Hebrew understanding was the seat of man's thinking. The “soul” was considered to be the spring of man's will and feelings. The “mind” was the source of intelligence and thought, and was often interchangeable with the Hebrew conception of “heart.” The Hebrew perspective on “strength” was that it represented the physical power and being of man. Thus, this collection of words points toward the entire personality, the whole “being.” There is nothing with which we can hold back in our love of God. It is a complete and total orientation of the self.

Given the different Greek words for love, it is entirely obvious and sensible that the word Mark uses in our passage this morning is agape. We are called to give our entire selves to God and this giving is sacrificial. It is what it means to Love God as God. And thus, when we can devote ourselves entirely to God in self-giving Love, we can then properly Love those around us. This understanding of Love was made complete in the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. Jesus is both a model for us, and an expression for God. Jesus models a complete devotion to God in Love and Obedience, and then models ultimate sacrifice for others in his death for all humanity. But Here we also see the supreme demonstration of God's agape for humanity through Jesus. God loved us all supremely, in that we are offered Grace through Jesus' death.

The scribal Pharisee affirms Jesus' words saying “You are right, Teacher” (v. 32). He too believes that these commandments are more important than all the burnt offerings and sacrifices of the temple cult, which is why he became a Pharisee and not a Sadducee. But it is more than affirming his political name within Judaism, it is an admission that Jesus is correct in his understanding of Love. Thus, Jesus responds “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” This is not the future Kingdom, but the Kingdom that would begin upon the death and resurrection of Christ. The Kingdom of forgiveness and Grace, of Righteousness and Good Work. This is the Kingdom of Love and Sacrifice. The scribe has thus made his place in this Kingdom through his recognition of true Love.

This morning, as you reflect on the words of Jesus written in Mark, ask yourself if you have completely committed yourself to God. Have you made God the object of a self-sacrificing Love? Or have you fallen short and not truly given of yourself? Are you holding to a friendship and passionate attachment like the young man who bought the engagement ring with his girlfriend's money? Or are you truly in Love with God?

No matter how you answer that this morning, the Good News is that God is truly in Love with you. He has supreme agape for you and longs for you to seek after that same love for God and God's people. Will you do that this morning? Will you commit yourself to God and God's people this morning? I pray that you will.

Come. Let us sing.

Hymn.

Benediction: May the God of Grace and Love shower his blessings upon you as you toil and work for the furthering of God's Kingdom. May you fully realize the depth and beauty of God's Love so that you can return it to God and to God's people. There is nothing more Glorious than to feel the presence of the Almighty God wrapping God's arms around you in protection, mercy, and compassion. May that be the reality of our embrace as well, that we would wrap our arms around those who need our protection, mercy and compassion. Let us Love the Lord our God with all our Heart, Soul, Mind and Strength, and Love our Neighbor as ourself. There is nothing greater than this for the rest is just commentary. May we go, Love, and learn. Amen.