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Post by Giller on Oct 20, 2018 23:36:51 GMT -5
Even though in love there are rightly motivated actions, and that it does not depend upon a feeling whether we should obey God or not, does that mean that in love that there are no feelings at all?
Well of course not.
Here is a Greek definition of the word love:
(Strong's concordance)
(G26
ἀγάπη
agapē
ag-ah'-pay
From G25; love, that is, affection or benevolence; specifically (plural) a love feast: - (feast of) charity ([-ably]), dear, love.
Total KJV occurrences: 116)
In love there is affection, there is caring, and there is worth, and value.
Even though we do not depend upon a feeling in order to obey God, love can be felt, and we can feel the love of God flowing through us, and it brings in a type of affection, a type of caring, brings a type of worth and value towards the things of God and towards people.
Love definitely has feelings.
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Post by Giller on Oct 21, 2018 1:56:01 GMT -5
And concerning the fruit of love, people do not be afraid to share on it, even if you have to say similar things to what Frienduff and I have already shared.
Because we have no copyright in what anyone wants to share concerning love, feel free, even if you say similar things.
Just share your heart out.
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Cletus
Senior Member
Posts: 2,517
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Post by Cletus on Oct 21, 2018 14:15:05 GMT -5
I think its important at this point to note the word love in Galatians is agape and the strongs reference Giller posted is accurate which is g26. its not phileo.
I have always said love is an action and not a feeling because of the scripture talking about someone being in need and we just pray for them and then say God bless and send them away without helping them. That and Gods love to us is accompanied by action, Jehovah Jireh... our provider, Jehovah Rapha... the God who heals us, and of course what Jesus has done to accomplish our salvation. there is really much to be said, to much, on love being an action. But it is good what Giller has said because the affection or benevolence will bring about the action. someone who does not have the affection or benevolence will most likely not do the action... and this thread is about fruit. we wont see a feeling in someone, but we will see the action. we may be able to "sense" the feeling by being in their presence, but again, if all we have is that feeling of love... do we really love our neighbor as ourself? I do not want someone to pray for me and say go and be blessed if I am in need.
Another thing I think worth noting is while God knows our heart, I am unaware of a verse that says we will be judged by how we feel about something, I do see verses saying we will be judged by our words and actions. More than likely God will take the intent of our heart into the judging process but also do we recieve rewards for feeling a certain way,... or doing?
For the record I do stand in agreement with what Giller has said that love has feeling because after all love is from the heart, and from God because God is Love, and the godless have not love... but there have been other christians who we had love for each other, but from experience when their actions were lacking... it hurt and i can not say they did that in love, I definitely did not "feel" the love. this is why I continue to say love is action.
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Post by John on Oct 24, 2018 5:58:55 GMT -5
Love is about genuine caring for others. That is the reason why if you love God and your neighbor, you won't do things to hurt them. You don't go around willfully trying to hurt those you love and care about. It is like the relationship between faith and works. If you have faith, it will automatically produce works. As such, just as works come as a result of faith, and works is not the same thing as faith, actions will result as a result of your love for God and your neighbor, though those actions are not the definition of love. Hopefully I wasn't confusing. Let me put it like this.
Love is a genuine caring for others, not things we do, but our actions will be effected by our love or lack of love to do either good or evil.
Faith is an absolute belief in something, not the things we do, but our faith or lack of faith will effect our works, either to do good works or evil works.
As such, I agree with Giller that feelings are involved in love. Love is not the fulfilling of commandments, but the fulfilling of commandments is the result of love.
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Post by Giller on Oct 24, 2018 9:15:38 GMT -5
Love is about genuine caring for others. That is the reason why if you love God and your neighbor, you won't do things to hurt them. You don't go around willfully trying to hurt those you love and care about. It is like the relationship between faith and works. If you have faith, it will automatically produce works. As such, just as works come as a result of faith, and works is not the same thing as faith, actions will result as a result of your love for God and your neighbor, though those actions are not the definition of love. Hopefully I wasn't confusing. Let me put it like this.
Love is a genuine caring for others, not things we do, but our actions will be effected by our love or lack of love to do either good or evil.
Faith is an absolute belief in something, not the things we do, but our faith or lack of faith will effect our works, either to do good works or evil works.
As such, I agree with Giller that feelings are involved in love. Love is not the fulfilling of commandments, but the fulfilling of commandments is the result of love.
Hmmm, well said. Love will result in actions, I like it when we get prompted to think.
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PG4Him
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Post by PG4Him on Oct 24, 2018 9:36:01 GMT -5
I would define agape love as the perfect sum total of all virtues. It's like a compound. You take patience and modesty and everything else from 1 Corinthians 13, add them all together, and you end up with a lifestyle of love.
And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness. (Colossians 3:14)
Christians fail in this area because they start with some idea of "loving people" and then they try to be patient/modest/supportive in order to show their love. This is backwards. They haven't put in the work to develop real virtue, so they don't have a clue what real love is. Then we end up with weak-kneed politically correct so-called tolerant Christians who think "love" means being nice to bad people, while in their personal lives they are failing as spouses and parents.
I agree with Cletus. Love is a lifestyle of action, not a fuzzy abstract emotion.
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Post by 2fw8212a on Oct 24, 2018 9:43:19 GMT -5
I would define agape love as the perfect sum total of all virtues. There is only one who can teach us to love.
"Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light." - Matthew 11:28-30
Still, many people will consider it as hate.
"But all these things they will do to you for My name's sake, because they do not know Him who sent Me." - John 15:21
"He who does not love does not know God, for God is love." - 1 John 4:8
Blessings to you in Jesus' name!
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Post by Giller on Oct 24, 2018 9:53:50 GMT -5
Love no doubt will produce a lifestyle of action, yet is not without feelings, and has care , value and so on.
Gal 5:22-23 (22) But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, (23) Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.
The first fruit is love, and all the other fruit follow the fruit of love, and 1 Corinthians makes me think of the fruit of the Spirit, such as it says that love beareth all things and so on.
Each fruit is it's own fruit yet none can operate without the fruit of love.
Many in different religious circles get caught up in either a non emotional religion were there is no feelings, or into emotionalism such as the vineyard movement, but just because some get into extremes does not mean that there are no feelings to love, otherwise you would look like a tombstone when you are doing actions towards someone.
Now love does not depend on a certain feeling in order to obey God, but love sure does have feelings and cares for people, in the end God is love.
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Post by Giller on Oct 24, 2018 10:01:13 GMT -5
All the other fruit follow love, and if you are walking in the love of God, you will be walking in the other fruits.
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Post by John on Oct 24, 2018 10:21:44 GMT -5
I would define agape love as the perfect sum total of all virtues. It's like a compound. You take patience and modesty and everything else from 1 Corinthians 13, add them all together, and you end up with a lifestyle of love. And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness. (Colossians 3:14)Christians fail in this area because they start with some idea of "loving people" and then they try to be patient/modest/supportive in order to show their love. This is backwards. They haven't put in the work to develop real virtue, so they don't have a clue what real love is. Then we end up with weak-kneed politically correct so-called tolerant Christians who think "love" means being nice to bad people, while in their personal lives they are failing as spouses and parents. I agree with Cletus. Love is a lifestyle of action, not a fuzzy abstract emotion. Now you have forced me to think. On the one hand, you have love as a fruit of the Spirit, and a fruit is different from a law. On the other hand, we are to put on charity and are commanded by Jesus to love. I think there is something to be said for both. If all love is to us is a feeling of endearment, that is not Biblical love. There is something missing in our relationship to Christ.
I think the difference is doing good to others because of our love for them verses following a commandment to love them. The law was given for law breakers, those who are not Spirit led. As such, according to Galatians, it is only those who are walking in the Spirit that are not under the curse of the law. The law itself still remains as a reminder to those walking in the flesh they must still be obedient children. Jesus said that till all be fufilled, not one jot or tittle shall be done away with in the law. It is just the difference as to being obedient because the Spirit is leading as opposed to obediently trying to obey in the flesh. Let me give you an example of what I mean.
Let's suppose that I am the Pastor of a local church, and one of the members experiences the death of their Mother. Love for that person would have me be there with them at the funeral home, though I may have had other plans, like going to a ball game. I wouldn't miss being there out of genuine love. On the other hand, if I am not Spirit led and don't have genuine feelings towards that person and their grief, I may obey the commandment to love and go to the funeral out of pure obedience to Christ and the Bible. In both instances, I showed love outwardly, but in only one instance did I genuinely have love on the inside. I think that is the difference in the Spirit led life and trying to do things on our own, and you will see that reflected in all of the fruit. The Spirit will cause you to bear fruit without effort, while the flesh will fight against you doing the right thing, but you can still choose to obey.
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PG4Him
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Essay Moderator
Posts: 3,570
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Post by PG4Him on Oct 24, 2018 11:02:40 GMT -5
Love no doubt will produce a lifestyle of action, yet is not without feelings, and has care , value and so on. Gal 5:22-23 (22) But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, (23) Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. The first fruit is love, and all the other fruit follow the fruit of love, and 1 Corinthians makes me think of the fruit of the Spirit, such as it says that love beareth all things and so on. Each fruit is it's own fruit yet none can operate without the fruit of love. Many in different religious circles get caught up in either a non emotional religion were there is no feelings, or into emotionalism such as the vineyard movement, but just because some get into extremes does not mean that there are no feelings to love, otherwise you would look like a tombstone when you are doing actions towards someone. Now love does not depend on a certain feeling in order to obey God, but love sure does have feelings and cares for people, in the end God is love. I certainly agree that love comes from a sense of genuine caring. I don't want to imply that love is some sort of mechanical process. As with the other fruits of the Spirit, there is the human kind based on conditional fleeting emotions, then there's the supernatural kind that moves through you like electricity. I think we would all agree that agape love is on a totally different level from casual affection. I just happen to believe that no one will get that electricity moving through them if they're not serious about cultivating the other fruits. We're in total agreement that these fruits overlap each other and feed into each other. Love is the ultimate expression of all the other fruits. The Bible says love is the fulfilling of the law. Love is the greatest of all virtue. It is the gold standard of perfection, and this is why we are told God Himself is love. As a side note, love is actually identified as being as strong as death (Songs 8:6). Love and death met in an arena 2,000 years ago, and death lost. That's really profound. You don't hear much about it in church though because very few Christians understand agape love.
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PG4Him
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Post by PG4Him on Oct 24, 2018 11:06:28 GMT -5
Now you have forced me to think. On the one hand, you have love as a fruit of the Spirit, and a fruit is different from a law. On the other hand, we are to put on charity and are commanded by Jesus to love. I think there is something to be said for both. If all love is to us is a feeling of endearment, that is not Biblical love. There is something missing in our relationship to Christ.
I think the difference is doing good to others because of our love for them verses following a commandment to love them. The law was given for law breakers, those who are not Spirit led. As such, according to Galatians, it is only those who are walking in the Spirit that are not under the curse of the law. The law itself still remains as a reminder to those walking in the flesh they must still be obedient children. Jesus said that till all be fufilled, not one jot or tittle shall be done away with in the law. It is just the difference as to being obedient because the Spirit is leading as opposed to obediently trying to obey in the flesh. Let me give you an example of what I mean.
Let's suppose that I am the Pastor of a local church, and one of the members experiences the death of their Mother. Love for that person would have me be there with them at the funeral home, though I may have had other plans, like going to a ball game. I wouldn't miss being there out of genuine love. On the other hand, if I am not Spirit led and don't have genuine feelings towards that person and their grief, I may obey the commandment to love and go to the funeral out of pure obedience to Christ and the Bible. In both instances, I showed love outwardly, but in only one instance did I genuinely have love on the inside. I think that is the difference in the Spirit led life and trying to do things on our own, and you will see that reflected in all of the fruit. The Spirit will cause you to bear fruit without effort, while the flesh will fight against you doing the right thing, but you can still choose to obey.
Here's another humble invitation to think... I've never seen the law of Christ (Galatians 6:2) to be a law in the OT sense. I see it more like the law of gravity or the laws of economics.
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Post by John on Oct 24, 2018 11:22:31 GMT -5
I feel I need to add a correction of sorts to what I just posted. I was reflecting on it and realizing that I don't always have all of those fruits naturally occurring in me, so I took it to the Lord and asked that I would going forward. You have not because you ask not, so why not ask. I feel that the Lord showed me that within our flesh, we will always have struggles with the flesh fighting against the Spirit. The fruit mentioned is the characteristics of the Spirit of God on the inside, but not our natural characteristics. As such, we do have to choose to obey the Spirit or the flesh from the time we get up till the time we go to bed at night. The reason I felt it was important to immediately correct this is because it can cause false condemnation to come upon people that aren't always wanting to do the right thing on their own morning till night. It could give the false idea that we are somehow coming short of what is expected of us, even when we do right. I said that Candance made me think, and I was kind of thinking out loud.
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Post by John on Oct 24, 2018 11:27:20 GMT -5
Now you have forced me to think. On the one hand, you have love as a fruit of the Spirit, and a fruit is different from a law. On the other hand, we are to put on charity and are commanded by Jesus to love. I think there is something to be said for both. If all love is to us is a feeling of endearment, that is not Biblical love. There is something missing in our relationship to Christ.
I think the difference is doing good to others because of our love for them verses following a commandment to love them. The law was given for law breakers, those who are not Spirit led. As such, according to Galatians, it is only those who are walking in the Spirit that are not under the curse of the law. The law itself still remains as a reminder to those walking in the flesh they must still be obedient children. Jesus said that till all be fufilled, not one jot or tittle shall be done away with in the law. It is just the difference as to being obedient because the Spirit is leading as opposed to obediently trying to obey in the flesh. Let me give you an example of what I mean.
Let's suppose that I am the Pastor of a local church, and one of the members experiences the death of their Mother. Love for that person would have me be there with them at the funeral home, though I may have had other plans, like going to a ball game. I wouldn't miss being there out of genuine love. On the other hand, if I am not Spirit led and don't have genuine feelings towards that person and their grief, I may obey the commandment to love and go to the funeral out of pure obedience to Christ and the Bible. In both instances, I showed love outwardly, but in only one instance did I genuinely have love on the inside. I think that is the difference in the Spirit led life and trying to do things on our own, and you will see that reflected in all of the fruit. The Spirit will cause you to bear fruit without effort, while the flesh will fight against you doing the right thing, but you can still choose to obey.
Here's another humble invitation to think... I've never seen the law of Christ (Galatians 6:2) to be a law in the OT sense. I see it more like the law of gravity or the laws of economics. Interesting. That will give me more to think about as I swap containers.
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Post by Giller on Oct 24, 2018 11:28:52 GMT -5
It is indeed the fruit of the Spirit (big S), which supernaturally comes from God.
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