Today, at The Way, we will finish 2 Peter’s list of virtues to add to our faith. The final virtue is love. Agape is the Greek word and over and over (if you have spent any time at all in the church) you will hear it defined as unconditional love. That means that this type of love is not predicated by desire or attraction to the one being loved.
And who are we to love? Well, Peter covered that in the preceding virtue with brotherly kindness (love). The word he used there is philadelphia in the Greek. It is usually translated as brotherly love in the NT, except here in 2 Peter 1. In this section, for some reason, the translators almost always use brotherly kindness. Perhaps they didn’t want to confuse the two loves.
Yet, there should really be no confusion; we need both philadelphia and agape in ever-increasing measure. Philadelphia tells us we are to love whom the Father loves, His children. We are brothers and sisters, all washed in the blood of Christ, and all children of the same Father. Agape completes the picture by telling us that we are to love as God loves, in the same manner, unconditionally.
As humans we use phrases such as being in love or falling in love. We know love is an emotion sparked by an attraction to someone or something. When we feel that emotion, we love. Agape love, unconditional love, becomes an emotion, but it doesn’t begin there. It begins with a choice. We will to love, and then by the power of God, we feel.
I learned this lesson early. There was a woman I worked with that just drove me nuts. I avoided her whenever possible. I was a new Christian. I heard about agape love. I asked God to give me His kind of love for people. And, of course, you know what happened. God put this woman in my path all day, every work day. She agitated me, and then I decided I would love her anyway. It wasn’t too long after the choice was made to love that I experienced love for her.
2 Peter 1:5-8: For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith … brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love.
