The good news—we can succeed at life. The bad news—we can fail. We know that because history is replete with both successes and failures. The good news—you have the resources to succeed. The bad news—if you don’t use those resources effectively, you will fail. How can you use them effectively? We are identifying 14 principles that, if employed, will guarantee success.
First principle calls us to manage our God-given resources proactively. We noted that chaos comprises the default setting of life. Every area of life tends toward chaos requiring that we organize it in order to make it productive by actively managing it.
This first principle prompts the question, if we are to manage every area of life, what commodity are we managing our life to produce? That question led to the second principle, identified in our previous article. Scripture indication many ways that God calls us to produce agape love. We asserted that God designed us to be agape producing organisms. We achieve success in life by using the resources God has given us two maximize agape production. Since agape production comprises the measure of success, it is critically important that we identify this product accurately. We noted that in our society, the word love prompts us to instinctively think of emotions and romance. However, agape refers to seeking to benefit others; asking the question, “What can I do to make your life better?” and then pursuing that objective.
This article further defines agape. We want to be sure we fully understand this commodity. Consequently, there are several other aspects of agape that we need to understand in order to get it right. In fact, we find people failing by misunderstanding the nature of agape in these areas, so it is essential that we discuss them.
Keeping the First Commandment First
It is strange but true that in seeking to produce agape it is easy for us to overlook the First Commandment. We tend to think of benefiting needy human beings while overlooking loving God. Perhaps we are inclined to omit God in our plans for agape production because agape entails benefiting others, and we think of God as having everything. Therefore, we conclude that we cannot do anything that would benefit Him. Since Scripture positions loving God as the First Commandment, apparently there is some way that we can benefit God.
What can we do for God? We can bring joy to the heart of God by worship, obedience, and loving others. We can be a blessing to God by representing Him well before a watching world. Parents can relate to this. It brings joy to our hearts as our children honor us, obey us, get along with one another, and represent us well by their lives.
We can detect in God’s conversation with Satan the joy that the righteous lifestyle of Job brought to His heart.
And the LORD said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil?” (Job 1:8)
Hebrews 11:5 records God’s pleasure in observing the life of Enoch:
By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death, and he was not found, because God had taken him. Now before he was taken he was commended as having pleased God.
Scripture indicates that our giving brings pleasure to God. The apostle Paul reported to the Philippians:
I have received full payment, and more. I am well supplied, having received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent, a fragrant offering, a sacrifice acceptable and pleasing to God. (Philippians 4:18)
Other passages also reveal that our godly living and sacrificial service bring joy to the heart of God. In contrast, Scripture indicates that ungodly living causes God grief:
The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the LORD regretted that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. (Genesis 6:5-6)
It seems that God is especially pleased when we love one another. Parents quickly get frustrated when their children fight and experience substantial joy when they observe their children being kind to one another.
The joy we bring to God by loving our neighbor reveals the connection between the first and second commandments. After describing the First Commandment, the mandate to love God, Jesus says, “And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (Matthew 22:39) By saying “a second is like it,” Jesus indicates that loving our neighbor is like, related to, loving God. We show our love for God primarily by loving our neighbor.
Understanding this connection between the First and Second Commandments is crucial because the First Commandment provides the framework for the Second. We keep the First Commandment by loving people in accordance with God’s directions.
In contemporary society we hear people asserting that we must embrace all forms of “love.” However, not everything our society labels as “love” is compatible with God’s commandments. This contemporary perspective on loving others ignores the First Commandment. It is essential that we keep the First Commandment first and make the Second Commandment subservient to it. Only as we fulfill the Second Commandment within the guidelines of the First Commandment will we bring joy to the heart of God.
Levels of Agape
We display agape at two levels: morality and grace. Understanding agape requires a working knowledge of these levels of agape production and their relationship.
Morality
Morality entails giving others what we owe them, that is, dealing with them fairly and honestly. This also includes the negative—not treating others in harmful ways they do not deserve such as taking their possessions or hurting them physically. Synonyms might include fairness, righteousness, and ethical behavior.
We tend not to think of morality as a form of agape, but it is. Being fair and honest is more loving than being unfair and dishonest. A just society is more loving than an unjust one. The Apostle Paul draws the connection between morality and agape in Romans 13:9-10: “For the commandments, ‘You shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not covet,’ and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”
Since agape entails seeking the benefit of others, morality—giving them what we owe them—constitutes its foundational level. Loving them requires that we benefit them at least to that extent.
Morality serves as the gears that make society work. Government, business, family, educational institutions, and interaction between neighbors and friends all depend on the exercise of morality. For example, it is virtually impossible to maintain a good relationship with a person who lies or steals. The absence of morality results in relational chaos and disintegration.
We can see how immoral behaviors such as murder, stealing, and the like fail to display agape. But what about sexual behaviors such as cohabitation and homosexuality? If these relationships are consensual, in what way do they deprive others of their just due and are therefore unloving?
As noted earlier, the First Commandment requires that we love God. Maintaining His moral instructions regarding sexuality comprises love toward Him—love on the vertical plane. Disregard for His instructions is acting in an unloving way toward Him.
On the horizontal plane, maintaining God’s moral standards produces agape because they provide the greatest benefit to others, though that outcome is not always evident to us. It is obvious, however, in most cases. For example, cohabitation fails to provide the lifetime commitment commensurate with sexual intimacy. Thus, even though sexual relations are consensual, failure to make that commitment takes something very precious from persons without giving them due compensation. This arrangement also robs children born into that relationship of the stable home life parents owe them and marriage provides.
Grace
While morality comprises the foundational level of agape, grace constitutes its highest expression. We have defined morality as giving others what we owe them. Grace consists of giving others what we do not owe them. This also includes forgiveness—not exacting from them what they owe us.
Your neighbor is sick, so you mow his lawn. You have no moral obligation to do so. Therefore, this action represents an act of grace, going beyond what you owe. Giving to charities embodies grace. The cross exhibits history’s greatest expression of grace—Christ’s dying for our sins, providing us with forgiveness, eternal life, and countless other blessings He did not owe us and we do not deserve.
While morality serves as the gears that make society work, grace provides the oil that lubricates those gears, which reduces friction and prevents overheating. If we were all perfect, we could do just fine in a society characterized solely by morality. Because of human flaws, however, we need the oil of grace to keep relationships and society running smoothly.
Most of us have overdrawn our checking account, resulting in brutal fees of $35 or more for each bounced check. Our agreement with the bank gives it the moral right to charge those fees. Then banks introduced overdraft protection, grace that supplies oil to the financial gears. Grace is the overdraft protection that God extends to human beings and that God calls us to extend to our spouses, children, friends, and even our enemies.
The Relationship between Morality and Grace
Because morality comprises the foundational level of agape, it is wrong to extend grace at the expense of morality, e.g. to neglect paying my electric bill in order to give to a charity. Doing so in essence is stealing from the electric company to help others. Agape requires that we meet our moral obligations first. We must pay creditors what we owe them before giving others what we do not owe them.
If we do not maintain morality as the required foundation for agape, instead displaying grace at the expense of morality, our individual lives and society will quickly descend into chaos, inflicting harm on everyone. The gears of society will cease to operate properly, leaving a puddle of the oil of grace on the floor.
Maintaining morality while extending grace requires that someone must pay for grace. The cross provides the ultimate example of this principle. God did not provide grace, forgiveness for our sins, by sweeping them under the carpet. That would have been unjust—grace at the expense of morality. Rather, He paid for them on the cross. Grace comes at a cost. The Good Samaritan’s display of grace cost him effort, time, and financial resources. Mowing my neighbor’s lawn as an act of grace demands my time and energy.
The Apostle Paul instructed, “Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need.” (Ephesians 4:28) Paul required that this man earn the resources necessary to manifest grace. When we display grace, we must be willing to pay the price.
God calls us to produce agape. This article has revealed that producing it effectively can be more complex than it might appear at first blush, requiring that we familiarize ourselves its nature and develop skill in its application. What opportunities does life provide for displaying agape? The next article examines the scope of those possibilities.