Table of contents

Definition of love and what love is not

Characteristics of The God-Kind

of Love

Natural love vs God’s Kind of love

Chapter 1

Definition of love and what love is not

Our success in life is based on relationships, if you don’t understand

relationships (God’s system of relationship) you stand a chance of failure in
life.

There are seven currencies we use to purchase realities in this realm.

The lowest of them all is money

We have

• Integrity

• Godliness

• Relationships etc

Anything money can buy relationships can pay for it. The only thing that
gives money value is that there is a hand or entity to collect it and reward
you, one person can open windows of opportunities from you. Who likes you
can make a change in your success you don’t exalt man above God, you
exalt God bu if you ignore men every prophecy will remain barren in the
realm of the spirit.For example

• God so love men and they became redeemed by his son’s blood

• A king loved a village girl(Esther) and she became the Queen.

Every thing reproduces on the basis of relationships, your success, failure,

spirituality, your resources in life will always come out of relationships.
Favour is who God has made to like you and their willingness to
communicate benevolence to you.

Relationships don’t maintain themselves the parties involved must commit to

maintaining it.

Jeremiah 31:3,John 3:16

The foundation for anything that was done is love. It is a word that is
carelessly used but many doesn’t knw the gravity of it, many just use it to
explain positive attachment to a certain person or thing.

• True love is not emotion, feelings. There is an emotional component en

love is talked about but true love isn’t emotion. There is a lot of trouble in
the world because of the word “feelings”, the word feelings is a word created
to express your psychological disposition at a given time . Love can and
should create feelings, emotions without feelings there is no point of being
passionate, but love based on feelings shouldn’t be trusted, feelings are
temporary disposition based on something we consider pleasant. Building
anything on feelings is a guarantee of failure. There are several things that
can create a positive disposition in us

• Looks

• Education

• Appearance

• Orientation

• Wealth

• Godliness

• Spirituality

But none of this equate to love . Feelings can be deceptive and not an
accurate measure of love

Ephesians 3:17-18

Paul mentioned four dimensions of love which he called the length, breadth,
depth, height of love .

When you talk about love which of this dimensions are you referring to. So
let me give you the dimensions of love:

• Passion
There is no love if t can’t be Express in passion. A strong and extravagant
enthusiasm on a certain thing or a desire for something is what is called
passion.

The prove that you are passionate about a thing or person is pursuit,

Psalms 8:3-5

The first dimension of love is measured by your passion, then your

willingness to pursue without caring of being embayand being vulnerable.

• Commitment

Love is commitment. It is the willingness to give your time, energy, self to

something or someone you believe in, it is the product of your believe in
something. It is a state of being dedicated, it is an engagement that restricts
freedom of actions.

• Pleasure(delight, gratification)

The satisfaction derived to ones liking, of you really like a thing or someone
that thing should at least give you or put a smile on your face. If there is no
pleasure in what you are doing there is a problem.

• Sacrifice

It is giving up something you consider valuable for the sake of something or

a better course. Sacrifice talks of pain and the language this generation
doesn’t know is constraints and pain.

If there is no sacrifice there is no love. Love is measured by sacrifice because

love is not an investment. For whatsoever you want there must be
something to lay down.

What then is love ?

• True love is a choice; it is an act of will, it isn’t feelings and everything

around love is by will.

• True love is understanding the value, worth, significance of a

person,thing to God, your life and te society. Love is understanding value.

• True love is honour; the recognition, acknowledgement of a valuable

thing. True honour is mutual especially in relationships. Therefore if I say I
love you means I celebrate your uniqueness as a person.

If the God-kind of love is so important, then we need

to know what it is. You understand, of course, that the

God-kind of love is not the same as natural human love.

Natural human love can turn to hatred overnight, but

God's love never fails.

We find God's love defined in First Corinthians

chapter 13.

1 CORINTHIANS 13:4-8

4 Charity [God's love] 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.

You see, God's love is greater than all these things

Paul lists here. It's greater than prophecies, tongues,

and greater than knowledge. Why is it greater? Because

one day all those things will vanish and pass away. We

won't need them anymore. But God's love will never

pass away.
There will be no tongue-talking in Heaven, no

prophesying, no word of knowledge, or gifts of the Spirit

in operation in Heaven. Those things will have passed

away. But love—the God-kind of love—endures forever.

It won't pass away because God is love and He eternal!

Not only does God's love endure forever, but the

Bible says that God's love endures everything that may

come along. What does it mean to endure everything?

The Amplified Bible says, "Love bears up under

anything and everything that comes. .." (v. 7). Its hopes

are fadeless, and the love of God will never fail.

Now let's read this passage in The Amplified Bible,

because it defines the God-kind of love more clearly.

1 CORINTHIANS 13:4-8 (Amplified)

4 Love endures long and is patient and kind; love never is

envious nor boils over with jealousy; is not boastful or

vainglorious, does not display itself haughtily.

5 It is not conceited—arrogant and inflated with pride; it is

not rude (unmannerly), and does not act unbecomingly.

Love [God's love in us] does not insist on its own rights or

its own way, for it is not self-seeking; it is not touchy or

fretful or resentful; it takes no account of the evil done to it

—pays no attention to a suffered wrong.

6 It does not rejoice at injustice and unrighteousness, but

rejoices when right and truth prevail.

7 Love bears up under anything and everything that comes,

is ever ready to believe the best of every person, its hopes

are fadeless under all circumstances and it endures

everything [without weakening].

8 Love never fails—never fades out or becomes obsolete or

comes to an end. As for prophecy [that is, the gift of

interpreting the divine will and purpose], it will be fulfilled

and pass away; as for tongues, they will be destroyed and

cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away [that is, it will lose

its value and be superseded by truth].

I wish believers would really take time to let this

passage of Scripture soak into their minds and hearts.

Just walking in the light of these verses would solve so

many of their problems.

For example, notice First Corinthians 13:4 in The

Amplified Bible: "Love endures long and is patient andkind." Now some
people endure long, but they're not

patient and kind while they're enduring! They endure

long just because they have to, but they let everyone

know they're enduring too!

For example, sometimes a husband suffers and puts

up with things because of his wife, but he's not too kind

while he does it. Or sometimes a wife has to suffer and

put up with some things about her husband, but she

let's him know she's suffering!

However, the God-kind of love endures long and is

patient and kind while it endures. And it doesn't

weaken, fade out, or come to an end. It never fails.

Closely related to this is verse 7: "Love bears up

under anything and everything that comes." You hear

some people say, "I just can't love him anymore." Or

"I've had it! I just can't love her anymore." Love can.

God's love can bear up under everything without

weakening or coming to an end.

And since the love of God is in you, then you can

bear up under everything that comes. Maybe you've

said, "I just can't take this any longer." Or "I can't put

up with So-and-so any longer." But God's love working

in and through you can!

Chapter 2

Characteristics of The God-Kind

of Love

And now abideth faith, hope, charity, thesebut THE GREATEST OF THESE IS

CHARITY [love].

—1 Corinthians 13:13

He that loveth not knoweth not God; FOR

GOD IS LOVE.

—1 John 4:8

The Bible says that God is love. It also says that

love is even greater than faith or hope. Well, since God

is love, then we need to know what love is—that is, the

God-kind of love.

In First Corinthians 13:13, the King James Version

of the Bible translates the word "love" as charity.

Actually, it is to be regretted that the word "agape" was

translated as charity because it doesn't really express

the full meaning of the Greek word that is used in this

verse.

According to the dictionary, the word "charity"

means a benevolent goodwill toward or love ofhumanity. But the actual

Greek word that is used here

is "agape," which means the love of God. Elsewhere in

the New Testament, the word "agape" is translated love

instead of charity.

For example, in First John 4:8, the Bible literally

says, "God is agape." In other words, God is love. So the

word "agape" means the God-kind of love.

What is agape or the love of God? Before I answer

that, let me show you something interesting about the

love of God. The Bible says that love is greater than

either hope or faith (1 Cor. 13:13). Why is God's love

greater than hope or faith?

First of all, faith won't work without love. In other

words, faith is dependent on love in order to work.

Galatians 5:6 says, "For in Jesus Christ neither

circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision;

but faith which worketh by love."

You can readily see that love would have to be

greater if faith won't work without it. It takes love to

make faith work.

Second, faith won't work without hope. The New

English translation of Hebrews 11:1 says, "Faith gives

substance to our hopes." You have to hope for

something before your faith can give substance to it. So

faith is also dependent on hope.

HEBREWS 11:1

1 Now FAITH is the substance of things HOPED FOR, the

evidence of things not seen.

You see, if you don't hope for anything, your faith

can't work because it has no goal or object to believe

God for. Therefore, faith can't work without hope. Also,

faith is dependent on love in order to work. That's why

the Bible says that love is greater than either hope or faith.(1 Corinthians
13:13).

Chapter 3

Natural love vs God’s Kind of love

Natural love is selfish, but divine love is

unselfish. A human being exercising natural

human love is concerned about himself or

herself, thinking, What's in it for me? We see

this even in the Christian realm. Saved

people—even ministers of the Gospel—may

get in the natural and think this way.

Brother, we ought to be glad for the

kingdom of God. The family of God is one.

We ought to let the unselfish love of God

dominate us.

Much of the time we don't walk in

divine love, but we should. The love of God

has been shed abroad in our hearts, and the

first fruit of the spirit is love. We should be

responding to that indwelling Spirit,

shouldn't we?

Many churches have been torn up by

people arguing, "Well, I've got my say—and

I'm going to have it, too!" If they were to act

in love, they just might keep their mouths

shut.

The fruit of the spirit is love. That'swhat God wants to reproduce in our

recreated, born-again spirits because of the

life of Christ and the Holy Spirit within.

What are the characteristics of the God-

kind of love that has been shed abroad in

our hearts? God didn't leave us in the dark.

The Psalmist of old said, "The entrance of thy

words giveth light...." (Ps. 119:130).

Now let's go to the thirteenth chapter of

First Corinthians. It's to be regretted that

the translators of the King James Version

translated the Greek word for divine love,

agape, as "charity." I don't think we

understand exactly what Paul is saying

here about "charity."

My favorite translation of this discourse

on divine love is from The Amplified Bible. It

starts with the fourth verse of First

Corinthians 13:

"Love [divine love, the love of God]

endures long. . . . " But some say, "I'm not

going to put up with that anymore. I've had

it up to here!" That's the natural talking,isn't it? "Love endures long and is
patient and

kind...." That has to be divine love. Many

people endure long, all right, because they

have to. Others say, "I've suffered all I'm

going to. I'm not going to have it this way

anymore." That's natural human love

talking. God's love endures long and is

patient and kind.