We live in a world where the word love is used for many things. We love our family, our friends, and our pets. But we also love coffee, cheesecake, fall weather, shoes, cars, and our favorite shows on TV. We say we love God, and Jesus loves us. There is the Hollywood version of love, religion's version of love, and many people experience a love that abuses and rejects. Are all these really love? What messages do all these versions of love send? Â
Not all love is the same. In the New Testament, there is the word phileo. Phileo means to like, to treat with affection, to be fond of, and to have personal affection for. We phileo our friends, pets, coffee, and our favorite possessions. We also phileo our family. But there is a love that is deeper than phileo. It is agape love. This love is the love that God has for us. It is the love that He tells us to have for others when Jesus said, Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends (John 15:13). It is the love that husbands are to have for their wives (Ephesians 5:25.28). We need to understand a hidden truth about agape love—it cannot be done without the Father. As humans, we have the capacity to phileo love. Our human nature, apart from God, can have affection for other people and things of this world. But, we cannot operate in the sacrificial love of agape without first being filled with the love of the Father. If you read the book of 1 John, you will see this truth, but I want to show you why this is the case in Hebrew.Â
Most Greek words can be traced back to a Hebrew equivalent. If we trace the word agape back to the Hebrew, we get the word ahabah (H160). Ahabah means intimate love between a man and woman, love between friends, God's love for His people, and is often associated with forming a covenant. The root is ahab (H157), meaning to have affection for. If we look at ahab in the letters we have:
If we pull out the aleph and the bet, we get another Hebrew word:
The aleph and the bet form the word Father! What is in the middle of the word Father? It is the hey, which means to reveal. So, what is love? Love is
THE REVELATION OF THE FATHER
To truly love, we must have a revelation of the Father in our lives. So many of us learned a broken way of loving called codependency. Codependency is a false system of love based on toxic shame where we are always basing our worth and value on external factors. This leads us to live our lives manipulating and controlling others and our environments to maintain peace in our hearts but ultimately destroys authentic connections and relationships. Authentic connection and relationship cannot happen when there is manipulation and control instead of detachment and free will.Â
Deep roots of rejection and toxic shame have led the culture in our churches and in the world to be guided by this false system of love. Trying to get free from its mud and mire can seem overwhelming. BUT GOD! It can be done. We can get free from codependency's control and step into freedom and true Biblical love to be able to love as God loves.Â
The journey into true Biblical love and out of codependency has been the story of my life over the last decade. It is an ongoing process that I will be working on with the Lord until He calls me home, but I can testify there is so much freedom when we learn to let go. When toxic shame is replaced by identity and the deep inner knowing of your value and worth, codependency's control over us can be broken. My prayer as we continue through this Hebrew year of 5784 and we go into the Gregorian year of 2024 is that we all begin to take steps out of this false love system. It starts with knowing how much you are loved by the Father and getting that revelation deep down into the depths of your being. From there, we can let others go and trust God that even when we are rejected, we are still very much loved and valued because we are His children.Â
I look forward to sharing more with you about healing from shame and codependency in the new year!
Shalom,Â
Brandee