The Validation of Love
Rex Yancey
1 Corinthians 13:5-6
Paul was writing to a divided church that needed God's kind of love in their relationships. This truth is still a reality in our life experiences. The song writer wrote ''What the world needs now is love...'' Love may not make the world go around but it sure makes the trip more bearable. We need that kind of love in our homes, church, business relationships and world.
Without love all I say is ineffective, all I know is incomplete, all I believe is insignificant, and all I accomplish is inadequate.
Dwight Small says of agape, ''Agape is not born of a lover's need, nor does it have its source in the love object. Agape doesn't exist in order to get what it wants but empties itself to give what the other needs. Its motives rise wholly from within its own nature. Agape exists in order to die to self for the blessedness of caring for another, spending for another, spending itself for the sake of the beloved.''
A sociology professor at John Hopkins University assigned his class to a city slum in interview 200 boys. On the basis of their interviews they were to predict their futures. They came back to the professor with the prediction that at least 90% of them would spend time in prison.
Twenty-five years later the same professor assigned another class the task of locating those boys and finding out what happened in their lives. Out of 180 they found only four had spent time in prison.
This was an astounding find. They began to search for a common denominator which could account for the results. The common denominator turned out to be a high school teacher named Sheila O'Rourke. They found her in a nursing home in Memphis. When she was asked to explain her impact on those boys she was puzzled and said, ''All I did was love them.''
Do you understand the awesome power of agape? Agape is not the least we can do for someone. Agape is the best we can do for someone.
I want us to look at the vali ...
Rex Yancey
1 Corinthians 13:5-6
Paul was writing to a divided church that needed God's kind of love in their relationships. This truth is still a reality in our life experiences. The song writer wrote ''What the world needs now is love...'' Love may not make the world go around but it sure makes the trip more bearable. We need that kind of love in our homes, church, business relationships and world.
Without love all I say is ineffective, all I know is incomplete, all I believe is insignificant, and all I accomplish is inadequate.
Dwight Small says of agape, ''Agape is not born of a lover's need, nor does it have its source in the love object. Agape doesn't exist in order to get what it wants but empties itself to give what the other needs. Its motives rise wholly from within its own nature. Agape exists in order to die to self for the blessedness of caring for another, spending for another, spending itself for the sake of the beloved.''
A sociology professor at John Hopkins University assigned his class to a city slum in interview 200 boys. On the basis of their interviews they were to predict their futures. They came back to the professor with the prediction that at least 90% of them would spend time in prison.
Twenty-five years later the same professor assigned another class the task of locating those boys and finding out what happened in their lives. Out of 180 they found only four had spent time in prison.
This was an astounding find. They began to search for a common denominator which could account for the results. The common denominator turned out to be a high school teacher named Sheila O'Rourke. They found her in a nursing home in Memphis. When she was asked to explain her impact on those boys she was puzzled and said, ''All I did was love them.''
Do you understand the awesome power of agape? Agape is not the least we can do for someone. Agape is the best we can do for someone.
I want us to look at the vali ...
There are 9802 characters in the full content. This excerpt only shows a 2000 character sample of the full content.
Price: $5.99 or 1 credit
