AGAPE vs EROS

These are two Greek words that are both translated in our English Bibles as "love", although they have completely different meanings in the Greek. This is not uncommon because English is a very poor language by comparison. Thank God He had the scriptures recorded in Hebrew and Greek! Can you imagine the confusion if it had been recorded in English? There are many places in scripture where the translators used different English words for the same Greek word. For example check out (John 14:2 and 23), the KJV translators used "mansions" in verse 2, and "abode" in verse 23 for the exact same Greek word. The proper word should be abode or dwelling place.

In the matter of "Agape" and "Eros" the real meaning in Greek is nearly opposite from one to the other. Agape can best be described as the God kind of love, while Eros is a sensual or sexual kind of love. Eros could better be defined as "lust" and not love. Agape is a love that "gives", while Eros is a love that

"takes". "God so loved (Agaped) the World that He gave---" (John 3:16). We use the word love very loosely today, for example we love our special foods, our cat, our car, our job etc. As Christians we should be careful how we use this word, realizing that it has different meanings. There are even more meanings in the Greek for love than these two but we are not considering them now. I wish to draw your attention to the fact that Agape is a "giving" type of love, while Eros is a "taking" type. This is an important distinction when considering spiritual things. God gives, and we receive, or at least that is how it should be. But often when we stop receiving for some reason, and start taking from God, we are exercising Eros love. Often we can be guilty of this when we are trying to make a scripture say what we want it to say to prove some theory or doctrine we might hold. This could be called "raping" the scripture, and I'm sure we have all done it at some time. It often happens on the back side of a move of God, when things cool off and we try to make things happen like they did at the height of the revival. This trying to make things happen can take many different forms, but the result is often an open door for "fanaticism" of some sort.

Our Creator God seldom repeats a move of His Spirit exactly like the last one. Why would He, because He is still a Creator? We are such creatures of habit, and we like things we are used to and familiar with, and don't like change. So God, who is always moving forward, has to find a new group of people who will move on with Him. A careful look at church history is all we need to prove this to us, so let's seek to be a close follower of Jesus, a receiver of God's love, and not a taker!!

Sincerely submitted

Gramp