What is love (that is, the agape (ἀγάπη) kind)?

Very often we say that when the Bible speaks of love, it speaks chiefly in terms of an unconditional commitment to a sinful person. We say that the definition of agape is primarily in terms of sacrifice, and extol the virtues of giving things up for others. But I think that doesn’t quite get the heart of what biblical love is. It begins to fall apart when we talk about loving one another after the last vestige of our sin has been gone for eons. It falls short when we speak of our love for God (for in that there is surely no true sacrifice, nor a sinful recipient) or the Father’s love for the Son (which is perfectly and eternally given with, as far as we can imagine, nothing that would constitute loss or sacrifice in it). So what then, is the heart of the biblical definition of love?

What I would suggest is that love is not so much inherently self sacrificial, but rather, love, at its heart, is self-giving. It is a surrender of the self, a giving of all that you are, over to another. And perfectly, it is a complete self-giving.

Loss is not central, sacrifice is not central, rather they are implications of how love must work in light of fallenness. But at it’s core, love is the unconditional yielding over of the self.

And this matters. It means that when God says he loves us, it doesn’t just mean that He is committed to our well-being despite our imperfections. It meansHe gives us Himself. God’s love is His undeserved provision of the ultimate good, it’s Him giving Himself to us.

-djstevens

P.S. A working definition.