4 For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world — our faith.
1 John 5:4
You may know that the Bible was not originally written in chapters and verses. The translators partitioned it into chapters and verses to make it easier for us to read. The chapter before the verse before us, 1 John chapter 4, is totally focused on love. The Holy Spirit through John really took out time to teach about love before He culminated in the victory verse above which tells us that the victory that overcomes the world is our faith (1 John 5:4). Also, in Galatians 5:6, we read that this same overcoming faith is activated, energized, and expressed by love. That is how important agape love is.
There are four major words translated as love in Greek. These four kinds of love are: storge, which is family love; phileo, which is friendship love; eros, which is sexual or physical love; and then there is agape, which is God’s kind of love, divine love, and unconditional love. In every relationship, agape love where present, gives a balance to all these other kinds of love. For example, there are times when in the marriage relationship that eros, phileo and storge fail. If you’ve got agape love in your marriage, it will give stability to the other kinds of love. Only a believer can express this agape love. That is why a believer should not marry an unbeliever who cannot express agape love. Agape love is the highest form of love. What is even more interesting about agape love is that it was previously unknown before Christ came into this world. That’s how special and unique this love is.
You can now see why John took out time in the fourth chapter of his first epistle to really talk about love before he began to talk about our victory and our faith in chapter 5. He knew something that we all need to know, which unfortunately a lot of us have forgotten: the love of God. The agape love of God is at the foundation of everything that you do. So if you are screaming and shouting about your faith and victory and you are not paying attention to your love walk, you might just experience a whole lot of frustration.
Confession:
I have God’s kind of love, the highest form of love. It is the balance to all other kinds of love expressed in my life.