Excerpt from the book, “The Utopia of a Strange Love: When the Love of God is Mishandled” by Tavares D. Robinson, Watchman Publishing

The Agape Deception

“God’s love for me is agape, and it is unconditional.” This phrase has been used so repeatedly among believers that to speak anything contrary is like signing one’s own death warrant. Men whom we have admired throughout the ages have written books and preached sermons on the love of God which have shaped and developed our views concerning this subject. What are some of the things that we have learned? From such men, we have learned that there are four levels of love: eros, storge, phileo, and agape. Eros is love that extends from the heart, and it is romantic in type. Storge is the kind of love that is founded on family loyalty and duty. Phileo is brotherly love; it is humanity’s love for one another and the lesser form of love when compared to agape. Lastly, there is agape love. We have been taught that this is the highest form of love—the type that only Christians can exhibit as it is selfless, divine, and unconditional. But is agape really unconditional? Is agape divine love? Is phileo the lesser love?

In this chapter, we will look at agape and phileo, due to the frequency of their use today. As stated, agape has been commonly taught as divine and unconditional love, while phileo is a lesser form of agape—brotherly love. How did the concept of unconditional love originate? Before we move forward, I believe it’s important that we first define unconditional love. The dictionary says, “It is the acceptance of a person without them meeting any conditions. Affection that has no limitation. To cherish someone regardless of their character.” Is this what the Bible teaches? Clearly not. Does God extend His love toward all mankind without partiality? Yes. John 3:16 states that “for God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” But to define it as unconditional is misleading and eternally dangerous.

“Unconditional love” has never been a biblical concept. It was first coined by a German psychoanalyst named Erich Fromm in 1934. The idea was further developed in his successful 1956 book, The Art of Loving. Fromm rejected all forms of authoritarian government including God’s. He viewed the God of the Old Testament as a self-seeking authoritarian. He was a vowed atheist who vehemently argued against the teachings of the Christian faith. He believed that man is the measure of all things. He taught that a person must love himself, accept himself, and esteem himself in order to reach his highest potential. He believed that a father’s love was always conditional—while a mother’s was unconditional and couldn’t be forfeited by sins or transgression. His ideas were later refined in the 1960s by a famous humanist psychologist named Carl Rogers.

Rogers’ parents were devout Protestants, and he enrolled in seminary school but later dropped out and abandoned Christianity for New Age mysticism. Rogers, skilled in the Greek language, defined agape as unconditional, but termed it “unconditional positive regard.” It is the basic acceptance and support of a person regardless of what the person says or does. It is to always approve someone by setting aside your personal opinions and biases. It is the ability to isolate behaviors from the person who displays them. Does this sound familiar? How many times have you heard someone say, “God loves the sinner but hates the sin”? Is this biblical? Yes and no. If you are making reference to His love for the sinner in that He gave His Son for the sake of redemption, then yes. But if it’s used to justify and accept wayward behavior without accountability, then no. You cannot separate sinners from their sins. What made them a sinner is their sin. God does not cast the sin into the lake of fire. He will cast the person who died in their sin into the fire.

This view of agape is contrary to apostolic teachings. It is humanistic psychology which is the workings of seducing spirits influencing the wisdom of men. Paul warned the church at Colossae concerning this issue: “And now, just as you accepted Christ Jesus as your Lord, you must continue to follow him. Let your roots grow down into him, and let your lives be built on him. Then your faith will grow strong in the truth you were taught, and you will overflow with thankfulness. Don’t let anyone lead you away with empty philosophies and high-sounding nonsense that come from human thinking and from the spiritual powers of this world, rather than from Christ” (Col 2: 6-8).

As stated previously, phileo is a type of love that has also been distorted in our time. It is said that phileo is shared mostly by the worldly and unregenerate. The words agape and phileo have become something like urban legends, anecdotes based on hearsay and widely circulated as true. In the church, many things have been said about these terms that are untrue. Whereas phileo has been taught as brotherly love, it has also been taught that only those who are not Christians express it. In that way, it is a lesser form of love than agape. Yet some Bible texts teach otherwise:

• For the Father loves [phileo] the Son and shows him all he does. Yes, and he will show him even greater works than these, so that you will be amazed (John 5: 20).
• So the sisters sent word to Jesus, “Lord, the one you love [phileo] is sick” (John 11: 3).
• Then the Jews said, “See how he loved [phileo] him!” (John 11: 36).
• No, the Father himself loves [phileo] you because you have loved [phileo] me and have believed that I came from God (John 16: 27).
• So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved [phileo], and said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!” (John 20: 2).
• If anyone does not love [phileo] the Lord, let that person be cursed! (1 Cor. 16: 22).
• Those whom I love [phileo] I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest and repent (Rev. 3: 19).
• These scripture verses and others clearly show us we have been taught a distorted view of phileo. Yet even greater damage has been done to agape. We have been led to believe that agape is God’s divine love. And because it is divine, we have been told it is unconditional and never ceases. First John 4 has been used to convince the masses that this is absolutely the meaning of agape:
• Dear friends, let us love [agape] one another, for love [agape] comes from God. Everyone who loves [agape] has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love [agape] does not know God, because God is love [agape] (1 John 4: 7-8).

These verses use agape in reference to God five times. If this reference could be taken alone, we could indeed hold that agape means divine love. But what is missing is correlation. How does 1 John 4:7-8 correlate with other texts referencing agape? It is highly important for us to learn this principle. Imposters and deceivers will steadily increase as we approach the return of our Lord, and Peter left some weighty words on this in his second Epistle to the church:

And so, dear friends, while you are waiting for these things to happen, make every effort to be found living peaceful lives that are pure and blameless in his sight. And remember, our Lord’s patience gives people time to be saved. This is what our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you with the wisdom God gave him—speaking of these things in all of his letters. Some of his comments are hard to understand, and those who are ignorant and unstable have twisted his letters to mean something quite different, just as they do with other parts of Scripture. And this will result in their destruction. You already know these things, dear friends. So be on guard; then you will not be carried away by the errors of these wicked people and lose your own secure footing. Rather, you must grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. All glory to him, both now and forever! Amen (2 Pet. 3: 14-18 NLT).

Other verses besides 1 John 4: 7-8 show us that agape can mean different things than divine love or unconditional love:

• Woe to you Pharisees, because you love [agape] the most important seats in the synagogues and respectful greetings in the marketplaces. (Luke 11: 43)
• No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love [agape] the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money. (Luke 16: 13)
• This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved [agape] darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. (John 3: 19) . . .
• for they loved [agape] human praise more than praise from God. (John 12: 43)
• Demas, because he loved [agape] this world, has deserted me and has gone to Thessalonica. Crescens has gone to Galatia, and Titus to Dalmatia. (2 Tim. 4: 10)
• They have left the straight way and wandered off to follow the way of Balaam son of Bezer, who loved [agape] the wages of wickedness. (2 Pet. 2: 15)
• Do not love [agape] the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves [agape] the world, love [agape] for the Father is not in them. (1 John 2: 15)

Paul Prophesied These Days Would Come

In the previous verses in which all of them use a form of agape, it is impossible to translate agape as divine love or love from God. Is it divine love that we love money or human praise? Is it the love of God that men desire darkness? Is it really God’s love that we love the world—or seats in the synagogues? In 2 Samuel 13 there is the story about Amnon having love for his sister, Tamar. In the Septuagint, the translation of the Old Testament into Greek, the word used four times to describe Amnon’s love for Tamar is translated agape. Verses 14-15 say, “But he refused to listen to her, and since he was stronger than she, he raped her. Then Amnon hated her with intense hatred. In fact, he hated her more than he had loved her. Amnon said to her, ‘Get up and get out.’” If agape means God’s love, or divine love, how could it lead to rape?

If the scripture text does not fit, the teaching or doctrine is not legit! Do men love darkness unconditionally? Did Demas love the world in a divine way? Do people have a God kind of love for money? People love darkness, the world, human praise, and money because these things bring them something back in return. They certainly don’t love them unconditionally.

We can use the same vocabulary, but if our vocabulary has the wrong definition, we will worship another Jesus. Paul warned that “if someone comes to you and preaches a Jesus other than the Jesus we preached, or if you receive a different spirit from the Spirit you received, or a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it easily enough” (2 Cor. 11: 4). J. C. Ryle (1816–1900), the first Anglican bishop of Liverpool, wrote, “There is a quantity of half-truth taught by the modern false teachers: they are incessantly using Scriptural terms and phrases in an unscriptural sense.”

Why does Satan work to convince the church that God’s love is unconditional? It is in order to promote lives of disobedience, to remove the fear of God, and to strip away the belief of God’s wrath. The enemy ultimately desires us to nullify Jesus’ death on the cross. If I am convinced God’s love is unconditional, I can pick and choose what scripture to obey. There is no reason why I should repent and be converted. I can live my life to please myself, and I can live without conviction. Why would God require a Lord-and-slave relationship?

To summarize, phileo means to cherish, to be fond of, to take strong delight in, or to like well. The word is associated with intense endearment, although brotherly love and unregenerate love is a stretch. Paul’s closing remarks to the Christians in Corinth should make us rethink the idea that phileo is a lesser love: “If anyone does not love the Lord, let that person be cursed!” (1 Cor. 16: 22). Agape, on the other hand, means to esteem, to honor, to value, or to respect. Agape represents devoted love for someone or something. Agape love is an act of the will, not the emotions, and it should not be defined as “divine love” or the “God kind of love.” According to the scriptures, agape is not always unconditional. God functions in both phileo and agape types of love. It is vital we divorce ourselves from erroneous teachings concerning God’s love.

By Tavares Robinson

It’s amazing how many people pretend to live Spirit-filled lives until their denominational persuasion or political preferences are touched.

In fact, the rivers of gross deception have risen and swept away many who you thought were sober-minded and biblically centered.

We spend more time on social media “politicking” and “positioning,” rather than praying and proclaiming. We operate our social media sites the same way we read our Bibles — proof-texting. This is best described as a method by which an individual isolates a quotation and uses it out of context, without regard to the true meaning of the quotation. Not to mention, proof-texting does not consider how a quote coincides with other quotes on the same subject.

But we scroll through countless sites to find material that supports our presupposed beliefs. And based on our discoveries, we believe that our views must be accurate because others think the same way. Delusion!

In the words of Demosthenes, an ancient Athenian statesman and orator, “Nothing is so easy as to deceive oneself; for what we wish, we readily believe.”

It is discouraging, sickening, and appalling, to see the behavior and mannerisms of so-called believers when their “idols” are touched. If we had this much passion for Christ, and His word, like we do for our favorite preacher or political party, the church’s landscape would look differently.

Make no mistake about it, God is going to give every nation the leadership that they deserve. The leadership you choose, tells a lot about your heart and what God thinks about you. The nation of Israel wanted a king so they could be like the rest of the world, so God gave them a king that looked impressive — head and shoulders above all the people — but he was never God’s choice. God gave the people a physical manifestation of what their hearts looked like internally. Every time they saw King Saul, they saw themselves.

What is God saying to us today? From the White House, down to our local church house, we are childish. We have people in positions of power with titles, but they don’t possess neither the character nor the temperament of that title.

Abraham Lincoln said, “If you want to test a man’s character, give him power.”

This spirit of pride in leadership is alarming, egregious, and eternally dangerous! True biblical leadership is about serving, not demanding; it’s about being last, not first; it’s about leading, not controlling; it’s about being mistreated, but not retaliating; it’s about humility, not exaltation; it’s about giving your all, but not expecting something in return.

True leadership is not an avenue for validation or fulfilling one’s self worth, it’s about responsibility—eternal responsibility. It’s about standing before the Alpha and the Omega, alone, and giving account for your motives; your stewardship of the things you received and the things you have heard; and in what way did you influence others. It’s about forever foreseeing the day that Christ will ask me to hold my hands up, and to wonder if blood will drip down from them. It’s a terrifying duty, not a worldly glorified acceptance.

Many in leadership are suffering from the Dunning-Kruger Effect and don’t even know it. It’s a psychological principle, but the Bible has one word for it: Pride. People suffering from this effect are really incompetent and unable to recognize their own incompetence; therefore, it leads to an inflated self-assessment of their abilities. But this is not something new; it was part of God’s judgment in times past.

The prophet Isaiah declared, “I will make boys their leaders, and toddlers their rulers. People will oppress each other–man against man, neighbor against neighbor. Young people will insult their elders, and vulgar people will sneer at the honorable. In those days, a man will say to his brother, ‘Since you have a coat, you be our leader! Take charge of this heap of ruins!’ But he will reply, ‘No! I can’t help. I don’t have any extra food or clothes. Don’t put me in charge!’ For Jerusalem will stumble, and Judah will fall, because they speak out against the LORD and refuse to obey him. They provoke him to his face. The very look on their faces gives them away. They display their sin like the people of Sodom and don’t even try to hide it. They are doomed! They have brought destruction upon themselves. Tell the godly that all will be well for them. They will enjoy the rich reward they have earned! But the wicked are doomed, for they will get exactly what they deserve. Childish leaders oppress my people, and women rule over them. O my people, your leaders mislead you; they send you down the wrong road,” (Isaiah 3:4-12).

God’s judgment on a society can be when He withholds true godly leadership on every level; subsequently, the void is filled with zealous, pompous and incompetent people. To be deprived of godly leadership is worse than a famine of food and water.

Mark this down: Anytime there is incompetence in leadership, there will be a breakdown and a disrespect among the people. Notice what God said through Isaiah: “People will oppress each other – man against man, neighbor against neighbor. Young people will insult their elders, and vulgar people will sneer at the honorable.”

Do we not see this very sign among us now? There is a level of hate and disrespect in this country that’s brewing toward internal catastrophe. In an age in which sexual immorality has been giving a platform to proclaim its sinful indulgence, so has racism, fascism, and ill-treatment has been given a mic. The volume of that mic has been so magnified that even Christians and church leaders have begun to parrot the same language. When leadership in the church submit to secular and unredeemed counsel to be the template of how they are leading God’s people, frightening consequences are looming.

Church, wake up and stop allowing the world to lead! Are you being the light? Have you allowed the water of worldliness to dilute your spiritual composition of being salt? Have we become like Samson and played with the world for so long that we, in our pride, just assume Christ is still with us? Have we been become so deceived that we think Christ is a Republican, Democrat, or other?

There is a story in the book of Joshua, chapter 5, right before the possession of Jericho, Joshua has an encounter with the pre-incarnated Christ. Joshua asks the Man is He for them or for their adversaries? And to Joshua’s surprise, the Man does not respond with an answer to Joshua’s question; he simply says, “No!” This is not a proper response to a question but He refuses to answer because Joshua asked the wrong question. It was not about was the Man on Joshua’s side, but whether Joshua was on His side. The question should be, “Are we really on the Lord’s side?” Are we really viewing current events through the lens of the word of God? Or are we simply “cherry-picking” to reinforce our determined view?

You can be “so proud to be American,” that you become disqualified from being a humble Christian. Don’t misunderstand me; I thank God for the freedom from which this nation has granted me, but I’m not so deceived to the notion that you can be a great patriot, and still be an enemy with God.

Patriotism does not equal Christian citizenship. In many churches in America, the messages on Sunday tend to be whatever transpired that week from the news – sinful! I would challenge those who are sitting in the congregation week after week, hearing political driven message, to ask your pastor, “Are you a spokesman for political parties or for Christ?” Ask him, “Are you viewing circumstances through the lens concerning the Last Days, or are you viewing circumstances through the lens of your political vote?”

Childish leadership has taken over the scope of the land. We are correcting errors with other errors but believe it’s OK because the last thing was so wrong; deceived! Today’s leadership needs to be reminded of the ancient proverb, “Two wrongs don’t make a right.”

In today’s culture, being vindictive, easily offended, and entitled, has become badges of honor. The statement “either you are for me or against me,” has become the statement of faith for many. Unsettled hostility and anger are being diagnosed as “passion,” and both accepted as admirable virtues.

Let us not forget what king Solomon said, “Don’t befriend angry people or associate with hot-tempered people, or you will learn to be like them and endanger your soul,” (Proverbs 22:24-25). Why are these things happening? Could it be the judgment of God? Could history be repeating itself once again?

Believers, take Isaiah’s warning seriously concerning how your leaders are leading you down the wrong road. Ask Christ to give you hears to ear because the Holy Spirit has been giving orders to start the eviction process. There are many things that have taken place among church leadership that God has not overlooked. God’s mercy goes beyond humankind’s understanding, but when He says, “that’s enough!” who is going to restrain Him? Christ will indeed have a pure church who has not defiled her garments.

By Tavares Robinson

We are living in a time where silence has become something admirable. The admiration has led many to believe that promotion from God will come if you just mind your business.

I understand there is a time to be quiet; however, there is also a time to speak. When the Holy Spirit is compelling us to open our mouths, silence is not a badge of honor and humility.

When Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany, he scornfully dismissed the church and its leaders as an irrelevant voice posing no threat to his agenda. Sadly, Hitler was right. Many of the German churches remained quiet and looked the other way. Hitler said, “We should destroy the preachers by their notorious greed and self-indulgence. We shall thus be able to settle everything with them in perfect peace and harmony. I shall give them a few years reprieve, why should we quarrel? . . . They will betray their God for us, they will betray anything for the sake of their miserable jobs and income.”

The church looked away, thinking that showing “love” instead of confronting evil would turn the tide. But this not only encouraged the sin; in fact, it directly strengthened the hands of the evildoers. Few voices were raised against the monstrous Nazi evil during that time. One of the few was Dietrich Bonhoeffer. He understood that love for Christ and others required courage to speak the truth even in unfavorable times. Bonhoeffer was deeply troubled by the church silence:

“We the church must confess that we have not proclaimed often or clearly enough the message of the One God who has revealed Himself for all time in Christ Jesus, and who will tolerate no other gods beside Himself. She must confess her timidity, her cowardice, her evasiveness and her dangerous concessions. She was silent when she should have cried out because the blood of the innocent was crying aloud to heaven. . . The church is guilty of the deaths of the weakest and most defenseless brothers of Jesus Christ. The church must confess that she has desired security and peace, quiet, possession, and honor to which she has no right. She has not born witness to the truth of God and by her silence, she has rendered herself guilty, because of her unwillingness to suffer for what she knows to be right.”

In its thunderous silence, the church became a traitor to the lordship of Christ. She failed to heed Bonhoeffer’s prophetic words, and within a few years Hitler’s agenda was accomplished—with over eleven million people being murdered, including Dietrich Bonhoeffer himself. True biblical love never turns a blind eye to deception, error and sin. The attitude that we should ignore these things and “just let God deal with it,” is anything but biblical. Compromising for the sake of peace, acceptance and approval is never the answer for devoted Christians.

This type of mindset draws minimal opposition from the Enemy. Satan knows people have the ability to reassess their spiritual condition, so his plan is to keep them as comfortable as possible. It could even appear God is rewarding them because of their increased earthly achievements, adding credibility to the notion that God is blessing them despite their unbiblical view of love. It is a view of love that compromises for the sake of adulation and approval.

What happened among the German churches happened first to the church at Corinth. In First Corinthians chapter five, we see a church that has become seduced by a false notion of grace and love. There was a particular man who was having a sexual relationship with his stepmother. This illicit relationship bore the same stigma as if the man had been having a sexual relationship with his own mother. Incestuous affairs were of course forbidden by the Scriptures: “Do not have sexual relations with your father’s wife; that would dishonor your father,” intoned Leviticus 18:8. “A man is not to marry his father’s wife; he must not dishonor his father’s bed,” Deuteronomy 22:30 reads.

This incestuous affair was even considered taboo by the pagan city of Corinth. To say that the city did not approve this sort of thing speaks volume. Corinth was known as the hotbed of immorality. Living a blatant, licentious lifestyle was standard. The city had temple priestesses who served as prostitutes where men would go in and have sexual relations as part of their temple worship. The prostitutes would leave the temple to come into the city and sell their services in the marketplace. They lived the immoral life to the fullest, and the church allowed this to go on. The world was looking at the church and saying, “Even we know that is wrong!” That is what troubled the apostle Paul.

What outraged Paul the most was not just the man’s sin, but the Corinthian church’s response to his sexual immorality. He asked, “And you are proud! Shouldn’t you rather have gone into mourning and have put out of your fellowship the man who has been doing this?” (1 Cor. 5:2). There are perhaps two main reasons why the church looked the other way when it came to egregious sin. First, the rejection of the authority of the Word of God. They overlooked the sin even after Paul said, “I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people, (1 Cor. 5:9). Second, the church had a false view of love, which led directly to the rejection of the Scripture. With the rejection of Scripture came a causal attitude toward sin.

What the church of Corinth displayed in this salacious situation was definitely not biblical love but rather the character traits of worldly love and undiscerning tolerance. Embracing tolerance just because it is politically correct will cause us to ignore what the Scripture says about a particular issue so we can come across as more loving and accepting. But according to Paul, when the church remains silent, this is not evidence of walking in love but in pride. “Your boasting is not good. Don’t you know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough?” (1 Cor. 5:6).  The Corinthians should have been grieving over the sin within their ranks, but they allowed sin to influence and corrupt the church at large.

How is it that when non-Christians divorce, due to adultery, we call them sinners? But when our favorite church leaders do the same, we call them human, say they’re under grace, and we allow them to hold on to leadership positions? We judge the person in the world, but we protect the one in the church. When someone in the church speaks against our personal idols, whether it is a sinning leader, smoking, drinking, or sexual perversion, it is common to hear, “Who are you to judge?” “That is not the love of God,” “That is not your business” or “Just pray about it.” According to Paul, this should never be. “What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. Expel the wicked person from among you,” (1 Cor. 5:12-13).

When the love of God is mishandled and becomes something foreign to God’s Word, we move from an apostolic view of love to a therapeutic view of love. When things are done contrary to God’s Word, and we are not bothered by it, that is a good indicator that we have attached ourselves to a strange love. This love is toxic, the mixture of poison and some truth. Biblical love is indeed the greater virtue, but without the complete truth, it loses its potency.