Love: God’s Gift and Our Calling

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Dec 22, 2025

In this enlightening discussion, the hosts delve into the rich meanings of love in the Hebrew Bible, especially the concept of 'ahavah' that emphasizes faithfulness and care for the vulnerable. They explore how Jesus radicalizes love, including the provocative idea of loving one's enemies. The conversation connects this to the New Testament's 'agape,' a self-giving love that reflects God's essence. They conclude by highlighting how Advent represents God's gift of love through Jesus, urging listeners to embody this generous and practical love.

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INSIGHT

Love Is Attachment And Action

Ahav/ahava in the Hebrew Bible combines emotional attachment with practical action, like feeding and clothing the vulnerable.
Love toward God and neighbor are reciprocal mirrors rooted in covenantal attachment.

INSIGHT

Covenant Love Means Clinging

Deuteronomy frames God's love as choosing and clinging to Israel within a covenantal story of liberation.
Humans are called to cling to God and live by his wisdom as the concrete expression of love.

INSIGHT

Two Commands That Sum The Law

Jesus presents two interlocking commandments as the core: love God fully and love your neighbor as yourself.
These two summarize Israel's purpose and human flourishing in mutual reciprocity.

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Advent E4 — We’re ending our short Advent series with a reflection on love. In the Hebrew Bible, the word “ahavah” involves faithfulness to God and living by his wisdom, but it also means showing practical care to others—especially the vulnerable. Jesus views this love for God and neighbor as the greatest command, and he expands it to be indiscriminate, radical kindness and generosity even toward our enemies. The New Testament authors were so blown away by this kind of love that they adopted an obscure Greek word for love, “agape,” and redefined it to be a self-giving, sacrificial love that Jesus demonstrates in his life, teaching, death, and resurrection. In this episode, Jon and Tim explore the main biblical words for love, showing how the story of Advent characterizes agape as God’s own essence and our calling.

FULL SHOW NOTES

For chapter-by-chapter notes including summaries, referenced Scriptures, biblical words, and reflection questions, check out the full show notes for this episode.

CHAPTERS

The Hebrew Bible’s Understanding of Love (0:00–13:17)
Agape and Jesus’ Redefinition of Love (13:17–21:25)
God Is Love (21:25–31:10)
Reflections on Love With JoDee (31:10-36:12)

OFFICIAL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

View this episode’s official transcript.

REFERENCED RESOURCES

The Affections of Christ Jesus: Love at the Heart of Paul’s Theology by Nijay Gupta
Ahavah / Love: Though not referenced directly in the episode, this 2017 video explores the same biblical word ahavah.
Agape / Love: Also not referenced directly in the episode, this 2017 video explores the same biblical word, agape.
Check out Tim’s extensive collection of recommended books here.

SHOW MUSIC

“Clouds ft. ahmo” by Lofi Sunday
“Warm Hugs” by Lofi Sunday & Cassidy Godwin
“Snowflakes” by Aves
BibleProject theme song by TENTS

SHOW CREDITS

Production of today’s episode is by Lindsey Ponder, producer, and Cooper Peltz, managing producer. Tyler Bailey is our supervising engineer, who also edited today’s episode and provided the sound design and mix. JB Witty does our show notes, and Hannah Woo provides the annotations for our app. Our host and creative director is Jon Collins, and our lead scholar is Tim Mackie. Special thanks to our guest JoDee Atherton.

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