There is a selfless love that can only be known in the embrace of Love. This selfless love frees us from our selfishness. Many of us use benevolence to feel better about ourselves or to help us sleep at night. When we do this, we are still holding on to the False Self. We may appear selfless, but we are really self-consumed. It’s sobering to know that we can give away everything (even sacrificing our bodies) and still be found without love (1 Cor. 13:3). 

The true love described in 1 Corinthians 13 comes from “the inner depths of the heart as an eternal energy.” It is an active power that bonds “hearts and lives in secure relation- ships.”2 Paul uses the Greek word agape, which describes the highest form of love—a love that is eternal, emanating from the One who is eternal. 

There are people who have died giving their lives for glory, yet they lacked any love for the people they were apparently dying for. Such a love is self- and glory-centric. While it may seem beautiful, admirable, and worth celebrating, at the end of the day, it “gains nothing.” 

Losing our lives for love doesn’t always mean losing our breath. When Jesus says, “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13), he is not merely speaking of losing our mortal lives. We Westerners can hardly relate to the idea of literally dying for someone else. 

In John 15, Jesus is speaking prophetically of Calvary, but he is also inviting us to partake of this same death (and the same love). This “great love” cannot be known without a form of death. Our God wouldn’t dangle great love and not give us the means to experience such love. In Christ, we have the pathway to every truly great thing. But we must learn to follow him and practice the rhythms of grace. 

I want you to notice that Jesus says, “Lay down his life for his friends” (emphasis added), not friend. It’s important to note that he is not strictly alluding to a glorious, sacrificial exchange, like what we see in Guardians of the Galaxy when Star-Lord gives his breathing mechanism to Gamora, leaving himself breathless and suspended in space. I don’t want to belittle the glory of such a sacrifice, but Jesus has something much bigger in mind. 

Jesus is ultimately describing a way of life, a way of dying to the False Self that releases the true life within. This new life may require a mortal sacrifice, but we have to be careful not to limit it to such extreme forms. When we do this, we strip dying of its meaning and application in this cushy, Western world. After all, most of us will never have the opportunity to voluntarily give up our breath. 

Such an invitation to grab hold of great love is available to all countries, cultures, and generations. It’s ultimately found in Christ’s invitation to take up our crosses and follow him. It’s found in the process of giving our lives away for the people impacted by who we are and what we do—family, friends, coworkers, neighbors, and others. 

This is how you will experience great love. 

God’s love and holiness compelled him to lay down his life. Now we are invited to know the love that emanates from God’s holiness—his superlative quality, the quality that makes us like him. God’s Spirit has invaded our lives to make us partakers of his otherness. As Saints—his holy ones—we tap into eternal love, and once we’ve tasted this heavenly gift, nothing else will do. 

We cannot hide from who we are as new creations in Christ. If we do, we will be overwhelmed by internal dis- sonance. After all, what fellowship does light have with dark- ness? The old is gone and the new has come (2 Cor. 5:17). 

Let’s choose to lay aside the Old Self and put on the New Self, washing ourselves of the stench of selfishness (Eph. 4:21–24). 

Addison Bevere is a man who appreciates the simple things in life—time spent playing with his four kids, late-night conversations with his wife, interesting words that no one uses, a meaningful day of work, and, of course, a good book. Addison is also the COO of Messenger International, an organization that impacts millions of people in over 150 countries through its various initiatives, and the cofounder of SonsAndDaughters.tv. To learn more about him, visit AddisonBevere.com.