Agape - Divine Unconditional Love
God's love is freely given, not earned, and serves as the model for human love.
Agape is the distinctively Christian concept of love—unconditional, sacrificial, choosing the beloved's good regardless of merit. 'God is love'—not merely that God loves, but that love defines His essence. This love is demonstrated supremely in Christ's death for sinners while we were enemies. Human love responds to attractiveness; divine love creates value in the beloved. This love transforms those who receive it and flows through them to others. John defines the word by an event, not a sentiment: love is that “he sent his Son” (1 John 4:10).
This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.
Anders Nygren's 'Agape and Eros' distinguished divine agape (spontaneous, unmotivated) from human eros (responsive, desiring).
First Epistle of John
Written about in
- What Christianity says about love
In this letter love is not something God does but what God is. The order runs from God first, which makes human love a response rather than an achievement.