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Along the Sea of Galilee some 2,000 years ago, Peter was stunned when the Risen Jesus asked him, โDo you love me?โ It was the word for โloveโ that got to him. Jesus didnโt speak of ordinary human affection. Another Greek word, phileo, describes that kind of love.ย Jesus instead uses the word agape, which describes a total, self-giving, sacrificial love.
And that is whatโs so troubling for Peter. After Peter just denied Christ three times, he painful knows he is incapable of agape love. He is sad that the best he can offer is only the imperfect, human love of phileo.
And we often feel the same.
We know we donโt love as well as we should. Our love falls short. But the good news is God wants to do in us what he did in St. Peter. In a beautiful play on words, Johnโs Gospel chapter 21 shows how Jesus will lower himself to Peterโs level and accept Peterโs broken, imperfect gift of phileo love and transform it into agape. It doesnโt happen all at once. But from this point forward, Peter is a changed man. He will go on to lead like Christ, serve like Christ, teach like Christ and even suffer like Christ.ย Like his Master, Peter will be handed over to the Romans and stretched out on a cross as he is crucified upside down in Neroโs circus.ย At this climactic moment, as Peter gives the heroic witness of his martyrdom, he lives agape love in a most profound way.
The same Jesus who transformed Peterโs phileo love into agape will do the same in our heartsโif we follow him faithfully as a disciple.