Philos - The Love Of A Friend

For most of human history, mankind looked upon their gods as subjects would look to an unkind king, as victims would look at an abusive tyrant or as a slave would look in fear to a master. Gods were seen as vengeful taskmasters and their followers as unworthy subjects. Even the God of the Old Testament was seen by many in this light.

Then came Jesus.

Jesus changed how the world looked at God. He did that with these words in the Gospel of John. It’s important that we read these words and understand the impact they had on the world. All this because Jesus used the word philos to describe God to you and me.

John 15:14-15

“You are My friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you slaves … but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you.”

Philos is the Greek word for friend in that passage. God uses the word for love to describe us as friends to Him. This is what Jesus did for you and me. He brought God’s love to us in the form of friendship. To a world that was hostile to Him, He sent His Son to tell us that He wants to befriend us.

The world will tell you that God has no need for us and He hates us. Jesus said otherwise. To Jesus, we are friends. The world changed on the day that Jesus told us that. In the middle of a discourse where Jesus tells us about God’s great agape love for us, He offers a friendly handshake - philos - to pave the way for that love. God loves us and and desires to have a relationship with us.

1 John 4:9-10

“By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”