Word 16: Zōē
- Greek: ζωή (zōē) – life of the divine
- Hebrew conceptual equivalent: חַיִּים (chayyim) – life (often plural in form, denoting fullness)
Life as It Was Meant to Be
“I came that they may have life (zōē), and have it abundantly.”
— John 10:10
❌ Mistranslated & Misunderstood
Most Bible translations render zōē (ζωή) as “life”—which is technically correct.
But the problem isn’t the translation. It’s the reduction of its meaning.
We often hear:
- “Eternal life” as “going to heaven when I die,”
- “New life” as a vague internal experience,
- Or “Christian life” as a moral code or religious routine.
But when Jesus spoke of zōē, He wasn’t offering an afterlife reward or religious system.
He was announcing a new way of being human—right now.
Zōē is not just more life.
It’s different life.
It’s the life of the Kingdom of Love.
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📜 What Zōē Meant in Scripture
Ancient Greek had several words for “life”:
- Bios — physical life, biological existence
- Psychē — inner life, personality, soul
- Zōē — deep, whole, abundant life as it was meant to be
So when Jesus or the apostles speak of the life God offers, they don’t use bios.
They use zōē—and they connect it to the inbreaking Kingdom of God.
“In Him was zōē, and that life was the light of all humanity.”
— John 1:4
“This is eternal life [zōē aiōnios]: that they know You… and Jesus the Christ.”
— John 17:3
Zōē is the life that begins not when we die, but when we align our lives with the King.
It’s what it means to be fully alive—in body, mind, and spirit—as a citizen of God’s reign.
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📆 Not Just Forever—From the Future Forward
The phrase zōē aiōnios—often translated “eternal life”—doesn’t mean “life that lasts forever.”
It means “life of the age to come.”
In Jewish thought:
- This present age is marked by sin, death, empire, injustice.
- But the age to come—God’s future—is marked by healing, justice, peace, and Shalom.
Jesus didn’t say, “Wait for that someday.”
He said, “It’s breaking in now—through Me.”
Zōē is future life showing up early, pulling us into the reality of the Kingdom even now.
So when we say “eternal life,” we don’t mean escape.
We mean participation in God’s future—starting today.
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🧬 Zōē and the Story So Far
Zōē doesn’t stand alone.
It grows organically from every word we’ve explored:
- Euangelion: The reign of God has broken in.
- Christos: Jesus is the King of that reign.
- Metanoia: Turn toward this new way of being.
- Pistis: Pledge your trust and loyalty to the King.
- Charis: Receive the empowering gift of grace.
- Sōzō: Be rescued, healed, and made whole…
And now, in Zōē:
You begin to live a different kind of life—a life shaped by agapē, ruled by Christ, empowered by grace, and grounded in Shalom.
Zōē is not the reward for salvation.
It’s the reality of salvation—embodied.
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🌿 What Does Zōē Look Like?
Zōē looks like Jesus.
It’s not success, survival, or self-preservation.
It’s:
- Forgiving instead of fighting,
- Serving instead of grasping,
- Loving instead of dominating,
- Healing instead of hiding,
- Participating in the Shabbat life God intended from the beginning.
In short:
Zōē is the restored image of God at work in the world.
It’s the life we were created for in Genesis.
The life made possible by the resurrection.
The life we now live as citizens of a new creation.
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☀️ Zōē and the Restoration of Shalom
From Shabbat (Word 1) to Sōzō (Word 15), we’ve followed the story of a broken world being reclaimed by its true King.
Zōē is the life of that kingdom.
It is where salvation leads.
It is the ongoing experience of being restored into the likeness of love.
📖 Zōē in Luke 10:25–28: Living Is Loving
The heartbeat of God’s Kingdom has always been agapē love. Without it, there is no shalom and no true Shabbat. Yet again and again, religion has twisted the question of ZOE life into something smaller, safer, and far less costly.
When teacher of Torah asks Jesus, “Teacher, what must I do to inherit the life of the age of God’s coming Kingdom (zōē aiōnios)?” (Luke 10:25), he is not asking how to “get into Heaven someday.” He is asking the burning question of existence: What does it mean to truly live as God intended.
But for centuries, we have read his words as if the goal were escape — to pass the test, check the box, what to believe to be “saved”, and to secure a ticket to a utopian afterlife in heaven. And in doing so, we have gutted Jesus’ answer of its explosive force.
Because when Jesus replies, He does not say:
“Believe this, and you will live.” “Pray this prayer, and you will live.” Or “Perform this ritual, and you will live.”
Instead, He says: “Love — and you will live (zēseis).”
Life — true, eternal, abundant life — is not about what you believe or think you know or the the correct doctrinal tribe you belong to. It is not about climbing the ladders of religious achievement or defending your theological turf. Or committing correct religious acts (like baptism or the Eucharist). No, none of those thing. Instead Jesus is crystal clear clear- Life is found in love. Period.
And Jesus will not let this remain abstract. He immediately tells the story of the Good Samaritan, blowing apart every boundary of comfort, prejudice, and tribal loyalty. He forces us to see the despised outsider as the true neighbor, the true lover, the true human being who is alive.
Here’s the scandal: you can believe all the right things, recite the Shema, sing the psalms, attend church, pray eloquent prayers, and still be dead inside. But the moment stop trying to find the way and simply do the agape loving acts toward God, ourselves, and others, in a world in need— that’s when we begin to live (ZOE) in the here and now according to Jesus.
Zōē is not a distant hope. It is not an inner feeling. It is the embodied reality of agapē here and now. Anything less — no matter how pious — is not ZOE life at all.
To love is to live. To refuse to love is to choose death and the path way to it that we were born into and the entire Gospel (as we have described thus far) that was given to save us from. That is the decision before us every single day.
Word Summary: Zōē
- Literal Meaning: Life—deep, full, whole
- Biblical Function: The lived experience of God’s reign breaking into the present
- Theological Meaning: The abundant, relational, future-oriented life that begins now under the rule of Christ
In Our Words:
Zōē is not life after death.
It’s life after allegiance.
It’s the life of the age to come—breaking into the present through the grace and love of King Jesus.
Zōē is more than existence or survival — it is abundant, eternal, whole life. Jesus shows us that this kind of life is not abstract or future-only but present and concrete. In Luke 10, He makes it unmistakably clear: to love is to live.
Life is found in agapē — love for God, for neighbor, and for self. This is why Jesus pairs zōē with the command to love and then illustrates it with the Samaritan who embodies costly compassion. Zōē is not about escaping this world; it is about entering into the fullness of God’s love here and now.
WHAT’s NEXT:
This prepares us for the next stage in our journey:
– Not just living, but setting the world back right order the way it was always intended to be.
That is what our next word (orge) is all about!
The Logos of Agape 
[…] Mistranslated Series: Word 16- Zoe – The abundant life we were meant for? […]
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