Love never fails

1 Corinthians 12:27-13:13 from the daily reading in the One Year Bible

Now you are Christ’s body, and individually members of it. ²⁸ And God has appointed in the church, first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, various kinds of tongues. ²⁹ All are not apostles, are they? All are not prophets, are they? All are not teachers, are they? All are not workers of miracles, are they? ³⁰ All do not have gifts of healings, do they? All do not speak with tongues, do they? All do not interpret, do they? ³¹ But earnestly desire the greater gifts.

And I show you a still more excellent way.

The Excellence of Love

13 If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. ² If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. ³ And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.

⁴ Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, ⁵ does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, ⁶ does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; ⁷ bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

⁸ Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away. ⁹ For we know in part and we prophesy in part; ¹⁰ but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away. ¹¹ When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things. ¹² For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. ¹³ But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Today’s text includes one of the most often repeated and reprinted portions of scripture, 1 Corinthian 13 is sometimes referred to as the love chapter and verses 4-7 are familiar even too many who have never read the Bible.

Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant,  does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered,  does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth;  bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  The world likes to tell Christians that they should love more. They call believers hypocrites if they do not act in love. The problem is that there is a difference between love as the world describes it and love as God demonstrates it. The world says that in order to love, we must be tolerant and inclusive; that we must embrace everyone and everything. Romans 5:8 says: God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.  In John 3:16, Jesus says: God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.  God’s love then, is inclusive, it includes eternal life for everyone who believes that Jesus died for their sins. God though never tolerated or embraced our sins. Jesus does not tolerate or embrace the very things that He suffered and died for.

To understand true love; the love described and demonstrated by God, we need to recognize that in today’s text, love is presented in the context of spiritual gifts. It is something that we receive from God. 1 John 4:19 says: We love, because He first loved us.  Our ability and capacity to love and to understand love comes only because God first loved us. True love is more than a feeling or an emotion. It is more than something we decide whether or not we will do. True love is a gift from God and is spiritual. What we do, how we express love is our response to God’s love for us.  We love, because He first loved us.  First and foremost our response should be what Jesus says in Matthew 22:37-38:  “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’  This is the first and great commandment.” In John 14:15 Jesus says:  “If you love Me, keep My commandments.”  So, true love is that we first and foremost love God with our whole heart, soul and mind. If there is an emotion to our love, a heart love, it should first be toward God. If there is a decision about our love, a mind love, it should be that we will love and obey God. Returning to Matthew 22, verse 39 adds to what we saw previously saying:  “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’  This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like it:‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”  So, our love for others then is dependent on and flows from our love for God, which comes from receiving His love for us, demonstrated in the cross. If we love others as we love ourselves then, we do not tolerate or embrace the sin that Jesus suffered and died for. Instead we also demonstrate the love of God, pointing others to the cross of Christ.

Now, look again at the description of love:  Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant,  does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered,  does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth;  bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  It is important to recognize not only what love is and what it does, but also what it is not and what it does not do. Love is not jealous. We cannot say we are acting in love when we are jealous of what others have. Love does not brag and is not arrogant. We are not acting in love if we say others are less than us. The world arrogantly says that those who don’t believe as they do are unenlightened and have not progressed or evolved. Love does not act unbecomingly. Love does not, seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered,  does not rejoice in unrighteousness. Those who seek self-promotion are not acting in love. Those who are provoked to violence, division and destruction are not acting in love.  Those who promote the idea that others should make restitution for the wrongs of the past, do not understand true love. Surely, those who rejoice in, celebrate embrace and participate in unrighteousness, do not understand or act in love.

The text says:  Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away.  For we know in part and we prophesy in part;  but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away.  When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things.  For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known.  But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love.   Surely if other spiritual gifts will be done away with in the perfect manifestation of love, then childish and imperfect human wisdom and knowledge will not last. Love never fails, because true love is demonstrated by God, in the cross of Christ, leading to eternal life. Ephesians 4:15-16 says:  Speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ,  from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.  True love speaks the truth.

Heavenly Father, Lord Jesus Christ and precious Holy Spirit, thank You for Your love that never fails. Through the cross, through the acceptance of Your love, may I fully know and demonstrate love. May I truly love You with all of my heart, soul and mind. May I love others, pointing to and demonstrating the love of Christ and may I always tell the truth, that Christ died for the sins of the world, so that everyone who believes could be included in the kingdom of heaven.  Amen.