Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

• 1 Corinthians 13:1-13

Noted Biblical Scholars, Teachers, and Preachers Comments

1 Corinthians 13:1-3 ‘But Do Not Have Love’: “First of all, what is said here is something very simple, namely, that a life has meaning and value only to the extent that it has love, and that a life is nothing- nothing at all-and has no meaning or value if there is no love in it (1 Cor. 13:1-3). A life has value according to how much love it has. Everything else is nothing, absolutely nothing, completely irrelevant, completely unimportant. Everything bad and everything good, everything large and everything small is unimportant-we are asked only one question: whether or not we have love….
” ‘If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels … ‘This is a possibility with which we had not reckoned: that even our holiest words can become unholy, godless, common, if they do not have heart, if they do not have love…
” ‘And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge …’ If I knew why I must travel this path and why others must travel that path, if I could perceive even here and now the dark ways of God-would that not be blessedness? …
“Perception, knowledge, and truth without love are nothing. They are not truth, for truth is God, and God is love. Therefore, truth without love is a lie.”

• Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I Want to Live These Days with You, devotional compiled from several of his writings

1 Corinthians 13:1 ‘tongues of men’: ”Cf. 12:10, 28; 14:4-33. That this gift was actual languages is established in Acts 2:1–13, affirmed in this text by Paul’s calling it ‘of men’—clearly a reference to human language. This was the gift which the Corinthians prized so highly, abused so greatly, and counterfeited so disastrously. God gave the ability to speak in a language not known to the speaker, as a sign with limited function (see … 14:1–33). Tongues … of angels. The apostle was writing in general hypothetical terms. There is no biblical teaching of any special angelic language that people could learn to speak. Love. Self-giving love that is more concerned with giving than receiving (John 3:16; cf. 14:1; Matt. 5:44, 45; John 13:1, 34, 35, 15:9; Rom. 5:10; Eph. 2:4–7; Phil. 2:2; Col. 3:14; Heb. 10:24). The word was not admired and thus seldom used in ancient Gr. literature, but it is common in the NT. Without love, no matter how linguistically gifted one is to speak his own language, other languages, or even (hypothetically) the speech of angels, his speech is noise only. In NT times, rites honoring the pagan deities Cybele, Bacchus, and Dionysius included ecstatic noises accompanied by gongs, cymbals, and trumpets. Unless the speech of the Corinthians was done in love, it was no better than the gibberish of pagan ritual.”

• John MacArthur, John MacArthur Commentary (quoted Scripture without bold/italics)

1 Corinthians 13:2 ‘gift of prophecy’: “Paul considered the gift of prophecy to be of primary significance for the Christian community (1Co 14:1–25; 1Th 5:19–20). The Corinthians, on the other hand, favored ‘knowledge’ (1Co 1:5; 8:1). Love is the essential undergirding for the proper management of any spiritual gift.”

• Dorothy Kelley Patterson, General Editor, NIV Woman’s Study Bible (Patty Comber, Pauline Epistles contributor)

1 Corinthians 13:3 ‘What is Love?’: ”… ‘but do not have love, I gain nothing’ (1 Cor. 13:3). Here we have the crucial word on which people basically differ and part ways: love. There is a knowledge of Christ, a powerful faith in Christ. Indeed, there is an attitude and a devotion of love unto death, but without love. That’s just it: without this ‘love’ everything falls apart, and every-thing is reprehensible; in this love everything is united, and everything is pleasing to God. What is this love? There are many differing definitions that claim to under-stand love: as human behavior, as attitude, as devotion, as sacrifice, as community spirit, as feeling, as passion, as service, as deed. All of this, without exception, can exist without ‘love.’ Everything that we usually call love – what lives in the depths of the soul and in the visible deed, and even what comes forth from the godly heart as friendly service to the neighbor-can be without ‘love.’ That is not because in every human behavior there is always a ‘remnant’ of self-seeking that totally darkens love. Rather, it is because love is absolutely something entirely different from what is meant by it here.”

• Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I Want to Live These Days with You, devotional compiled from several of his writings

1 Corinthians 13:4-8 ‘love – an act of the will’: ”We demonstrate God’s reality and power when we have learned the secret set forth in [the thirteenth] chapter  – the famous love chapter, of the New Testament, 1 Corinthians 13.  The most startling aspect of Paul’s love is the way he defines love; not as an emotion, but as a decision, or act of the will.“

• Ray C. Stedman, Adventuring Through the Bible

1 Corinthians 13:4-7 ‘Love is Patient’ : ”There is no one who lives without love. Everyone has love; we know about its power and its passion. We even know that this love makes up the whole meaning of our life…. But this love whose power, passion, and meaning everyone knows is the love of human beings for themselves … This self-love sets itself up as love of neighbor, as love of the homeland, as social love, as love of people, and does not want to be recognized. Paul calls self-love to responsibility by sketching before it and before us the image of the love that counts before God…. ‘Love is patient; love is kind … ‘(1 Cor. 13:4-7). Love, that is, can wait, wait a long time, wait until the end. It never becomes impatient; it never wants to hurry things up and force them. It deals with long periods of time. Waiting, having patience, continuing to love and be kind, even where it seems entirely to miss the mark-this alone wins people over; this alone breaks the bonds that chain every person, the chains of human fear and anxiety about a radical change, about a new life. Kindness often seems so completely inappropriate, but love is patient and kind. It waits, as one waits for those who have gone astray, waits and rejoices when they still come at all.”

• Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I Want to Live These Days with You, devotional compiled from several of his writings

1 Corinthians 13:4-5 ‘attitude’: “Attitude is so crucial in the life of the Christian. We can go through the Sunday motions, we can carry out the religious exercises, we can pack a Bible under our arms, and sing the songs from memory, yet we can still hold grudges against the people who have wronged us. In our own way-and it may even be with a little religious manipulation-we’ll get back at them. But that is not God’s way.”

• Charles R. Swindoll, Bedside Blessing

1 Corinthians 13:4 ‘love waits’: “To love and to be loved is the bedrock of our existence. But love must also flex and adapt. Rigid love is not true love. It is veiled manipulation, a conditional time bomb that explodes when frustrated. Genuine love willingly waits! It isn’t pushy or demanding. While it has its limits, its boundaries are far-reaching. It neither clutches nor clings. Real love is not shortsighted, selfish, or insensitive. It detects needs and does what is best for the other person without being told.”

• Charles R. Swindoll, Bedside Blessing

1 Corinthians 13:5 ‘Is it loving to do it?’: “When defining what love is not, Paul put rudeness on the list. The Greek word for rude means shameful or disgraceful behavior.
“An example of rudeness was recently taken before the courts in Minnesota. A man fell out of his canoe and lost his temper. Though the river was lined with vacationing families, he polluted the air with obscenities. Some of those families sued him. He said, ‘I have my rights.’
“God calls us to a higher, more noble concern. Not ‘What are my rights?’ but ‘What is loving?’
“Do you have the right to dominate a conversation? Yes, but is it loving to do so? …
“Is it within your rights to bark at the clerk or snap at the kids? Yes. But is it loving to act this way? “

• Max Lucado, A Love Worth Giving

1 Corinthians 13:6 ‘Love Rejoices in the Truth’: “Love is not an immediate personal relationship, going into the personal and the individual, in contrast to a law of the objective, of impersonal order. Apart from the fact that here ‘personal’ and ‘objective’ are torn apart in a very unbiblical and abstract way, love here becomes just a human behavior and, moreover, only a partial one. Beside the lower ethos of the purely objective and orderly, ‘love’ is then a higher ethos of the personal that appears as perfection and expansion. This corresponds to a situation in which, for example, one has love and truth in conflict with each other and ranks love as the personal above truth as the impersonal. This puts one in direct contradiction with Paul’s statement that love rejoices in the truth (1 Car. 13:6). Love does not know the conflict by which one might want to define it. Rather, love, by its very nature, is beyond any separation. Luther, with a clear biblical view, calls a love that encroaches on the truth, or even just neutralizes it, a ‘cursed love,’ even if it appears in the most pious clothing. A love that comprises only the area of personal human relations, but capitulates before objectivity, can never be the love of the New Testament.”

• Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I Want to Live These Days with You, devotional compiled from several of his writings

1 Corinthians 13:7 ‘the attributes of love’: “The love of which so much is spoken of in this chapter is absolutely essential to true godliness. So essential is it that if we have everything else but do not have this love, it profits us nothing. This love is not the prerogative of a few, but it must be the possession of all believers. This love has four sweet companions. They are: tenderness that ‘bears all things,’ faith that ‘believes all things,’ hope that ‘hopes all things’ and patience that ‘endures all things.’
“Love ‘bears all things.’ The word rendered ‘bear’ might as correctly have been translated ‘covers.’ This love both covers and bears all things. It never proclaims the errors of others. It refuses to see faults unless it may kindly help in their removal. It stands in the presence of a fault with a finger on its lips. It does not attempt to make a catalog of provocations.
“Love ‘believes all things.’ In reference to our fellow Christians, love always believes the best of them. This love believes good of others as long as it can, and when it is forced to fear that wrong has been done, love will not readily yield to evidence but will give the accused brother or sister the benefit of many doubts. Some persons habitually believe everything that is bad about others; they are not the children of love.
“Love ‘hopes all things.’ Love never despairs. We should never despair of our fellow Christians. As to the unconverted, we will never do anything with them unless we hope great things about them. We need to cultivate great hopefulness about sinners. Love ‘endures all things.’ This refers toa patient perseverance in loving. This is, perhaps, the hardest work of all, for many people can be affectionate and patient for a time, but the task is to hold on year after year. In reference to our fellow Christians, love holds out under all rebuffs. We endure not some things but all things for Christ’s sake. As to the unconverted, they may shut their ears and refuse to hear us-never mind, we can endure all things.“

• Charles H. Spurgeon, from sermon notes

1 Corinthians 13:8-10 ‘never fails’: “This refers to love’s lastingness or permanence as a divine quality. Love outlasts all failures (cf. 1 Pet. 4:8; 1 John 4:16). Paul strengthens his point on the permanence of love by comparing it to the spiritual gifts which the Corinthians so highly prized: prophecy, knowledge, and languages, all of which will have an end. There may be a distinction made on how prophecy and knowledge come to an end, and how the gift of languages does. This is indicated by the Gr. verb forms used. In the case of prophecy and knowledge, they are both said to ‘be abolished’ (in both cases the verb indicates that something will put an end to those two functions). Verses 9, 10 indicate that what will abolish knowledge and prophecy is ‘that which is perfect.’ When that occurs, those gifts will be rendered inoperative. The ‘perfect’ is not the completion of Scripture, since there is still the operation of those two gifts and will be in the future kingdom (cf. Joel 2:28; Acts 2:17; Rev. 11:3). The Scriptures do not allow us to see ‘face to face’ or have perfect knowledge as God does (v. 12). The ‘perfect’ is not the rapture of the church or the second coming of Christ, since the kingdom to follow these events will have an abundance of preachers and teachers (cf. Is. 29:18; 32:3, 4; Joel 2:28; Rev. 11:3). The perfect must be the eternal state, when we in glory see God face to face (Rev. 22:4) and have full knowledge in the eternal new heavens and new earth. Just as a child grows to full understanding, believers will come to perfect knowledge, and no such gifts will be necessary.
“On the other hand, Paul uses a different word for the end of the gift of languages, thus indicating it will ‘cease’ by itself, as it did at the end of the apostolic age. It will not end by the coming of the ‘perfect,’ for it will already have ceased. The uniqueness of the gift of languages and its interpretations was, as all sign gifts, to authenticate the message and messengers of the gospel before the NT was completed (Heb. 2:3, 4). ‘Tongues’ was also limited by being a judicial sign from the God of Israel’s judgment (see … 14:21; cf. Is. 28:11, 12). “Tongues” were also not a sign to believers, but unbelievers (see … 14:22), specifically those unbelieving Jews. Tongues also ceased because there was no need to verify the true messages from God once the Scripture was given. It became the standard by which all are to be deemed true. ‘Tongues’ was a means of edification in a way far inferior to preaching and teaching (see … 14:5, 12, 27, 28). In fact, chap. 14 was designed to show the Corinthians, so preoccupied with tongues, that it was an inferior means of communication (vv. 1-12), an inferior means of praise (vv. 13-19), and an inferior means of evangelism (vv. 20-25). Prophecy was and is, far superior (vv. 1, 3-6, 24, 29, 31, 39). That tongues have ceased should be clear from their absence from any other books in the NT, except Acts. Tongues ceased to be an issue of record or practice in the early church, as the Scripture was being written. That tongues has ceased should be clear also from its absence through church history since the first century, appearing only sporadically and then only in questionable groups. A more detailed discussion is given in the notes on chap. 14.”

• John MacArthur, John MacArthur Commentary (quoted Scripture without bold/italics)

1 Corinthians 13:8 ‘What is Really Left?’: ”If we ask ourselves in disturbing times what is really left, ultimately, of the back and forth of thoughts and reflections, of all the worries and fears, of all the wishes and hopes that we have, and if we want the Bible to give us the answer, then it will tell us: from all of that, there is ultimately only one thing-namely, love-that we have had in our thoughts, worries, wishes, and hopes. Everything else ends, passes away. Everything we have not thought and longed for out of love – all ideas, all knowledge, all speech – ceases without love. Only Love never ends (1 Cor. 13:8). …
“Why must all else cease? Why does love alone never end? Because only in love do people give up themselves and sacrifice their own will for others. Because only love comes not out of my own self, but out of another self, out of God’s self. Because, therefore, in love God himself is acting through us, whereas in everything else we ourselves are acting: it is our thoughts, our speech, our knowledge, but it is God’s love. Everything that is from us must cease-everything, but what is from God remains.”

• Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I Want to Live These Days with You, devotional compiled from several of his writings

1 Corinthians 13:9-13 ‘The Future Revelation of Full Knowledge’: “In 1 Corinthians 13 Paul discusses the issue of godly love (verses r-7) and concludes that, in the Christian experience, ‘love never fails.’ The gifts of prophecy, tongues, and knowledge will someday ‘be done away’ (verse 8). They will no longer be operative, but love will not disappear. For the present, believers in Christ know and prophesy only ‘in part’ (verse 9)-that is, with limitation. However, in the future, ‘when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away’ (verse 10). What does the apostle mean when he refers to ‘the perfect’ (Greek, teleios)? Edwards writes, ‘The temporary character of the Charismata is proved by their essentially partial nature.  It will, therefore cease, not because it has been absorbed in something better, but as sounds which have no music in them die away in the air and do not live in ideas (Commentary on the First Epistle to the Corinthians, P. 349).’
“Some believe Paul is here referring to the completion of the New Testament canon, when all the revelations and commandments for the church age are made known.  After the book of Revelation is written by John the apostle (A.O. 90-95), there will be no need for the ‘communication gifts’ within the body of Christ, such as prophecy, tongues, and knowledge.”

• Tim LaHaye and Ed Hindson, Exploring Bible Prophecy

1 Corinthians 13:9-10 ‘We Know Only in Part’: ”Love wants entry into the world of our thoughts and knowledge. Knowledge is the most like love. It too has others as its object and is directed toward others. It wants to grasp and understand and explain the world and people and the mysteries of God. … There are big questions on which we all want to try our knowledge and with which we also quickly learn the boundaries of our knowledge: What is our own way? What are the ways of other people? And what is God’s way that goes behind all human ways?
“… All answers are partial and pass away. That was recognized by one of the greatest thinkers of all time as the end and beginning of wisdom: I know that I know nothing. That was his final certainty. “For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end” (1 Cor. 13:9-10). The complete, however, is love. Knowledge and love are related to each other as the part to the whole. And the more longing for perfection there is in the knowing person, the more love there will be. Perfect knowledge is perfect love. That is a strange but still very profound and true statement of Paul.”

• Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I Want to Live These Days with You, devotional compiled from several of his writings

1 Corinthians 13:11-12 ‘Never Stop Skiing’: “When he was nine, Nathan went skiing with his parents in Colorado. All along the ski slopes, signs were posted with the warning:
“BEWARE OF SNOW CATS.
“Each sign was approximately five feet high and eight feet wide–you couldn’t miss these large warning signs strategically placed beside the ski trails heading down the mountain. After three days of skiing, Nathan pointed to one of the signs as he and his dad were riding the ski lift to the top of the mountain. ‘Daddy, have you seen one yet?’
” ‘Seen what, Nathan?’
” ‘A snow cat.’ Upon further discussion, Nathan’s dad realized that the ‘snow cats’ his son was keeping a sharp eye out for were of the mountain lion, snow leopard, or comparable dangerous-animal variety. Smiling, Scott explained to his son that what the signs were referring to were the snowplow-like machines that drove up and down the slopes packing down the snow, machines referred to as ‘snow cats.’
” ‘Oh.’ Nathan breathed a deep sigh of relief.
“You may have experienced a similar situation of misinterpretation with your children from time to time. But here’s what I want you to take from Nathan’s story: despite believing that at any given moment a mountain lion or snow leopard could leap out of the trees while he was skiing down the slopes, Nathan never stopped skiing. Instead, he pointed his ski tips straighter to be ready to outrun the danger.
“Things take on a different perspective through the eyes and heart of a child.
“But as the apostle Paul says, it’s not always going to be that way. Things that are a little muddied will be made crystal clear. God will dispel your fears, and you will be able to see things exactly as they are. Can you imagine the courage and hope you will sense when you stand before Him face-to-face?
“Why not feel it now? No matter what you face, keep on skiing!”

• Tony Dungy with Nathan Whitaker, Uncommon Life – Daily Challenge (excerpt from devotion for 16 January)

1 Corinthians 13:11-12 ‘The Mirror Writing of God’: ”It is a surprising image when the age of a child is com-pared with the partial nature of knowledge, and the maturity of adulthood with the perfection of love (1 Cor. 13:11). Knowledge without love is childish, a childish approach, a childish attempt … the pride of knowledge without love is like the boasting of youth, which only makes the mature person smile Paul says that love is the stuff of mature insight, of true knowledge, of age. That clearly distinguishes this love from all fanaticism, from all weakness and sentimentality-love means truth before God. It means perfect knowledge before God.
“And yet a second image: ‘For now we see in a mirror   ‘ (1 Cor. 13:12). God’s thoughts are found in the world only as if caught in a mirror. We see them only in mirror writing, and the mirror writing of God is hard to read. Indeed, it reads that large is small and small is large, that right is wrong and wrong is right, that hopelessness is promise and the hopeful expect judgment. Indeed, it reads that the cross means victory and death means life. We read the mirror writing of God in Jesus Christ, in his living and speaking and dying.”

• Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I Want to Live These Days with You, devotional compiled from several of his writings

1 Corinthians 13:12-13 ‘Corinthian mirrors’: “The city of Corinth was famous for producing some of the finest bronze mirrors in antiquity. Paul used the analogy of looking in a mirror to explain the indirect nature of one’s view of God and his ways. One ‘sees’ God and his ‘mysteries’ only indirectly and partially. Although good, the image is limited (v. 12) and falls short of the real thing. Spiritual gifts were undoubtedly good but were only necessary for the present age of partial seeing and knowledge. Christian love, on the other hand, was eternal. Paul wanted the Corinthians to correct their perspective and focus on the greatness of the eternal rather than that of the temporal.”

• Dorothy Kelley Patterson, General Editor, NIV Woman’s Study Bible (Patty Comber, Pauline Epistles contributor)

1 Corinthians 13:12 ‘God is Love’: “l believe that at the end of time, when we know as we are known, it will be found that even the damning of a man is an expression of the love of God as certainly as the redeeming of a man. God cannot separate Himself into parts arid do with one attribute one thing, and with another, another. All that God is determines all that God does. So when God redeems a man in love, or damns another man in justice, He’s not contradicting Himself, but justice and love are working together in the unitary Being of God.
“What we mean when we say, ‘God is love,’ is what we mean when we say of a man, ‘He is kindness itself.’ We don’t mean that kindness and the man are equated and identical, but we mean the man is so kind that kindness is all over him and conditions everything he does. So when we say, ‘God is love,’ we mean that God’s love is such that it permeates His essential being and conditions all that He does. Nothing God ever does, or ever did, or ever will do, is done separate from the love of God.”

• A. W. Tozer, The Price of Neglect

1 Corinthians 13:12 ‘In a mirror or face-to-face’: “Ancient people often made mirrors from bronze, and the bronze of Corinth was especially famous as the best bronze of the ancient Mediterranean world. Some Corinthian bronze had even been imported to Jerusalem for use in the temple. Nevertheless, the best of ancient mirrors provided only an imperfect reflection, leading some philosophers to use the analogy of an imperfect mirror to depict mortals’ imperfect attempts to understand the deity.
“Paul apparently uses the same analogy. The present, partial state of our knowledge of God compares to seeing ‘in a mirror, dimly’ (1 Cor. 13:12). This contrasts with the full knowledge of God available when Christ returns, which will be like seeing ‘face to face.’
“Jewish traditions likewise contrasted Moses’ face-to-face revelation of God with the partial revelation seen by most other prophets (Num. 12:8; Deut. 34:10). In the present, God’s people receive spiritual gifts that partly reveal God, but in the future, such gifts will be unnecessary because believers will know God face to face, as Moses did.
“Paul anticipated this future age when he would know God directly (1 Cor. 13:12; see Jer. 31:31–34), and his expectation influenced his ideas about spiritual gifts. The gifts which the Corinthians valued so highly were only for this life, and in the future age there would be no more need for the gifts of prophecies, tongues, or knowledge (13:8–10). The reflection of the dim mirror would become a face-to-face view.”

• Timothy B. Cargal, et al., The Chronological Study Bible

1 Corinthians 13:13 ‘Love’: “The objects of faith and hope will be fulfilled and perfectly realized in heaven, but love, the God-like virtue, is everlasting (cf. 1 John 4:8). Heaven will be the place for the expression of nothing but perfect love toward God and one another.”

• John MacArthur, John MacArthur Commentary (quoted Scripture without bold/italics)

1 Corinthians 13 ‘Reflections’: “Just what is Paul telling us in this thirteenth chapter of his first Corinthian epistle? That love is absolutely indispensable to the Christian life. The gift of tongues without love is so much noise. The gift of prophecy without love is of no benefit. Without love, knowledge and faith are useless. And though a man bestow all his goods to feed the poor and die at last a martyr’s death, if he have not love it profits him nothing. So Paul states in the first three verses, after which he de-scribes love and identifies it so the reader will know what kind of person he must be to escape an unprofitable, empty, and deceived existence.
“Paul’s analysis of love is not intended to tell us what kind of being Christ is, but what kind of person a real Christian must be. That these virtues are all in Christ, I repeat, is the common belief of all Christians, but they were not listed in the inspired Word to teach us that.

• A. W. Tozer, The Pursuit of Man

My Thoughts

Before we get started with the “Love Chapter of the New Testament,” let’s put this chapter into context.  The introduction to this chapter is at the end of 1 Corinthians 12.  There it states that all these spiritual gifts are nice, but there is something different that is important.

Thus, especially since chapter and verse divisions were added later, we can see these verses about love as a test.  The Corinthians were proud people.  In having several of the gifts of the Spirit, they would elevate themselves above those that had less gifts or the one who had a gift that was not as impressive as theirs, in their opinion.

So, Paul says love is more important, but in defining what love is, he is asking a subtle question.  Can you demonstrate those gifts of the Spirit while being patient, kind, not envious, not boastful, not proud?  So, if we do not have love, and we do not put that love into action, our spiritual gifts mean nothing.

And 1 Corinthians 14 examines speaking in tongues.   So, without the chapter divisions, we might simply look at these verses as a sanity check, or more appropriate, a test to leave your pride at the door and come humbly to the feet of Jesus.

And one more comment about the “Love Chapter.”  In the NIV, there are only seven verses that have the word “love” in them.  Albeit, verses 5 and 7 say “it” meaning “love.”  Even so, the other four verses, roughly a third of the chapter, is not, on the surface, about “love.”

But Paul forgets spiritual gifts in the first verse.  He uses the illustration of if he did not have love, speaking the tongues of men or angels is simply like a clanging cymbal or a banging gong.  A lot of noise.

This is a setup for 1 Corinthians 14.  Love people.  Then if “speaking in tongues” can be used in the process of loving them, then it is okay.  But then, Paul expands that analogy to gifts of prophecy, knowledge, and miracles due to a strong faith.  Without love, those are meaningless too.

These statements can stand alone, but in context, does that gift help us love others better?  Moving mountains is a great trick, and Jesus promises us that we can move mountains with a small amount of faith.  But does that removed mountain love someone?  Then, before you pick up the mountain, you should already have an idea of where you are going to put it.  If you drop it in the sea, should you warn the fish?

Then we discover what love is.  Love is patient and kind.  We discover what love is not, such as proud or self-seeking.  We learn what love does not do, such as envy, boast, or dishonor others.  Then we see what love always does: protects, trusts, hopes, and perseveres.

But then, the attribute of love, that it never fails, brings us back to the gifts of the spirit.  When we are living in the new earth and Jesus is among us, there is no need for prophecy.  We will all speak the same language, although my wife’s dream (one among many that I have heard described), we will simply think something and the other person hears the thought in their head.  I guess that is one more reason to practice listening to God’s voice here on earth.  God’s voice is rarely audible in my experience.

About a year ago, I wrote a short story entitled, “The Lieutenant’s Dream” where Deviled Yeggs talks about a dream.  He had gone to Heaven, or some kind of Heaven, and he had to have a job, but there was no sin, no death, no pain.  So, no homicides that needed to be solved.  But he taught three Bible studies during the week, but with Jesus right there, why teach a Sunday school class?  And when there is no day or night, when is it Sunday?  And Deviled Yeggs started the mission project to feed the homeless, but in Heaven, everyone has a mansion.  Deviled Yeggs needed a job, but everything that he did on earth was unneeded skills in Heaven.  But Dev could love and worship God.

Paul says that we prophesy and know things only in part, but then completeness erases that incompleteness.

I love Alan Sherman music.  In his classic song, One Hippopotami, he speaks of singulars and plurals, stretching the definition drastically for comic intent.  Then there is a bridge in the middle of the song: “Singulars and plurals are so different Bless my soul Has it ever occurred to you That the plural of half is whole?”

In a comic way, Alan Sherman explains verse 10.  When completeness comes, that which is only in part disappears.  It is still there, but it is now whole.

Paul uses the knowledge of a child to illustrate.  The child thinks he or she knows it, but as the child gets older, more information is added.  I know that love is patient, but I sometimes get impatient when a grandchild says, “I know everything.”  Of course, that is proven to be false when he cannot even spell it.  Not the word he was talking about.  I mean “I-T”, it.

Sorry, frustration coming out there.

But Paul takes “the big enduring three”, faith, hope, and love.  The greatest is love.

Some Serendipitous Reflections

1 Corinthians 13 1. Have group members rewrite each of the ‘love is…’ qualities to show what love should look like in their specific situation at home, work, political views, church, etc. Which one do you need to work on this week?”

• Lyman Coleman, et al, The NIV Serendipity Bible for Study Groups

First Corinthians 13 has one question.

Substitute whatever group for any reference to a small group or ask who could come to your aid.

If you like these Thursday morning Bible studies, but you think you missed a few, you can use this LINK. I have set up a page off the home page for links to these Thursday morning posts. I will continue to modify the page as I add more.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.