When I have enough then I can be generous, but when will I have enough? We need more time, more resources, more energy. More often than not though I think we’re fooled into believing that we don’t have enough to give away, and that we need more than we can give. Perhaps that’s why it can be hard sometimes to live this way and to lay our lives down sacrificially for others. It often doesn’t come easily to us, because of that cost. It is therefore at least as important to be loving as it is to feel love, if not more so.īut love is not cheap, it costs something. In the New Testament, the word Agape – the word for love used here – is used 137 times as a verb and 116 times as a noun. It is not just a feeling or emotion, but it is something that one does. He taught patience, kindness, respect, and perseverance. I chose this passage because when speaking with Tom, one of the things he mentioned that characterized his father was his love. But Paul notes that if we don’t have love, the most basic of gifts, all the other gifts are meaningless. It’s important to notice this because the prior gifts – prophecy, wisdom, charity, for example – are the ones that get the most attention in the world. But then he goes on in chapter 13 to speak of how love the most important spiritual gift of all. He appeals to the gospel as the one thing that binds them all together.
In this letter it’s the topic he speaks on longest, because it’s at the core of the divisions in the church. Paul has just finished speaking about spiritual gifts – the foundation of the body of Christ. And then it’s at this point that he points them to the “why” behind the “what to do”. Paul responds to a number of their questions about the order of the service and so on, points out where he sees them in error. The church was “majoring in the minors” to borrow a phrase. They were boasting about their wisdom and knowledge, but Paul was pointing out that their wisdom was futile. There were rival groups fighting for attention and power while more serious issues were being ignored. When Paul wrote to the Corinthian church, he was writing to a church divided. But in reflecting back over an entire life we can see how that love flowed out to others, to see the hard work that it did in tough times, and to see that love is not merely something that is felt but something that one does. In marriage we see the romantic side of love, the love of one for another.
These words are often heard at weddings, not at funerals. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
5 It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing. 2 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 have not love, I am nothing. 1 Cor 13:1-7 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.
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