Love and the Power Part 3: Fighting for Something Better

1 Corinthians 13:8–13 ESV

Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Intro

In Chapter 9 of his book Strange Days, Pastor Mark Sayers writes about how many Christians in the west have grown soft largely because we have become overly comfortable.

He points out that many have built their faith around self-satisfaction rather than around the power and implications of the gospel message. Rather than making life about repentance, holiness, and the pursuit of love in Christ many say “I may do anything” (pursuing sin because of freedom) or “I must do everything (pursuing holiness but forgetting grace). Sayers points out that a Christian mindset is to say “Christ has done what I can’t do so I am free to do it.”

Christ, motivated by love, stepped out of His comfort in Heaven to come here and pursue extreme difficulty and discomfort in order to restore us to the Father.

Sayers reminds us that “unhindered comfort not only makes us spiritually sick but mentally and physically weak.”

He concludes that many in the church have been away from the battle for too long, forgotten how to fight, and perhaps we have even forgotten that we are in a battle. We have come to expect peace while the entire world is at war, trying to avoid the future Christ has decreed and which Christ will bring about in time.

While the world cried peace, we must go on fighting for something better, to bring as many into Christ as we can and to be as ready as possible for the future that we have in Him when it comes.

Like Christ, we step out of our comfortable place and into difficult spaces not because we enjoy the hardships but because through the hardships we can help others find joy in Christ, and we can be a part of helping Christ build towards His perfect plan for our future.

Tension

Adam and Eve settled for something altogether less that what God has for them. They did this because they were filled pride and impatience rather than love. Their pride manifested in the thought that they were ready to progress further than God said they could handle appropriately at that time. Their impatience manifested with taking action towards something that God had told them to wait on. Had they been acting out of love, they would have trusted God, that He was for them and that His plan for them was good.

Like them, we often operate in pride and impatience rather than love. When we jump ahead of God, or run after a goal contrary to where God is leading us, we are walking in the way of Adam and Eve. Christ wants to teach us the way of love which is built on trust in God and is practiced by making faith, hope, and love the waypoints by which our lives are directed forward.

Whereas the world seeks after its own desires above all, and we are tempted to do this also, Christians set our hearts of Christ alone and by doing so we join Christ in fighting for something better than a life marked by selfish pride and impatient power grabs. With His help, we can do as Jesus did and set ourselves aside, trusting God and living lives clearly marked by faith, hope, and love.

Truth

I. We consider our perfect future (8-10)

Teleios (10)

This word is used several times in the Bible with varying meanings, but all can be boiled down to maturity and/completeness.

Specifically here in 1 Corinthians 13, the word means the state of being complete without any defect or blemish.

In other places, it refers to the Christian growing up into Christ-likeness

Colossians 1:28 ESV

Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ.

Matthew 5:48 ESV

You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

James 1:4 ESV

And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

Ephesians 4:13 ESV

until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ,

Just as God aims to perfect each Christian, He also aims to perfect this fallen world and we are a part of His master plan.

James 1:18 ESV

Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.

We want to be careful that we don’t somehow forget God’s definition of perfection, and prefer some version of perfection of our own.

Most human ideas about what is perfect pertain to short term happiness or contentment. Christ is playing the long game, and intends to establish a future based on permanent joy which is entirely different, greater, and lasting compared to what the world pines after.

The gifts are good, but they exist for building the church towards maturity and a fulfilled future in Christ.

The gifts must never be our ultimate aim, but we must desire them with the intent on building up God’s church and pursuing His ultimate future.

The gifts are tools, like a good pair of running shoes which can equip us to win a race. The shoes are never the finish line, but they help us get there.

Until we get to the perfect future in Christ, we will always be a little incomplete in the way we operate and practice the faith. We must keep our eyes on the prize and not get too stuck in our present.

II. We run towards God’s perfect future at all costs (11-12)

Embracing the future Christ has for us means growing up. (11-12)

In our world today, there are many who refuse to grow up. They have a sort of Peter Pan syndrome.

They don’t embrace responsibility, they don’t get married or have kids, their chief questions are about personal happiness and fulfillment rather than serving and making our society a better place.

Likewise, many in the church have refused to grow up. So many make church about self, about having experiences and getting what we can out of the church rather than sacrificing ourselves to build up God’s church.

Our best experiences today are at most dim mirror compared to what we are going to experience in Christ one day.

We should enjoy the moment we are in, but we don’t want to mistake this moment for the ultimate which we are headed for.

The finish line for us is a place in which we know God fully as He knows us… that is AMAZING! That is a future worth pressing towards.

III. We consider what the map to that future looks like (13)

Faith: The way of love is marked by trust in God and waiting on Him.

It’s easy to get impatient with regards to spiritual gifts or any other aspect of our lives as believers. Sometimes God’s timetable is different than ours.

Jack Deere tells a story in his book Surprised by the Power of the Spirit, that after he knew God wanted him to begin praying for the sick in his church services, he prayed for the sick for months before he ever saw a healing.

Sometimes God just wants us to trust Him and walk down a path He has set for us even when we don’t understand what He is doing.

As we wait on God in obedience, our character and faith grow.

Isaiah 40:31 ESV

but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.

Hebrews 5:7–10 ESV

In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence. Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. And being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him, being designated by God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek.

If Christ was made perfect (same root word telios as “the perfect in verse 10) through his obedience, how much more is that true for us who are so far from where He wants us to be?

Hope: The way of love is marked by belief in God, taking Him at His word and looking optimistically towards the future He is crafting for us.

Love: The way of love is marked by hearts and lives set on doing everything possible to love God and our neighbor above all other things.

“The indispensable mark of Christian life is Christian love. The measure and test of love to God is whole-hearted obedience (John 14:15, 21, 23; 1 John 5:3); the measure and test of love to our neighbors is laying down our lives for them (1 John 3:16; cf. John 15:12, 13). This sacrificial love involves giving, spending, and impoverishing ourselves for their well-being. Jesus’ story of the Samaritan’s kindness to a traditional enemy is His model definition of how to love one’s neighbor (Luke 10:25–37).

Christian love is described in 1 Corinthians 13. Its total lack of self-concern is breathtaking. It seeks the neighbor’s good, and its true measure is how much it gives to that end. Love is a principle of action rather than of emotion. It is a matter of doing things for people out of compassion for them, whether or not we feel personal affection for them. It is by their active love to one another that Jesus’ disciples can be recognized (John 13:34, 35).” -R. C. Sproul, ed., The Reformation Study Bible

Faith, hope, and love are the clear markers of a life set on the superior way Paul describes here.

Application

In what way is Christ calling you to grow up spiritually?

Is your life marked by faith, hope, and love? How is Christ calling you to rise up in each of these areas?

What is a gift you believe Christ has given you and how can that gift help move us toward His perfect future?