The Greatest of These is Love - 1 Corinthians 13
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If you have your Bibles, please open them to 1 Corinthians 13.
Tonight we are continuing our time in our series called ‘Messy Church.’ In this series we are going through one of Paul’s letters to the Corinthian church, and as we have already seen, they were a mess because of sin.
They were divided over who the best preacher was
They were involved in all kinds of sexual immorality
Some were being led into idolatry and pagan worship
And most recently, we have been looking at the disorder of the church’s worship gatherings.
we saw that there was confusion between the role of men and women in the church - they were not recognizing the diversity that God created within the church
But there was diversity in other ways that was being celebrated. The rich were putting themselves before the poor when they came to the Lord’s table - here the Church was creating diversity over social classes where there should have been unity
So last week, we saw how Paul brought these ideas, the idea of diversity and unity, together in showing us the beauty of the church. Paul said the church is like a body, and each of us have different gifts, which is how we are diverse, and yet we are all a part of the same body, which means have been unified with one another with one another.
27 Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. 28 And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healing, helping, administrating, and various kinds of tongues. 29 Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? 30 Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret? 31 But earnestly desire the higher gifts.
And I will show you a still more excellent way.
So, what is the more excellent way that Paul is referring to? 1 Cor 13, is the the the answers that question.
So as we hear of this more excellent way, lets stand for the reading of God’s word.
1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. 11 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. 12 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.
13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
Let’s pray.
When we think of love, I wonder what comes to mind?
Perhaps you think of romance and weddings. When we think about love, we think about what it is like to fall in love with someone, and who you will fall in love with. Not only that, but every good romance story ends with two people living happily ever after. I wonder if that’s what comes to mind when we think about love.
Maybe for the rest of us, mostly us guys, maybe we think love is a weak virtue that isn’t worth pursuing. Maybe we think love is a sign of weakness, and so instead of showing love we hide our love, because we would rather be seen as strong.
While we have all sorts of ideas about what love is, the Bible introduces us to a radically different concept of love. It’s not a concept of falling in love, rather it is the choice to show love even with those who are difficult to love. And if love is far from being a sign of weakness. Rather, the Scriptures teach us that loving people is actually really hard work.
So if you think this chapter is about romantic love, then you have the wrong idea. While this is the great love chapter that we hear at weddings, it really has nothing to do with romantic love. Remember the context of this chapter. Paul is writing to the church, not to a husband and wife. And the church gatherings were a mess with all kinds of disorder. And so Paul shows us that the key to bringing order into the church is through love. Listen to how Paul puts it;
1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
Remember, all the gifts that Paul spoke of in 1 Cor 12? Well here he brings up some of these gifts again, particularly the higher gifts that all the Corinthians wanted.
Now, Paul is using exaggeration in this passage. Paul is describing the Corinthians idea of the “super Christian”…
1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
If you can speak in a way that has great eloquence, but you have no love, your words will have the same effect as a clanging cymbal.... this is a great illustration that I won’t actually do, because it will be all together obnoxious!
2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.
Okay these are serious powers here. You understand all mysteries and have all knowledge… how many of you know someone who is really wise? They really know the Scriptures well?
29 “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.
36 “But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only.
No one has all knowledge… but remember Paul is exaggerating to depict this “super Christian”
2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.
Paul is drawing an allusion to what Jesus said about having faith like a grain of a mustard seed to move the mountain… but the Point he is making is this is a lot of power!
So this Christian has all wisdom, and all power… These are the things that the Corinthians loved, but what they lacked was love… and so Paul said, that those who have all this wisdom and power, but lack love are in fact nothing.
3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
Here it is, the ultimate expression of following Jesus! Martyrdom, that is, dying for Jesus’ sake.
Remember Jesus said
11 “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
So persecution is the means to a reward then?
Well not if you don’t have love.
3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
1. Love is the vital virtue of every Christian.
1. Love is the vital virtue of every Christian.
You can have every spiritual gift, but if you lack love, your gifts are racket!
You can have all wisdom and power, but if you do not have love, you are nothing!
You can give everything up for Jesus’ sake, but if that is done apart from love, you will not receive any reward.
Pauls point is this; love is the vital virtue for every Christian.
While there is plenty diversity within the church, the one thing we all should have in common is love. And when we love, we will be less with how great our gifts are, and we will be more preoccupied with using our gifts to bless others as an expression of our love!
Love is the vital virtue of every Christian, but it’s also more than that…
Love is the vital virtue of of the entire Bible!
14 For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
Love is the vital virtue! So the question we must ask then, are we marked by love? It’s kind of hard to tell isn’t it?
I mean love isn’t something you can see, because love is an affection that is inside you. So I have it if I say it right? No not at all
Paul continues…
4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
2. Love is objective.
2. Love is objective.
Let me define this word here.
When something is objective, it means it can can be measured.
To help understand objective means, consider what the opposite side this is
What’s the opposite of something being objective?
Subjective
So if things that are objective can be measured, then something that is subjective is very difficult to measure.
When something is subjective, it is based on personal feelings or tastes
Look at this piece of art for example… can anyone take a stab as to what this is supposed to be?
It’s a dog
And let me tell you how much it sold for… This piece of art sold for 2.2 million dollars
Art is subjective… it’s difficult to define what is good and bad art…
I would argue that this art looks terrible… but apparently someone thought it had value.
Often times we treat love as if it was subjective…
We make love out to be a personal feeling or taste.
We like to make it so no one can correct me if I am unloving, because you can’t really measure my love because it’s my personal feeling… Well that’s what the Scriptures teach.
4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
If you lack patience… it’s not owing your personality. It’s a result of you lacking love.
If you are unkind, you can’t passing it of as just being the way you are.... your lack of kindness is a symptom of your lack of love.
But here’s the deal… if you are marked by love, then you should be able to insert your name where you see the word love in these verses…
Josh is patient and kind. Josh does not envy or boast; he is not arrogant or rude. He does not insist on his own way; he is not irritable or resentful; he does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Josh bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things…
Put your name in the place of love and consider, are you characterized by love?
If not, then you are lacking the vital virtue that every Christian must possess!
So if you are lacking love, what must you do? Do you need to start working harder? Do you need to just be more patient? More kind? Do you need to be less envious and less proud? Is this what we need to do in order to possess this vital virtue?
If you are lacking love, it is owing to the fact that you are disconnected from the very source of love! God is love… and so we can just as well understand the nature of if we put his name in the place of the word love.
Jesus is patient and kind. Jesus does not envy or boast; he is not arrogant or rude. He does not insist on his own way; he is not irritable or resentful; he does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Jesus bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Here we have this beautiful picture of Christ’s love for us! That even when we deserved his wrath, Jesus was patient with us. Even when we deserved sickness and death, Jesus was kind in showing us generosity and compassion. Even when we insisted on our own way, Jesus invited us to a better way through is perfect law. Even when we sinned against him time and time again, he didn’t resent us for it, but instead he forgave us. But Jesus never approved of our sins either, but instead he died so that we might know truth.
If you are lacking love, the get to know the very source of love! If you are lacking love, then you need Jesus.
There are many things that we might pursue, and they are things that we ought to pursue!
Paul told us;
31 But earnestly desire the higher gifts.
And I will show you a still more excellent way.
There is one way that we ought to pursue far more than all the rest, and that is love. Why? Paul tells us;
8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. 11 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. 12 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.
13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
3. Love will never end.
3. Love will never end.
There will come a day, when prophecies are no longer needed. For prophecies point forward to the day when Jesus will return. There will be a day where preaching will no longer be needed, for we will no longer need to be taught about God, rather we will know God, not just because he has revealed himself in his Word, but we will know him because we will be with him.
For now, we know God through the Scriptures… and Paul says this is like seeing God in a mirror dimly…
You know what this is like if you have ever looked in the mirror after a steamy hot shower. When the mirror is covered in steam, you can see your general outline and the color of the walls around you. But you can’t see the details of your face clearly. So what do you need to do? You need to wait for the steam to clear up so you can see clearly.
Similarly, Paul says that we see in a mirror dimly, but then, when Christ returns we will see God face to face.
And in that day, there will no longer the need for preaching as we know it now. There will be no need for repentance, for we will be made perfect! There will be no need for faith, for we will not believe in what he have heard, but instead we will know God because we will see him. On that day we will no longer hope in him. For who hopes in what he already has? When Christ returns our hope will be fulfilled. But what of love? Will our love for God ever end? Will our love for one another ever cease? Absolutely not. Rather our love will only grow!
So paul says,
13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
Let’s pray