1 Corinthians 13
“And the Greatest Is Love”
Sermon by
Mark A. Horne
John Brown wrote a letter to his family just before he was hanged at Charles Town, Virginia. Among many excellent things he said in his letter, he made a statement to his children that he found the highest joy in life in loving and being loved. He tells them man is made for love. But they should be watchful for in the image of the earthly there are many shadows and many difficulties in the way of loving and being loved.
Paul confronts his readers with the same type warning at Corinth. In chapter 13 Paul engages us in conversation with the faith and practice of both the Church at Corinth and our own Christian community. As we have noted through our study in this Epistle, Paul was dealing with several genres of people. He was dealing with mostly Gentiles, yet there were some Jews in the congregation. Here we note an ethnic and racial tension within the church. He was dealing with an upper class, a middle class, and a lower class of people mixed into one congregation. There were nobles and there were peasants. Then there were issues among the men and women. He was answering how they should handle marriage and divorce, who should take care of the widows, and what role women have in the house and home? Paul speaks to his church, as Jesus does, of a grace that crosses traditional boundaries of culture and ethnicity. This is important because Paul wants his Gentile hearers, who have now been included in the mandate of salvation, to understand that we are witnesses to more than just our kind of people in the church.
Remember that Paul is tempering his arguments with more than mere life lessons. This church at Corinth was demoralized because individuals were boasting about who was the best and which had the best spiritual gift – all which occurred when they gathered for worship. There was competition among the individuals and groups. And this competitive spirit was destroying the fabric of fellowship. Anarchy was taking place due to the resentment of the nature and function of the gifts being built among them.
The congregational identity of the Corinthian church had turned into nothing more than a clash of identities. We saw in chapter 1 that it was Chloe’s people who had reported this disheartening fact to Paul. The shape and style of the congregation, that which made it distinctive, was perceived throughout the region as nothing more than prideful, quarreling, so-called Christians.
This kind of attitude is not exempt from the modern church either. Most congregations of today become tangled up in controversy and conflict. Usually it is over program issues such as curriculum for the youth group, the kinds of hymns we should sing in worship, repair of the roof; and I am sure you can think of some of your own examples that can easily go along with these.
For the Corinthians it just happened to be the issue of gifts to which Paul gives them some guidance or should I say correction that they had to consider. And we must consider this correction as well. Because as we try to assert our own perspective on God’s call and sense of what Norris Hill should be, and the kind of identity we have as individuals within it – we must be careful and consider the kind of reflection that is being shown to our community.
In our passage Paul’s correction is built upon the last statement in verse 31 of chapter 12, that of “showing them a more excellent way.” This more excellent way he describes through the rule of love. And by this love he describes - we gain our three points to remember, all beginning with F.
1. We must understand the Full meaning of love.
2. There must be Fruits of love.
3. We must understand the Fulfillment of love.
What is the Full meaning of love if this is what we are to portray to each other and to our world? Paul answers this question in the first three verses of our passage using several types of hyperbole, or exaggeration. In these three verses it surfaces that love should be the regulating principle of all our actions. All Excellencies in this life and the life to come are of no value with out love. Everything is spoiled or corrupted if love is not there. From 1 Timothy 1:5 we learn that love is the end of the law and in Colossians 3:14 it is the bond of perfection. All of our deeds are estimated by their appearing to proceed from love. Love is the deep respect and admiration that always shows itself, even to those who are inferior.
It is in verse 1 that we learn that love is distinguishing. It is distinguishing because without it neither men nor angel’s speech could be heard or understood. The Corinthians held up their gifts of tongue as a sign of esteem. But Paul puts them down as nothing more than “sounding brass or a clanging symbol.” They were gongs that produced hollow, echoing, groaning noises like the Copper Bowl of Dodona, which an oracle portrays as sounding all day long and to which the people of Paul’s day used as an idiom to describe a person who talked incessantly. Yes love is being heard sweetly and distinctly, so Christ is understood to those whom we portray Him.
It is in verse 2 that love is not limited. Love is not limited to all the knowledge we think is possible to have in its entirety. Love is more than just understanding the will of God and being able to make that known to the world. Love is not limited to miracles, miracles of great faith that even we struggle to have and which Jesus himself condemns His own disciples of not having in Matthew 17 when He says you must have the “faith of a mustard seed.” It is more than what Chrysostom calls the “faith of miracles,” or what we call “special faith” because it does not apprehend the whole of Christ, but simply His power. Yes love is not limited to our perceptions of knowledge and power, but only in the knowledge of the Trinity and the power of Christ who overcame death so we might have life.
And in verse 3 Paul shows that love is accomplishing. It is accomplishing because its meaning is more than giving. The rabbis in Paul’s day taught that there was great merit for one who gave his possessions to the needy. In our finite world we uphold those who give their possessions even their life for a good cause. However, even the life of a martyr, which Paul was himself, is regarded as nothing in the sight of God if it is destitute of love. The full meaning of true love is the very heart and spirit of Christianity. If we feel none of its sacred heat in our hearts there is no gain. Yes love is accomplishing, because through it we have the example of our Lord whose life, mercy and grace was bestowed upon us. It is Jesus to who possesses the full meaning of love. And it is by Him and His Word that that we have the only rule of our actions, and the only means of regulating the right use of the gifts of God.
When we understand the full meaning of love then the Fruits of love begin to show in our lives. In verses four through seven, Paul describes for the Church what these fruits look like. And these fruits are important, especially to those within the church. The object Paul seems to have in mind is to show that the nature of the fruit is necessary for preserving unity within the church.
In verse 4 Paul states that love produces peace and harmony. It produces peace and harmony because in them is the seed of patience and longsuffering. And the word that Paul uses in its present tense emphasizes the continual state of action. The patience that Paul describes means we hold on to our thoughts or actions before we give in to the fuming passion, which breaks into flames. We haven’t any envy which is the product of ill-will, not love. Love calms angry passions and will give us an esteem of our brothers and sisters. The peace and harmony that love bears has the seeds of grace and humbleness. There is no place for pride, as the Corinthians thought. There is no place for boasting. Love produces peace and harmony because it is a bridle to restrain men and women that live to make themselves the center of attention or to be number-one.
In verse 5 Paul states that Love emulates unselfishness. The love one should have produces tactfulness and does nothing that would raise a blush. Love does not behave indecently or in a shameful manner. It is only when one has that propriety of haughtiness that the fruit of selfishness arises and love dims. Though we naturally are prone to only love and care for ourselves, and to aim it at our own advantage; we must realize that true love often neglects its own for the sake of others. Love leads us to leave off caring for ourselves and to feel concern for our neighbor’s welfare.
Then love generates joy as verse 6 describes. Notice that it is not joy that can occur and be shared with one person. No, when we rejoice we do so with each other. We rejoice because there is truth among us. We rejoice because no harm has come to one of our own. We rejoice because compassion has been stirred and we can trust each other.
Finally, verse 7 tells us that love bears all things. The meaning is either to cover in the sense to protect, as a roof, or to bear up as to support, or to endure, forbear, to put up with. In other words, the fruit of love does not always want to place ourselves upon the shoulders of someone else – rather it causes us to place upon our shoulders the burdens of the other. Love believes all things, or hopes that the motives and actions of the other are pure. We tend to be suspicious of everyone, and not trust what looks to be deceiving. True love endures despite the ingratitude, the bad conduct, and the problems that communal living involves. And this we should do without complaining or becoming discouraged. When the motives prove to be impure, love bears it with no resentment.
And then from the fruits of love, we must understand the Fulfillment of love. On the one hand, God’s loving patience and forbearance is demonstrated by His withholding his wrath; on the other hand His kindness is exhibited in His mercy and grace. How much more is this revealed than by our treatment of each other and what we will have in heaven.
For Paul says in verse 8 that Love never fails. It is love that must be preferred before temporary or perishable gifts. Prophesying have an end, tongues fail, knowledge ceases. Yet love is more excellent than these on the ground that while they fail, it survives. These temporal gifts become ineffective or powerless, while love is effective for eternity. While certain gifts die in their own time on earth love will enter into heaven.
Verse 9 indicates again that love will last forever. Where we know in part, or because of our imperfection we only have imperfect knowledge. We can’t know perfectly. We can’t discern God’s will perfectly, because imperfection cleaves to us. Their advantage is only temporary. When we think of who God is and what we will behold in heaven, we understand that even the prophets and Apostles heard just a little portion of the Holy of Holies. But love, the love that we should earnestly desire will last forever
It is this love that verse 10 describes will yield perfection. Whether we die first or Christ returns, “when the goal has been reached, then the helps in the race will be done away with (Calvin).” Verse 10 is a contrast with verse 9, where Paul magnificently explains to his church that “perfection” is the opposite of “in part.” When the end is once attained then the means will be abolished. God will be known more clearly.
You see now we only see as children sees or as looking in an obscure mirror. But love overcomes obscurity. Verses 11 through 12 gives to us two similes portraying what things will be done away with when arriving to maturity. That is maturity in its glory. Us being in heaven. As adults we are able to see the errors we made as children and we despise thinking in those terms. Also, we now have to look at who we are through the mirror of God’s word. So we see somewhat whom we are made in the image of God, but yet it is obscure because we see our sin as well. We only see God’s face in the Word that He has revealed, through the administration of the sacraments, and through the life we live among our Christian brothers and sisters. We look forward to the day when He will openly manifest himself to us and show us His face. It is the love that overcomes obscurity through which we make a glorious change and pass from darkness to light. It is His love through which we will have eternal day and never night. And it is this eternal love that we are to zealously seek.
Verse 13 again reiterates this for us. For the love Paul states is the greatest among its two counterparts. Love is the greatest because it requires action and extends its benefits to others. The love we have remains in a state of perfection even when the other gifts – including faith and hope – are lost when imperfection ceases. We must realize that love is found in Christ’s body, the Church. It is the description of what we ought to do. It is the description that confronted those in Corinth, and maybe us today. We should hold up the mirror in front of us both as a church and as individuals. Our life and our love can only be understood through the image of Jesus Christ.
I believe Betty Stoffel sums this up for us in her poem
Lord, let our loving issue from Thee,
For human love is limited and blind,
But Thou art all that perfect love can be,
And in Thy kindness Thou art more than kind.
As need turns first to Thee, wilt Thou release
From human hurt, from fear, from evil thought,
Till the disquiet heart is bathed in peace,
And freed of self to love as Jesus taught.
Then love comes unrestrained in endless flow
To those who needs the strength our love can share,
Until Thou art within us and we glow
With warm, compassionate concern and care.
Hold in Thy steadying love each precious day,
Love us, that our love may never go astray!