13:1-3 - You can be an incredible speaker, a prophet, a bible scholar, a giver, a servant, but if you do not have love it means nothing. Paul describes a teacher without love as a clanging cymbal...the words keep ringing and ringing but they carry no meaning because they do not carry love. Words and actions are meaningless without love. I think it is interesting that Paul says you can have faith that could move mountains and still be loveless and useless. It seems that you can have a saving faith and still not completely get it...Paul implies that you can have a real faith yet still not truly walk in the kingdom of heaven, i.e. still not live out the higher way that Christ has called us to. I believe that the people with great faith and no love will be last in God's kingdom even though they may have been held up as great examples here on earth...love is what matters to God.
13:11 - In this world love is seen as the weaker way. To show mercy...to walk away from a fight...to put others ahead of yourself...these things are seen as signs of weakness. In reality, the path of love is the path of strength. When we were infants, we were selfish and self-centered and reacted in violence...as we leave our immature ways to follow Christ our actions should reflect that way.
13:12 - In the here and now, when we live out love, we can just start to see a dim reflection of the reality of the kingdom of God. The awesomeness of these brief and dim encounters with love makes me long for the time when I can bask daily in the presence of the God of love.
3 comments:
This is such a great chapter to read anytime. Want to know the attributes of God better – here they are – plain as day.
Love (get it?!) these parallels in verse 10:
NIV – but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears.
Msg – But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.
12 “We don't yet see things clearly. We're squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won't be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We'll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!”
There will come a time when we won’t wonder anymore if He hears us – it will be one on one communication in a way that we can only dream of for now.
“Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly.”
Enough said.
Peace,
j
I never thought of this before, but you might be able to take versus 1 through 3 in reverse. If you have love God gives you gifts of tongue and prophecy. If you have love you have faith that moves mountains. If you have love God blesses you so that you can give to the poor.
Love is an awesome subject! We were teaching last night on the temptation of Jesus, and we were talking about Jesus being tempted to test God. Something interesting we came across was the idea that Jesus falling for that temptation would have compromised the integrity of the central point of Jesus' ministry: love. See, Jesus was about to embark on a 3 year ministry that was based on teaching people love God's way; I love you, period. Not I love you if, or when, or but; I love you. Yet, Jesus accepting Satan's temptation to test God would've been Jesus saying, "God, if you truly love me, you will save me." It would have then made it real hard for Jesus to preach a message of "I love you, period," with this experience in mind. But Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, knew what to say and how to handle the situation. Faith, hope, and love; the most important of these is love.
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