The Greatest Is Love

I Corinthians 13

 If I speak in the tongues of humans and of angels but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 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 do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions and if I hand over my body so that I may boast but do not have love, I gain nothing.

 Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable; it keeps no record of wrongs; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth. 

 It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

 Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part, but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end.

When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. 

For now we see only a reflection, as in a mirror, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. 

 And now faith, hope, and love remain, these three, and the greatest of these is love.

 What is this thing that is greatest of all, that always abides, and is a sign of maturity?

 The assignment question is tough because love, though simple in its elegance, is complex and multi-layered in its expression. It is too magnificent to reduce to words and too basic to everything to say much about.

 Furthermore, the best that can be said about love has already been said in scripture and acted upon by Jesus Christ in His life and death.

 Perhaps it is easier to begin with what love is not.

 It is not a chemical reaction leading to a sudden attraction which is irresistible in its call or insatiable in its appetite.

It is not a warm feeling or a cozy familiar presence on a cold, dark night.

 It is not any sort of feeling at all even though it may produce all sorts of feelings from joy to sorrow. Love’s emotions can be nurturing and comforting, but they can also be troubling and demanding.

 Real love is not the happy, sappy, poetic platitudes of popular music or romantic poetry. We relate to those because we have experienced or long to experience them  in the context of love. Yet they do not define, limit, or explain what love is.

Love is deeper.

 Love is transcendent while those sentiments are temporal and fleeting. Love endures when they fade. In fact, the Bible says that three things remain. They are faith, hope and love and love is the greatest.

 There are four Greek words for love. Two are found in the New Testament. They are phileo and agape. Phileo is affection, love, and even preference. Agape is unconditional love. Both are commanded and commended, but agape is the highest form of love.

 The other two are “stergo” and “eros.” Stergo is natural affection. It does not need to be commanded because it flows naturally like familial love or the deep affection between a husband and wife on their wedding day. Eros is real and natural and is the subject of romance and physical relationships where there is strong attraction. These are gifts from God, but not the highest forms of love.

 It is agape that the King James Version translates as “charity” in I Corinthians 13. It is agape that Paul describes this way in verses 4-8:

 Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable; it keeps no record of wrongs; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth. 

 It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

 Love never ends

 You may have learned part of it this way:

 Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Charity never faileth

 Love “is patient That means that real love is extraordinarily patient. It is manifest in its ability to renew itself in spite of hardship, insult, betrayal, and difficulty. That means we cannot define it as a response to the behavior or love of the person we love. That would be a form of love, but not the core meaning of the deepest kind of love.

 “Love is kind.” That means that in all of its truest expressions, love is motivated by the desire to act tenderly, receptively, and graciously toward the other person. In true love, we always wish the other person well and act in that person’s best interests.

 One man described the kindness of agape love as dreaming he had thrown himself in front of a moving vehicle to save the life of a “bratty” child who lived next door and whose very site annoyed him.  It was God’s love in and through him that wished only kindness for that child. He would sacrifice his own life for that child’s well-being.

 It knows no envy.  Godly love is not envious of the success of others, even when it comes during times when the one loving is not enjoying the same success. Love can cheer from the sidelines. It is not threatened by others moving ahead. In fact, lovers push people ahead of themselves and rejoice when they get credit for jobs well done.

 Love “is not puffed up.” A real lover cannot be a very accomplished sour puss. When pride rules life, one takes oneself too seriously. The humor and joy are depleted because laughing at oneself is not an option. When love rules, the person loving takes a step down in importance and there is freedom to enjoy life.

  “Doth not behave itself unseemly.”   Love is on its own best behavior. It is not rude. Political correctness is never an issue because agape determines what is done or said. That is why Jesus could sum up the law as a two step process: loving God supremely and loving neighbor as self. When love happens, behavior falls into line.

 The bottom line is that agape “seeketh not her own.”  Selfishness is outside the realm of love. That is why it is not ruled by emotions or by the responses of other people to our overtures. Those are all secondary to the real act of loving. When one loves, one acts in the best interest of others. Jesus said that in order to come after Him, a person would have to deny elf, take up a cross, and follow Him. To take up ones cross is to do what He did, bear the burdens of others. 

Love “is not easily provoked.”  Since lovers have demoted themselves to servants and have taken the wind out of their own sails, it is difficult to offend, insult, or inconvenience them. All of these statements are on a continuum because no person has been made perfect in love yet. If we had been, according to John, we would have no fear. Fear is a primary emotion upon which anger is built. Where there is real love, in perfection, there is no fear but the fear of God. Therefore, there is no need to be angry. As people grow in God’s love, they find themselves less and less provoked. 

Love “thinketh no evil.” Love rules ones thought life eliminating negative thinking and evil imaginations. To the extent that we are ruled by love, we think the best of others. We see them through God’s eyes. We edify them in our own minds. We expect great things. 

 Love “rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth.” A person committed to the love of God and love within relationships does not gloat when others fall or fail. That person does not wish for bad things to happen in order to enjoy some sort of vindication. “I told you so,” is not a loving statement when spoken with vindictiveness or spite. That being said, love and truth walk hand in hand. Sometimes lovers must speak hard truth lovingly because sin and evil cannot be justified by love. 

Love “beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Charity never faileth.” Love is durable. It gives people the strength to bear up under pressure and stress. It informs ones belief. It nurtures hope for the future. It endures. 

People do not fall into real love or out of it. Love does not die. Commitment to loving is abandoned. A promise to love is a promise that can be kept with the help of the One who is the Author and Giver of love. Sometimes relationships do not work and friendships fade, but it is not love that fails. Love endures. To the extent that we have grown in love, are enveloped by love, and are bathed in God’s agape, we love. 

To the extent that we love, we act with redemptive and sacrificial compassion. 

The last word in love is Jesus on the cross. All that can be said or known about love is present there. As Isaac Watts penned, “Did e’er such love and sorrow meet, or thorns compose so rich a crown?” 

Of all humanity, only Jesus, who is all God and all man is all perfect in love. He is the shining example. He is the standard. He is the source. He calls us to live lives of love and to invest everything we have and are in the process of loving. As we act in faith, lovingly, He has promised to be with us. He will help us. 

Love is a tall order, but it is the most wonderful thing in the world … and beyond.