THE IMPORTANCE OF LOVE
1 Corinthians 13:1-13 (NRSV)
1/ If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have 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 do not have love, I am nothing. 3/ 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.
4/ Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant 5/ or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6/ it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. 7/ It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
8/ 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. 9/ For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; 10/ but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. 11/ 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. 12/ For now we see in a mirror, dimly, 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. 13/ And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.
Someone has reported that the big toy makers carefully watch the divorce rate. It seems that, when divorce rates rise, so do toy sales. The explanation? According to the analysts, in a given family you may have as many as four parents and eight grandparents competing for the affections of the children. So, what do they do? They buy toys.
Now, I like toys as much as the next person. But a toy, no matter how entertaining, is a poor substitute for love. So is hard, calloused religion that is given more to correctness than to compassion. Here in the thirteenth chapter of 1 Corinthians, Paul urges us to offer ourselves in loving action before we impose ourselves in legalistic demands. Love, he says, is the most important part of faith. What makes it so? Paul gives us three qualities of love that we may sometimes forget. But, when we review them again, we can readily see his point. Love is the most important thing of all.
I. Love Is Essential
The first quality is this: Love is essential. You and I may do many things -- in fact, we may do many good things -- and, without love, they won’t matter. Look at verses 1 through 3. Paul says, “If I speak in the tongues of mortals 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.”
Do you know the background to these verses? Paul is writing to a body of Christians who are divided over who or what is most spiritual. There are basically five groups, or positions, each centered around a particular spiritual expression, each contending that it alone is right and that the others are wrong.
There are those who speak in tongues, those who prophesy, those who exercise astounding faith, those who have given up everything for the poor, and some who, it appears, even boast about their willingness to suffer martyrdom.
Now, is any one of those things unspiritual? Not necessarily. But what’s missing? It could be love. Paul says that, if I speak in tongues, but do it without love, I’m just making noise. If I speak for God through prophesying, but do it without love, or demonstrate faith, again without love, it amounts to nothing. Same thing with giving away everything or even dying for the cause. No love in it, no point to it. Who needs religion without love? It’s worthless.
We had a friend one time, a lovely and hospitable woman, who would often have us over for dinner. And she was a great cook. But I couldn’t enjoy her desserts, especially her cakes. She always made them without salt. I don’t exactly know what salt does in a cake recipe, but I know that, when it’s not there, the cake is dry and tasteless.
Who wants dry and tasteless religion? Not me. But you leave love out of the recipe, and that’s what you’ve got. Something that looks good, maybe, but it tastes awful. So, no matter how you and I express our spirituality, let’s make sure we do so with love. It’s that important.
II. Love Is Expressive
Love, Paul says, is essential. It is also expressive. In verses 4 through 7, Paul lists no less than fourteen ways that love expresses itself. Paul seems fond of lists like this. Sometimes he lists sins to avoid, sometimes graces to exhibit. And here, starting in verse 4, he gives us the characteristics of love. Listen again for them: “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 or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.”
That’s a lot to remember, isn’t it? But, you know what? I don’t think Paul is asking us to remember all fourteen characteristics. The list is probably not exhaustive anyway, just suggestive. We don’t have to be able to recite all these things, but there is not a one of us here today that cannot observe them.
We all know what it’s like when someone is impatient with us or unkind. We’ve all been around people who are envious or try to top us by being boastful. We know what it looks like when somebody always has to get their way. We’ve seen people who take great pleasure in another’s exposure, who take delight when someone else falls from favor.
And nobody has to tell us that such attitudes are unloving. We know it. And we know, too, when we meet someone who kind and slow to find fault, who is understanding and compassionate toward others, someone who puts the well-being of others high on their list of priorities. We would say that such a person is loving.
Well, why can’t we be that kind of person? There’s no reason we can’t set out to show love in everything we do. Now, notice that I did not say “feel” love. If you and I wait until we feel love for others, we will wind up loving only those who make us feel loved. I did not say that we are to feel love but rather that we are to show love. Paul did not say that love is patience. He said that it is patient. We may not be naturally possessed of patience, but we can be patient in a given circumstance. In the same way, Paul did not say that love is kindness; he said it is kind. What’s the difference. Kindness is a state of being, and it’s wonderful when kindness fills our hearts. But what if, when someone needs us to be kind to them, we don’t happen to feel like it, at least not at the moment. Or what if, to our way of thinking, they don’t deserve our kindness? Love, you see, has nothing whatsoever to do with merit. Merit has to do with justice; you get what you deserve. But love has to do with grace and mercy; you get what you need.
What is called for is a love brigade, so to speak, a people who are militant about the matter of being patient or kind or thoughtful or considerate, a people who are intentional about showing love -- even when they may not feel it.
III. Love is Eternal
Finally, Paul says that love is eternal. It is essential. It is expressive, and it is eternal. Listen again to verses 8 through 13: “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 in a mirror, dimly, 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 abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.”
Love never ends. You can’t say it any more clearly than that. Other things will come to an end: all the ways we have of expressing our spirituality, whether speaking in tongues to God or speaking prophetically for God. Even all the knowledge you have gained from studying the Bible will pass off the scene one day. The truth is, everything we think we now know is but a dim reflection in a cloudy mirror.
But one day, everything will be clear. We’ll see how silly were our preoccupations with appearing spiritual, and we’ll gain a new perspective. Only a few things will last, but, of that few, one will stand out as the greatest of all. And guess what that is. Love.
There’s nothing like it. Without it, our religion is hollow and empty. With it, our faith is full and expressive, inviting and contagious. Maybe what we need to remember is not to try so hard to look spiritual. It would be better, perhaps, just to be loving and let the spiritual find its expression in that.
