A More Excellent Way

I'd like you to think back to the last time a little child gave you a card. What was it that made that special to you? I'm guessing it wasn't the quality of the art, whether it was a little flower or a boat or whatever it was. It probably wasn't something that belonged in an art museum. I'm guessing it wasn't how neat the handwriting was or how eloquently they said what they said. But I'm guessing that card was far more special to you than any one of those nice professional cards you could buy in a store ever could have been. Because that child made it for you and it was an expression of their love. And of course what mattered was not how sort of good the card was, but that this child used whatever he had, you know, whether crayons or markers or stickers or whatever it was, and whatever words he knew how to write to try to communicate love. And in a similar way, I want us to consider this morning, what is it that matters most to God? As we think about spiritual gifts, How much does it matter how skilled of a Bible teacher you are, or how eloquent of a preacher, or how wise of a counselor, or how strong of a leader? I mean, are any of these things impressive to God? Are they not more like a little child trying to write a card? I think 1 Corinthians 13 helps us to see that spiritual gifts are good and useful, and they're perfectly appropriate for this phase of life. But at the end of the day, they're childlike things for a childish age. And therefore, they're a silly thing to boast in. They serve a temporary function that's fading away. And at the end of the day, what matters before God is not the greatness of our gifts, but the greatness of our love. Now, before we dive into chapter 13, let me just take a moment to remind us where we've been. Paul's writing this letter to the church in Corinth, which is a church that he established several years prior. Paul's now in Ephesus, from which he's both received visitors from the Corinthian church, and he's also exchanged letters with the Corinthians. And so in 1 Corinthians, Paul's responding both to reports that he's received as well as to a letter that he's received from them. And he's answering various questions and he's responding to various concerns about various aspects of the life of the church. And in chapters 12 through 14, Paul is dealing with the topic of spiritual gifts. And as you read through these chapters, it becomes clear that Paul's especially concerned to address the gift of tongues or languages, because this was the primary gift that the Corinthians were overemphasizing and misusing, particularly by allowing people in the worship service to speak in tongues with no interpreter. So no one understood what was being said. And Paul recognizes that this is not only disorderly, but it betrays a self-centeredness and a willingness to use gifts for self-promotion and self-edification rather than for the good of the body. So in chapter 12, Paul begins seeking to correct that. And the first three verses of the chapter, Paul begins by establishing that the criterion for a genuine work of the Spirit is this. The Spirit of God always works to build up the church in the truth that Jesus is Lord. The Spirit is like a spotlight on Christ. He doesn't gift the church so that we would focus on the Spirit and His gifts. He gifts the church so that we would focus on Jesus and grow in our understanding of the truth of the gospel. And then secondly, in verses four through 11, Paul says that this one and same spirit gifts us in various ways for the common good. All right, so we're not all supposed to have the same gift. There's supposed to be variety, and whatever gift we have, it's not for our individual good, but so that we can contribute to the common good of the whole. And then in verses 12 through 31, the rest of that chapter, Paul fleshes this out by using the metaphor of a body. And he says that just as a body has many members, but is one body, and all the different members have different functions, but they all make up one body, well, that's what the church is like. So there's supposed to be this interdependence where our different gifts actually unite us by making us rely on one another. And then what all this means is, number one, that we should want to be gifted so that we can be useful to the body. Not so that we can promote ourselves, but we should earnestly desire the spiritual gifts so that we can contribute to the common good. And then number two, Paul wants us to understand that we need to define the common good in terms of building up the church in the truth that Jesus is Lord. So it's not just about sort of having vague displays of raw miraculous power like uninterpreted tongues would be, but through intelligible speech that helps people understand the gospel. And that's why in chapter 14, Paul is gonna begin by arguing that the Corinthians should value prophecy more than uninterpreted tongues, because that will be more helpful for building up the church. However, before Paul gets into that, He says at the very end of chapter 12, and I will show you a still more excellent way. I will show you something that's more important for the common good of the church than even the highest of the gifts will ever be. I will show you a way that displays the power of the spirit and the glory of the gospel more clearly than any gift ever could. And I will show you something that will last longer and matter more in the eyes of God than any of the gifts. And he says, I will show you the way of love. And the point of chapter 13 is this. If you're taking notes and want to write down a main idea, it's this. Love is greater than the greatest of the gifts. Love is greater than the greatest of the gifts. And as we work through, we'll consider three aspects of love that tell us why it's the greatest. And the first is this, the necessity of love. The necessity of love, verses one through three. Paul writes, if I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not 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 have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. Now here Paul imagines the highest possible expression of various spiritual gifts. And he says that even if you have that, but have not love, then you accomplish nothing, you are nothing, and you gain nothing. He says, if I speak in the languages of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. So even the most beautiful and eloquent angelic language, if divorced from love, is reduced to an annoying sound or an irritating clanging. I was wrestling with how to illustrate that and what I thought of would be, you know, imagine listening to a beautiful song written by your spouse, then finding out it was for a different man or a different woman. Just however beautiful that music was would suddenly become a disturbing noise. And Paul is saying that tongues without love is like that. I mean, if self-promotion rather than love is why you're doing it, then you've become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal before God. Now some have argued based on this verse that tongues must have included actual angelic languages, but I think that's unlikely because Paul is clearly using hyperbole here. He says in the next verse, if I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, But clearly no prophet ever actually has done that. In fact, down in verse nine, you'll see that Paul even builds his argument on the assertion that we know in part and prophesy in part. So the point is not that some people actually speak in the language of angels, but that even the most majestic form of tongues that we could possibly imagine is still reduced to nothing without love. And likewise, even if there were a prophet who actually understood all mysteries and all knowledge, and he could disclose to us every detail of the future, he could tell us the very day and hour of Christ's return, and he could preach with a wisdom and a power that we could not imagine. And even if this man also had all faith, so that he could literally move mountains, and he could work wonders, and he could do all these amazing things, yet Paul says, if he doesn't have love, he's nothing before God. I mean, none of these things are impressive to God. None of these things in and of themselves accrue us any standing before him. Think, for example, of Balaam. There's a prophet whose very words are inscribed in scripture. And even to this day, we read them and are edified by them. Words like, God is not a man that he should lie or a son of man that he should change his mind. Has he said and will he not do it? Or has he spoken and will he not fulfill it? I mean, those words come to us from the mouth of Balaam. And yet far from making Balaam great in the eyes of God, God rebuked him with his own donkey to restrain the madness of the prophet. And that man was cut down with a sword and sent to hell. You see, God can use donkeys or even rocks to prophesy and communicate his word. Our gifts and our knowledge do not impress him, and they are not needed by him. What matters is whether or not we have love. Paul continues in verse three, if I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. So here he speaks of acts of sacrifice, that of giving away your possessions or even giving up your body itself. And I think Paul actually probably still has spiritual gifts in mind. Some of the church fathers did think of martyrdom as a spiritual gift and Paul elsewhere mentions the gift of contribution. And once again, either way, Paul is envisioning the most dramatic examples he can, giving away all you possess or giving up your body to be burned, one of the most horrifically painful deaths imaginable. And of course, these are things that we would ordinarily associate with meriting great reward. Jesus says in Luke 12, sell your possessions and give to the needy. and thereby you will provide yourselves with money bags that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys. Or in Revelation chapter two, Jesus speaking to the church in Smyrna, he tells them, be faithful unto death, and I will give you the crown of life. You know, so ordinarily such sacrifices would merit great heavenly reward, and yet Paul says, that even such sacrifices made to the highest degree imaginable, but without love, profit us nothing. You see, the point here is that love is the greatest because it's the thing that's absolutely necessary for anything else to even matter. I mean, the very greatest of the gifts means nothing without love. They accrue us no stature in the eyes of God, they earn us no heavenly reward, and they display no true spiritual maturity if not for love. Love is necessary for the gifts to matter at all. However, I think an easy way to misunderstand this passage would be to think that Paul's contrasting love and gifts in such a way that he's sort of setting love over against gifts, as if the point where, well, love is necessary, but gifts are not. Love is everything, gifts are nothing. But it can't be that kind of either or, because if you look ahead to chapter 14, verse one, notice how Paul sums it all up. He says, pursue love and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts. Right, so love is not sort of instead of spiritual gifts. Love actually leads us to desire and value the gifts. And obviously the church would be impoverished without them. They're part of God's design. But even still, I don't think we can just sort of sum this up with a both and either, as if Paul's just saying, well, you need gifts and you need love too. No, there's something primary about love. There's a sense in which love is essential and necessary in a way that gifts are not. And I think a good way to kind of capture what's being said here is this. Love isn't just a necessary component of the Christian life. Love is like the whole comprehensive environment in which every other aspect of the Christian life is meant to be lived out. So we can picture love like the ocean in which we're meant to live. Well, then spiritual gifts and our abilities and every other resource, I mean, that would just be like the boats and the paddles and the tools we sort of use to get around. What Paul's saying here is that boasting in gifts while lacking love is as ridiculous as boasting in the prowess of your boat while you're stranded in a desert of sand. I mean, you could get further clinging to a piece of driftwood in the ocean than you'll ever get on the most elegant yacht in the middle of a desert. I mean, the most pitiful gift with love is better than the most extravagant gift without it. You see, love is to be the very environment of the Christian life. Everything we do should be done in love. The gifts are necessary as a component of the life, but love, is necessary for it all. So what about us? To what degree is love undergirding and motivating and permeating and defining everything that we do? I mean, do you realize that no matter how successful your ministry is, no matter how wonderful your family, no matter how much you give or how gifted you are, None of it means anything at the end of the day if you're not walking in love. And conversely, I mean, do you realize that no matter how meagerly gifted you feel, I mean, maybe you look around and you just think, what could I contribute? I'm not a good teacher. I'm not very knowledgeable. I'm not good at leading. I don't have much to give. But oh, brother or sister, do you realize that if you have love, You can contribute more to the common good of this church than anyone else could, no matter how gifted they are, without it. And you have the thing that matters most in the eyes of God. So love is the greatest because it's the absolutely necessary thing. But if we're gonna pursue it, we need to know what it is. especially because there are so many counterfeits out there. And this leads us to the second aspect of love and the second reason why it's the greatest, the nature of love. So number two, the nature of love, verses four through seven. Paul says, love is patient and kind. Love does not envy or boast. It is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way. It is not irritable or resentful. It does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Now the first thing to note about this description of love is that all of the words used to describe it, at least in Greek, are verbs. Now in English, we translate it with a bunch of adjectives, but that can give the sense that love is some abstract thing that just sort of resides in you in this static way. But Paul is actually describing it here in dynamic terms, as something that's being exercised in ongoing action. So positively, he lists seven things that love does. And negatively, he lists eight things that love does not do. Now Paul begins by saying, love is patient and kind. Or to try to capture the verbal sense of this, love long suffers and bestows generous mercy. And I think the first thing we should think of when we hear that is the love of God himself. I mean, this is a wonderful summary of God's own action towards sinners. As Paul says in Romans chapter two verse four, do you presume on the riches of God's kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance. Right, so it's as though God in his long-suffering patience is holding back his own righteous wrath with one hand, even while simultaneously extending loving kindness and rich mercy with the other. I mean, day after day, God endures patiently our sin against Him, and day after day, God provides, He protects, and He shows mercy. And even more than that, just think of how God's loving patience and kindness are displayed through the cross. You know, Jesus hangs there, suffering long, patiently enduring not His own sin, but ours. And simultaneously, there He is spreading out His arms of kindness, inviting sinners to come to Him, even praying on the cross, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. Friends, that is the patience and the kindness of love. If you're here this morning, you're not a believer. It's because of this patience and kindness that you can be forgiven. that all your sin can be atoned for and washed away, trust in Christ and receive his love. And then for those of us who have received that forgiveness, well, this is the kind of love we're called to express to others. I mean, when someone wounds you, you're called to hold back anger with patience and extend kindness. When someone irritates you, maybe it's a family member or a child, a spouse, that is just doing the same thing again and again, you're called to imitate Christ by suffering long and showing kindness. And when someone fails you or disappoints you, instead of abandoning them, you're called to bear with them in love, patiently and kindly, walking with them through it. You see, Christ himself is our model. And this is what love is all about, patience and kindness. And yet even though we have this perfect example in Christ, and as clear as this should be, how easily we go astray. How easily we begin to convince ourselves that we are being loving when we're actually not. And so very helpfully, Paul next gives us eight things that love does not do. Okay, so here's eight ways that you can know I'm not acting in love. Number one, love does not envy. So if you feel envy in your heart, you are beginning to be envious of someone else's gifts, envious of their recognition, envious of how easy their life seems. And right there, you've identified the problem. You are not walking in love. I mean, just think about it. The only way you can envy somebody is if you care more about your own interests than theirs. But love is the opposite. Love is when you care as much or more about the interests of others as your own. So love does not envy. Number two, love does not boast. And boasting is the idea of a braggart or a windbag. The point is that love doesn't try to draw attention to itself or put on a show for self-exaltation. Number three, love is not arrogant. So if boasting is more about the external expression, well arrogance is the internal attitude. It's thinking of yourself more highly than you ought. It's being puffed up with pride within. Number four, love is not rude. This could also be translated shameful or disgraceful. And the point is that love doesn't behave in a way that's disrespectful or inconsiderate of others. Number five, love does not insist on its own way. It's not self-seeking. It's not focused on itself and its wants. It's oriented to the needs and the good of others. Number six, love is not irritable. This could also be translated, love is not easily angered or provoked. Love doesn't think, I'm so important. How dare this person do this to me? How dare this person say this to me? How dare this person inconvenience me or drive so slow when I'm trying to get somewhere. Love doesn't have a short fuse. And it's meek enough to take any insult and respond with godliness. Number seven, love is not resentful. Sometimes this is translated, love keeps no record of wrongs. So not only does it not explode in the moment, But love isn't like a slowly ticking time bomb either. It's not like slowly building anger and resentment. It's not like when you're a parent that sort of smiles pleasantly and puts up with things for a few weeks and then that final straw hits and bam, it's like everything your kid did wrong in the past month, you just start hurling at them. Love keeps no record of wrongs. It's not resentful. It doesn't allow past faults to build up or accrue. It just deals with sin as it comes and it genuinely forgives. And then number eight, love does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Right, so love doesn't rejoice in sin, but in the truth of God and his word. And this means that love doesn't rejoice in wrongdoing or falsehood even when it seems to favor your cause. You know, so when your boss at work who's a jerk gets slandered, how do you respond? You know, when something terrible happens to a politician you don't like, how do you feel? I mean, love doesn't rejoice at wrongdoing even when it befalls an enemy. It rejoices with the truth. Right, so we've seen what love does, and we've seen what it doesn't do. But then finally, in this description of love, Paul stresses that love keeps on doing what it does, and it keeps on not doing what it doesn't do. It perseveres. Verse seven, he says, love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. This set of four begins and ends with bearing and enduring, which I think are synonymous. And then in the middle, it says it believes and hopes, which I think are the qualities of love that energize it and enable it to keep going on. You see, love bears because it believes and it endures because it hopes. It's sort of like in the movies when love just attempts that impossible rescue because it just won't let go. It won't give up. The difference is Christian love endures because ultimately its faith and hope are rooted in God himself. We love because we serve a God who is able and a God who has loved us even when we were beyond hope. So love continues to believe and to hope and to endure for the good of others. Now of course this doesn't mean that love is gullible or naive, but it means that love never becomes cynical or sinks into despair. It knows that no matter how far gone a person may seem, they're never beyond the reach of God. Love is ever ready to rejoice in repentance. It is always ready to believe the best It doesn't become jaded, it doesn't lose hope, it perseveres. I think of Paul himself, just again and again, going to his own people, the Jews, being stoned, being slandered, being hated, and yet he just perseveres in love for them because he wants them to know Christ. Maybe there's a relationship in your life that you've just given up on. Well, consider how love might challenge you to persevere. in patience and kindness and in putting off these eight things that love doesn't do. And friends, in light of this glorious description of love, I hope it's already becoming obvious to you why love by its very nature is greater than the gifts. I mean, you see, gifts can be abused, but love can't. I mean, the Corinthians, in fact, were abusing the gifts. And in this whole list of things love doesn't do, that should have hit awful close to home for them. But love can never be abused. I mean, it can be counterfeited. But if it's love, you can't overdo it. If it's love, you cannot misuse it. I mean, love is the one thing that is perfect for every situation. By its very nature, it's altogether pure, it's altogether good, it's altogether true and right. You see, love is the greatest because of what it is. In fact, I think an implication of this is that love is the greatest way that we can reflect the image and the glory of God. I mean, spiritual gifts are good. Paul calls them manifestations of the Spirit. And so in some sense, as we exercise our gifts, we are reflecting God. But as we've already seen, I mean, God can raise up donkeys to prophesy. Man is not most like God when he exercises spiritual gifts. But listen to what the Bible says about love. In 1 John 4, love is from God. and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God because God is love. If we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. You see, if there is any way in this life that we can most clearly reflect the glory and the beauty of God, It's when we love. So love is the greatest because of the necessity of love. It's the greatest because of the nature of love. And now thirdly and finally, love is the greatest because of the permanence of love. Number three, the permanence of love, verses eight through 13. Paul continues, love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away. As for tongues, they will cease. As for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. So Paul says love never ends. Love is what's permanent. But prophecies, tongues, and knowledge are not. And by the way, when Paul says knowledge here, I think he means the gift of knowledge that he mentioned in chapter 12. So Paul's contrasting the permanence of love with the transience of spiritual gifts. And Paul says that these gifts will pass away because we know in part and we prophesy in part. But when the perfect or the mature or the complete comes, then the partial will be done away. Now some have inferred from this an argument for cessationism, and others have inferred from it an argument for continuationism. But I don't think this verse is a good argument for either side. I don't think Paul is trying to say which gifts cease when, but he's just saying that by the time you have something complete, you won't need the partial anymore. Imagine having a few tattered fragments of a photograph that was special to you. And so you hang on to them just so you can look at them and try to remember the picture. But if I came along and gave you that full picture, you wouldn't need the pieces anymore. What Paul's saying is that all the prophecies we have, all the sermons we preach, all the knowledge we possess, they're just the pieces. But the day is coming when the complete picture will arrive. When Christ will return and eternal glory will be ours. And in the full sun of eternity, we won't need the candle of former revelation anymore. And notice how he further illustrates this with two images. First, in verse 11, he likens this to the transition from childhood to manhood. He says, 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. What he's saying is that spiritual gifts and all of our current revelation is childlike and enables a childlike understanding of God. But when we enter into glory, it will be like adulthood and we will give up childish ways. Now it's important to realize that by calling spiritual gifts childlike, Paul is not discouraging their use. It's perfectly appropriate for children to use childlike things. In fact, it would be harmful to try to treat children as if they were adults. But Paul's point to the Corinthians is don't boast in these childlike things as if that were the height of spirituality, as if that were the place where you arrive. He's saying just as the time comes when a child gives up his pacifier and his crayons and his magic markers, the time will come when all these spiritual gifts will be done away. And we will be in the fullness of mature manhood in eternal glory. And then he gives a second illustration to help us imagine just how glorious that day will be. He says in verse 12, for now we see in a mere dimly, but then face to face, Now I know in part, but then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. So he compares the knowledge that we have of God now to seeing a dim reflection in a mirror. And in Paul's day and age, that would have just been a piece of polished metal. I mean, that's what the most glorious prophecy or the greatest sermon is like. But Paul says then, we will see him face to face. Then will come the day when we exchange the photograph for the reality. And we are ushered into His very presence and we see Him as He is. Then will be the day when there are no more veils. There is no more sin to obscure our view. But we will bask in the light of His glory and behold Him face to face. And at that point, the knowledge that we have now will be so swallowed up by such a fullness that the only thing Paul even can think up to and compare it to is the very way God himself knows us. Not that we will become omniscient, nor that we will know God exhaustively. But we will know God as fully as we possibly could. We will be as full of the knowledge of God as our creaturely bodies can contain. And we will be able to go on growing in that knowledge more and more throughout all eternity, unhindered in any way. And brothers and sisters, that is what we should hope in. That's what we should long for. How foolish it would be to boast in gifts that will so soon pass away. In fact, the very purpose of these gifts is to stir up in us that kind of hope, that kind of faith, that kind of eager expectation and love to give us a little glimpse of the glory that's been promised and to build in us all the more yearning for that day. And I think that's why Paul concludes by saying in verse 13, so now faith, hope and love abide will remain these three. But the greatest of these is love. You see, these three faith, hope and love. These are the chief things that the gifts are meant to just help produce. These are like a little mini summary of what true Christian piety is all about. As Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 1 verse 3, I thank God for your work of faith, and labor of love, and steadfastness of hope. Right, so if there's any three things that should characterize our lives as Christians, it's faith, hope, and love. And yet, even of these three, Paul says, but the greatest of these is love. Love is the highest virtue of them all. And I think one reason why is because love is the thing that is permanent in a way that nothing else is. In fact, there's actually no other way that the eternal reality and the life of glory invades the present than it does through love. Because spiritual gifts will pass away. Faith will be eclipsed by sight. Hope will be realized by experience. And yes, we will continue to trust God and hope in God throughout all eternity, but the very character and nature of faith and hope then will be so much different than it is now in this world of darkness, than when we are there in that world of light. But Paul says love never ends. Love is the thing that never changes. Love is the way, the preeminent way that the life of glory is here and now. I began this morning by asking you to think about a child's card. And as we close, I'd like you to consider what the card that you present to God on the last day will be like. You see, it won't really matter how skilled was your penmanship or how gifted of an artist you were. It won't matter how great were your spiritual gifts. What will matter is how much you used whatever gifts you had to express love and how much you invested your life and lived your life in love. You see, love is the greatest of God's commandments. It's the distinguishing mark of Jesus' disciples. It's the first of the fruit of the Spirit, and it's the highest of all virtues. Love isn't just a necessary thing we do. It is to be the very environment in which we live our lives. And no matter how far short we fall, brothers and sisters, Christ has died to forgive us, and he has given his Spirit to enable us and He's loved us to compel us to walk and love ourselves. So by God's grace, may we pursue love and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts. Amen. Let's pray. Oh, Father, your love is greater than we will ever know and could possibly imagine. We want to love you more. We want to walk in love ourselves. We pray that you would help us by your spirit to do so. We thank you for your grace and your patience and your kindness and for who you are. It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.