“Now abide faith, hope and love, these three, but the greatest of these is love.”
(1 Corinthians 13:13)
Viktor Frankl was a WWII Holocaust survivor, who later became a psychiatrist in Austria. His best-selling autobiographical book, Man’s Search for Meaning describes a search for life’s meaning as the central human motivation. The book is based on his experiences in Nazi concentration camps. Based on his observations in the concentration camps, Frankl concluded that the difference in those who survived the camps and those who did not, was due, in large part, to their sense of meaning. If a person believed that their life had some kind of meaning, they were more likely to have the hope necessary to survive. Clinging to this sense of meaning gave them the strength to carry on no matter how difficult things became. For most people, Frankl found meaning in life was related to love for another person. Frankl himself found the meaning to survive in the love of his wife, who did not survive the concentration camps. Frankl wrote, “Love goes very far beyond the physical person of the beloved. It finds its deepest meaning in his spiritual being, his inner self. Whether or not he is actually present, whether or not he is still alive at all, ceases somehow to be of importance.”
Love is a powerful force and a fundamental need in the lives of human beings. God made us that way. We need to love and to be loved. In 1965 a popular song, “What the World Needs Now Is Love,” was first recorded by Jackie DeShannon. The song became very popular and captured the imagination of millions. But the kind of love expressed in the song and the wider culture is not the love Paul was referring to in 1 Corinthians 13.The cultural understanding of love at the time, and since, was more a feeling and a sentiment. What Paul was talking about was a much deeper kind of love.
In its context, 1 Corinthians 13 is sandwiched between chapters twelve and fourteen, which talk about problems the church at Corinth was having with spiritual gifts. Paul’s main point in chapter 13 is that love must be the central motivating factor in the exercise of spiritual gifts in the church. We exercise our spiritual gifts because we care about the people we serve. This kind of deep-seated commitment to love is in stark contrast with the popular cultural conception of love. When people truly love one another, they will serve each other with greater consistency and compassion.
The Necessity of Love
“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 that I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.” (1 Corinthians 13:1-3)
The flow of the chapter is in three parts. First, we see the necessity of love in verses 1-3. Though a person may possess the most dynamic spiritual gifts and exercise them in the most dramatic way, they do nothing and are nothing without love. Love is the divine power that transforms a person’s efforts into meaningful ministry. Love is necessary.
The Nature of Love
“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 in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
(1 Corinthians 13:4-7)
Second, we notice the nature of love in verses 4-7. What is the love Paul is talking about really like? The nature of this divine love is humble and unselfish. It is focused on the needs of others. It is the way everybody wants to be loved. It is powerful to transform lives because it is the way God loves. Anybody can hate. Only God can truly love.
The Endurance of Love
“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. When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I thought as a child, I reasoned as a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish things. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. Now abide faith, hope and love, these three; but the greatest if these is love.”
(1 Corinthians 13:8-13)
In the final section, we see the endurance of love. All things in this world change, they all pass away. The only thing permanent is God and his plan. Even good things God uses in his plan have their time and are gone. But three things remain, three virtues or three graces, as they are called. These three eternal realities are faith, hope, and love. Our faith in this life has its eternal ramifications, even in the next life. The hope that holds us firmly connected to God and gives our lives meaning and purpose, will be an eternal hope in the presence of the Lord. But the greatest is love. The love of God displayed in the cross of Christ that wooed us and sustained us throughout the ups and downs of this world is the love we give to him in response and the love we give to others in obedience to him. This kind of never-failing love is possible only by the work of God in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. God loves us and empowers us to love him and others. This love is not based on how we feel but on the call of God to love. The surrender to love truly is the greatest thing in the world.