What kind of love? 1 CORINTHIANS 13:1-13 10.30 am 28th Jan 07
This well-known passage in Paul’s first letter to the church in Corinth, chapter 13, comes between chapters 12 and 14. I know that sounds obvious, but if we know what comes either side it can help us to understand the passage better. So chapter 12 talks about the church being one body, made up of many different parts which each have specific roles to play. Chapter 14 describes how some of the spiritual gifts are to be used in the church for the good of others. In other words, the chapter about love is set in the context of how to be church – and although it is often quoted at weddings, it was obviously intended to be guidance not specifically for just two people who are choosing to spend their lives together, but for whole churches.
Now, it’s obvious that it is impossible to love in isolation. Love is only love when it is directed at someone other than ourselves, isn’t it. It can’t exist in a vacuum. But this chapter brings the lofty ideal of love right down to earth. “This,” Paul says, “is what your everyday relationships within the church should be like.”
Now, very often, Paul is addressing a particular difficulty in a church when he writes to them. We don’t know all the background, but for Paul to write like this I think they obviously must have had a problem loving each other within the church in Corinth – so that gives me encouragement that it’s not only a 21st century problem! In fact, I believe Paul shows us that it is even possible to put on a show, to pretend that we love. It is possible to serve others but without really having a heart of service. He says at the beginning of chapter 13, “I could display all the spiritual gifts known to the church – but if people do not feel loved by me, it’s a waste of everyone’s time.” So let’s look at the characteristics of real love, and how to recognise when it is pretend love. We see the difference by Paul’s use of negative and positive language in describing love in this chapter.
Firstly, the positives. Real love, Paul says, is patient and kind. It rejoices whenever the truth wins out. It is always hopeful, and it endures through every circumstance. Real love will last forever!
This is the kind of love that shines out to us from God, and was seen in the life and works and teachings of Jesus:
o He was patient with his disciples. Even when they didn’t understand what was happening, he didn’t put them down, he kept on helping them to move forward and grow in their knowledge of the ways of God. As an example we can remember how many times Jesus gave Peter another chance – even after Peter had denied all knowledge of Jesus, Jesus didn’t write him off but offered him a fresh start. That is patience in action.
o Jesus was kind, meeting the needs of so many people who were poor or distressed or suffering or downhearted. Even when people didn’t really know what they needed from him, Jesus offered himself, his friendship as well as healing and forgiveness. He was kind.
o Jesus rejoiced in truth – in fact, he showed that accepting the truth is the only way to freedom. If we recognise the truth that we are sinful people who need God’s help, we are able to ask for that help and be changed. It’s if we refuse to accept the truth that we remain bound. Jesus commended those who spoke the truth. He taught that our words should be truth. He himself is the truth of God.
o And on the cross Jesus showed the full extent of his love that never fails, as he went to the most dreadful death and separation from his Father in order to spare us going through the same. That is love that keeps going to the end, whatever happens. That is real love.
But Paul says it is possible to have instead a pretend love – one that may look OK for a time, but it is impossible to keep up. This “pretend” love reveals itself when the chips are down to be, in reality, jealous, boastful, proud and rude. It demands to have its own way. It gets annoyed easily, and counts up how many times it has been wronged. It rejoices when some injustice brings it what it wants and cheats somebody else. It easily gives up and loses faith. This love is no good to anybody, least of all us.
Who wants to be on the receiving end of that sort of love? Not me!
I think the key to understanding more about real love comes when Paul talks towards the end of this chapter about “growing up”. “When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things.” We probably all know children who have been spoilt – who insist on having their own way and throw a tantrum when they don’t get it. They keep a count of how many times their brother gets something nice and they don’t. They want to have their wishes met now! They will say anything, even downright lies, to get their own way. As a Secondary School teacher, I come across children and young people who are so used to being given in to all the time that they don’t know that sometimes we have to wait, or put the needs of others first. They are not nice people to know! And it is a tragedy isn’t it if they continue the same into their adult life and find it impossible to cope with real relationships.
So Paul teaches that we are to grow up. We are to put behind us these childish ways of behaving, and to mature, to learn to live in love, which will outlast all the things that this world throws at us! We are to be a living demonstration to the world of the kind of real love that Jesus showed when he was living on the earth.
Now I don’t know about you but I find that isn’t easy! You see, we are all the product of our childhood, our past. We may still have things within us that affect the way we see and understand love. If our need for approval wasn’t met in childhood, for example, then we may struggle now to offer approval to others. If we didn’t receive unconditional acceptance, how do we know to make others feel accepted? So many of the negative things that Paul talks about are simply the outcomes of a lack, a setback in our earlier experience. When life seems unfair to a small child, for example, because others seem to get more attention or rewards than her, to help her grow up that child has to be shown that yes, life can be unfair – but she is fully loved and valued for who she is, not judged by how much she may or may not possess. She needs to be helped to cope with the painful feelings and move towards maturity.
So the pretend love that Paul describes is often, when we see it in the lives of people today, really a sort of cry for help. If my mask slips and I react by wanting revenge on someone who has hurt me, it may be because I have been mistreated in some way before and my needs were not met, and that pain is still with me – so I need to be helped to deal with the hurt so that I can move on. If I am impatient, that reveals perhaps that I have been disappointed in the past and I can’t cope with the pain of waiting and waiting for something that doesn’t come. I may try to hide the pain, but if it’s still there it is bound to come out sooner or later – and it may cause me to lash out at someone who inadvertently touches that raw spot.
So Paul tells us that we need as followers of God to put away childish ways, to recognise our need to change, to grow up and mature. If our love is very often the “pretend” sort – maybe on the outside we can look as if we are behaving in a loving way, but we know our hearts are hurting and crying inside – then we need to place ourselves into the presence of God’s love to have those hurts from the past brought to the surface so they can be healed. God’s love can be like the warming sunshine that allows us to remove the outer layers and bask in his goodness. In his presence, we can stop pretending and let those hurts be exposed to his touch. We can acknowledge the truth that they exist. You see, once we recognise them for what they are – once we allow ourselves to speak the truth about what we really feel and how we have been hurt – then those feelings and hurts are no longer holding us trapped in the past but we have brought them into the present, and so we can ask God to set us free from them now.
Of course, this may be a long process rather than a quick fix. If our parents for whatever reason did not give us the comfort and love we needed as a child, for example, then we may need to forgive them. This is a decision we have to reach, a choice we have to make, and it is not a light thing. But is may be necessary, to unblock where we got stuck in childhood so we can then develop into a more adult way of behaving.
Or if we are prone to jealousy, then we might need to spend time exploring where these deep feelings come from. Is it because when we were younger we kept feeling that someone else got the praise we so much craved? Or perhaps other families seemed to have so much more than ours, and we resent that. If we hold on to these deep emotions and refuse to bring them to the surface, it is impossible for us to move on. It takes courage to face up to the things we don’t like about ourselves, doesn’t it? Sometimes we may feel it is just too painful to go back to our childhood hurts, or too difficult to face bad things that have happened to us and we can’t seem to shake ourselves out of the effects they have left with us, sometimes over many years.
But the safe place to do this is if we know we are surrounded by God’s love. It is patient and kind, it rejoices in the truth, it is always hopeful and it endures through everything. As we allow the warmth of God’s love to shine on us, whether on our own or with the help of friends or family or church, then God can and will bring healing to these parts of our lives. He will set us free from their effects.
Then, Paul says, we will be able to grow up and love in a mature way. Instead of reacting out of hurts, our relationships within the church will be marked by patience and kindness, by rejoicing in each other’s successes and by hanging on in there when the going gets tough. That sort of love will build up the church, so that we feel comfortable to live in chapters 12 and 14 – to use our spiritual gifts, to develop our ministries, to see what God wants us to do for others, to be built together into the Body of Christ here on earth. God’s love will not only touch us, it will reach out to others through us. The whole world will see how much God loves – because it is shown by how much we truly love one another.
Amen.