“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.”
~ 1 Corinthians 13:4
Hi James and Ellen,
What does the word love mean to you? Is love a word that your dad and ma are always using with you? Is your dad and ma always telling you that they love you? Do you like to hear your dad and ma say to you that they love you? Do you tell your dad and ma that you love them? Your grandpaa knows that your grandmaa loves him. Your grandpaa tries to remember to tell your grandmaa at least once every day that he loves her. That is easy for your grandpaa to do. You have a very wonderful grandmaa. Your grandmaa is very easy to love. Your grandpaa thinks that your grandmaa is just as beautiful as she was when your grandpaa married her. Your grandpaa really likes being with your grandmaa. Your grandmaa is your grandpaa’s companion and helpmate. Love is talked about in the Bible. There is a chapter in a book of the Bible which is referred to as the love chapter. Ask your dad or ma if they know what chapter of the Bible is referred to as being the love chapter. 1 Corinthians 13 is called the love chapter in the Bible. Paul tells the Corinth Christ-followers why love had to supersede everything else that they were doing in their Christ-follower community regarding their interpersonal interactions with each another. To supersede can mean to ascertain that one specific thing that is being done is more important than everything else that is being done. The Corinth Christ-follower community seemed to have been putting speaking in tongues, prophesying, faith and giving ahead of loving one another. When a guy or gal puts speaking in tongues – even if the guy or gal is able to speak as an angel speaks, prophesying – even if the guy or gal is able to understand or fathom all life mysteries and have all knowledge, faith – even if the guy or gal is able to move mountains, and gives – even if the guy or gal passes on everything that he or she owns or has to the poor, who is the guy or gal putting before everyone else? A guy or gal is putting himself or herself before every other guy and gal when he or she puts what he or she wants to do ahead of the dreams, hopes and feelings of every other guy and gal. If you really love, you will not try to make yourselves as being the most important kid among the other kids; you will look at every other kid as being more special than you.
Ask your dad and/or ma to ask you what each mini sentence or mini phrase says to you in each verse in this chapter which gives meanings to love. Have your dad and/or ma begin with verse 4 – which says “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.” What does it mean to you that love is patient? What does it mean to you that love is kind? What does it mean to you that love does not envy? What does it mean to you that love does not boast? What does it mean to you that love is not proud? Have your dad and/or ma – using the next three verses, ask the same question to you. If you were to ever hear a guy or gal speaking in tongues or prophesying or sharing a word of wisdom do not forget that speaking in tongues, prophesying and having a word of wisdom will come to an end one day – that is if speaking in tongues, prophesying and having a word of wisdom have not already ended, but love will never end. Why do you think that love will never end? The love that Paul is writing about to the Corinth Christ-follower community is not the same kind of love that you have for your dad and ma. The kind of love that Paul is writing about to the Corinth Christ-follower community is the love that God showed that He has for every guy, gal and kid who He chose to be His specially elected guys, gals and kids before He created planet Earth when He had His only Son – Jesus Christ, be cruelly crucified to death on a couple of crossed wooden beams. The kind of love that God has for His specially elected guys, gals and kids is unmerited. God has shown His love to your grandmaa and grandpaa, your dad and ma and your Aunt Lynn and Uncle Chris by having His Son – Jesus Christ, die for their sins so that they might reside with Him on the other side of death’s door.
The love that God has for you is not the same kind of love that you have for your dad and ma. The love that God is talking about in this letter that He had Paul pen and send to the Corinth Christ-follower community guys and gals is a very different kind of love than that of a guy and gal putting the wants and wishes of every other guy and gal ahead of his or her wants and wishes. Only God – when He became His Son Jesus, can love the way that He is through Paul describing love. When you are saying to your dad or ma that you love him or her, you are thinking that you really do love your dad or ma but you really do not begin to love your dad and ma like God loves you. The love of God is more than just affection or adoration or really caring for other guys, gals and kids; God’s love would be an unconditional willingness to give up everything that you have – including your life, so that other guys, gals and kids can live. Would you be willing to die so that another guy, gal or kid could live? What God really wants you to do with your lives is to die to yourselves and not to die literally for other guys, gals and kids as God did – as God the Son, for you. If you did this, this would demonstrate to God your genuine desire for His love in your lives. When the guys, gals and kids who God chose as His specially elected guys, gals and kids are led to and through death’s door into heaven, these guys, gals and kids will leave everything but love behind them on planet Earth. No guy, gal or kid will need to speak in tongues, prophesy, demonstrate faith and give when they are in heaven. What do you think that you will need when you are in heaven? You will not need to have one single thing. As God’s adopted kids, you will experience as you are passing through death’s door into heaven a continued sense of God’s unequivocal love which will leave you with unbounded joy that will find you constantly praising God alongside heavenly hosts and angels.
1 Corinthians 13 (190)