A More Excellent Way

1 Corinthians is written to a church that is deeply divided in attitude and practice. Paul writes them in an effort to affect unity within this community of believers. Even though the church is ancient, the problems are not. As a matter of fact, many churches and denominations still argue and divide over these same issues today. Hopefully, we can learn from Paul's letter how we can experience greater unity within our faith families.

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Episode Transcript

Keith Jones (00:01):
Welcome to this episode of Planting Seeds.
I'm Keith Jones, the PreachingMinister of Calera Church of
Christ, and I've prepared ashort message from Scripture
that's intended to be theplanting of a seed that, if
cultivated, will in time producefruit in the lives of the
listeners.
Now let's get started.
In this episode we'll continueour study of the book of 1

(00:37):
Corinthians looking at 1Corinthians, chapter 13,
beginning in verse 1.
If you have a Bible with you,follow along while I read:
If I speak in the tongues of menand of angels but have not love
, I am a noisy gong or aclanging cymbal.
And if I have prophetic powersand understand all mysteries and
all knowledge, and if I haveall faith so as to remove

(01:01):
mountains, but have not love, Iam nothing.
If I give away all that I haveand if I deliver up my body to
be burned but have not love, Igain nothing.
Love is patient and kind.
Love does not envy or boast.
It is not arrogant or rude.
It does not insist on its ownway, it's not irrational or

(01:25):
resentful .
t o n at , but rejoices withthe truth.
Love bears all things, believesall things, hopes all things,
endures all things.
Love never ends.
As for prophecies, they willpass away.
As for tongues, they will cease.
As for knowledge, they willpass away.

(01:45):
As for tongues, they will cease.
As for knowledge, it will passaway, for we know in part and we
prophesy in part, but when theperfect comes, the partial will
pass away.
When I was a child, I spokelike a child, I thought like a
child, I reasoned like a child.
When I became a man, I gave upchildish ways, for now we see in
a mirror, dimly, but then faceto face.

(02:07):
Now I know in part, then Ishall know fully, even as I have
been fully known.
So now, faith, hope and loveabide these three, but the
greatest of these is love.
While this chapter may have beenpopularized by reading it at
weddings for our purposes, wewant to make sure we remember

(02:29):
that Paul is writing this in thecontext of how the Spirit
manifests itself in our publicassemblies.
As he mentioned severalspiritual gifts in chapter 12,
he mentioned that they all camefrom the same spirit, so they
shouldn't be exercised in a waythat creates division.
And he closed chapter 12 bysaying there's a more excellent

(02:52):
way than any of the gifts he hadalready mentioned to make the
spirit known in our assemblies,and this chapter lets us know
that that more excellent way isthe way of love.
The way that we love oneanother will reveal to believers
and non-believers that theSpirit of God is in our
assemblies.
Paul begins in that firstparagraph by letting us know

(03:15):
that there is no action that wetake in the name of Christ that
has any meaning or purpose apartfrom love, that no work is a
good work without love.
Paul mentioned several thingsthat he could do, and if they
were void of love they would bemeaningless.
He says that even if he couldspeak in the language of angels

(03:37):
or reveal everything that's amystery and actually know
everything there is to know,even if he could literally move
a mountain with his faith, noneof that would mean anything if
he didn't have the love ofChrist.
And Paul says this is also trueeven if he gives away
everything that he has to theneedy and gives himself up as a

(03:58):
martyr.
If love is not the motivation,then it's meaningless.
And that leads Paul to definelove for his readers, to make
sure they understand what he'stalking about when he says that
they should love one another andthat love is a more excellent
way of making the Spirit knownthan any of the gifts he had

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mentioned.
It's a good thing he does aswell, because often what we call
love looks very different thanwhat Paul describes here.
Paul is describing a love thatgives and not one that takes.
It's something that's notdependent on the way I feel or
the mood that I'm in, or eventhe way the other person makes
me feel.
Right, paul is not writing topeople so they can tell if they

(04:42):
are being loved.
He's writing to make sure thatwe know how to love others and,
as we see from his descriptionof this love, there are no
conditions for that.
This is the kind of love thatJesus has for us.
So as we read verses 4 through7, we kind of see a barometer
for determining whether or notwe are expressing love for our

(05:05):
fellow man.
We can evaluate our behaviorsand our attitudes to see if what
we're giving others is love, ordo those actions and attitudes
toward others representsomething else entirely.
Paul lets us know that we stoploving others as soon as we
become anxious about the outcomeof the relationship.

(05:25):
That's what he means when hesays love is patient.
I don't have to withhold lovepending someone else's right
response.
I can love them, even if thatlove is unrequited.
We also stop loving as soon aswe miss opportunities to be kind
, when we get so comfortablewith a relationship or the

(05:46):
benefits that it's providing usthat we neglect to be kind to
the other person to do thingsthat are helpful for them.
We've moved into somethingother than love.
Paul says love does not envy.
So we've stopped loving otherswhen we want more than we have,
when it becomes more about whatwe get than what we give.

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We're no longer loving anotherperson when we're bragging or
overconfident, as Paul says,when we're boastful or arrogant.
And he lets us know that we'vestopped loving others when we
stop being courteous becauselove is not rude, when we stop
being courteous because love isnot rude.
In the translation I read, hisnext phrase is that love does

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not insist on getting its ownway.
Other translations say keep norecord of wrong.
What Paul's describing there iswhen we get into a relationship
and keep score and our capacityto show love to the other person
is limited by whether or not wefeel like they've given as much
to us as we've given to themwhen we demand to get our own

(06:50):
way.
When we reach that point, whatwe're offering the other person
is not love.
Paul also says we've stoppedloving as soon as we become
irritable and resentful.
Those are reactions we'rehaving to other people based on
our expectations of what they dofor us, and that's not love.
And we certainly aren't beingloving when we rejoice when they

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get what they deserve.
And we stop loving others whenwe stop having faith that God's
way is the best way, when westop hoping for the fulfillment
of his promises in the life ofthat person and when we stop
enduring, being willing to dowhatever it takes to get there.
Paul is not describing aromantic love here, and he's not

(07:35):
talking about the vows thathusbands and wives make to each
other when they get married.
He is talking about the way weshould see other people,
especially in our churches, andhow we should treat them, even
if we're not getting that backin return, because over time
that's how we build strong,healthy churches, when everyone

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in our assemblies has learned tolove each other this way.
In doing so, our burdens becomelighter because they're shared
and our joys are multipliedbecause they're shared with
people who want everything forus that God wants for us.
Paul says this kind of lovenever ends.
Some of the things that theywere arguing about and using to

(08:21):
jockey for position within theassembly were going to fade away
.
Prophecies would go away.
Speaking in tongues, evenknowledge itself, goes away, he
says.
That's the case because thosethings may be helpful in
developing spiritual maturity.
But once we become spirituallymature we're not going to need

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some of those things.
We're going to understand morefully what God wants of us, what
God was doing and how ouractions affected others.
Paul says right now, because ofour limitations, we see things
dimly, as in a mirror.
You have to remember, a mirrorfor a first century person was a
piece of bronze that had beenpolished.

(09:02):
Corinth was actually known fortheir mirror production, but it
didn't give an exact image.
It wasn't always easy to seeevery detail.
But Paul lets us know that aswe grow in love, all of these
things become more and moreclear to us.
The Spirit's presence becomesmore and more obvious to us, and

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there will come a day when weshall fully know, in the same
way that we have been fullyknown.
So as Paul finishes up histhought in this chapter, he
reminds his readers of thethings that will always be there
, the things that will lastforever.
The things they were arguingabout, the things that they

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thought marked them out as morespecial than other people,
those were all going to go away,but faith, hope and love abide
forever.
And out of those three amazingvirtues, the greatest of those
is love.
We have all been blessed by Godwith a variety of gifts and
abilities.
You may think you don't haveany, but they're there.

(10:06):
As stewards of those blessings,we are to allow God to
cultivate and grow those in ourlives, and we should use those
for his glory.
But as we look to make theSpirit of God known in our world
and in our churches, we cannotforget that the greatest
manifestation of the Spirit ofGod is the way we love one

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another.
Thank you for listening.
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