Today’s reading from the 13th chapter of the First Letter to the Corinthians contains some of the most beautiful words in all of Scripture, and likely some of the most beautiful words ever written.
In many ways, there are no words that need to be added to this passage about the nature of love.
But what I would invite us all to ponder, for a few moments this morning, is not what 1 Corinthians says – we can all read that quite easily — but rather the context into which these words were set, the situation that motivated Paul to write these words in the first place. In many ways, as powerful as the words of this passage are, on their own, their power and their ongoing relevance may even take on greater significance when we remember what occasioned them.
The last verse of 1 Corinthians 12, which we read last week, sets the immediate context for these words. Chapter 12’s elaborate use of the metaphor of the Body, with many parts, to describe the church, was offered to remind his readers that they were not to compete for status or vie for power in the community of faith. There were different gifts, but they were to work together for the effective functioning good of the whole body.
But in spite of all of these different gifts, in spite of all of these different abilities, there was one overarching gift that they were all to strive towards. The 12th chapter ended with that reminder of that common gift, that shared goal, towards which all were to strive. “Strive for the greater gifts,” Paul wrote, “and I will show you a still more excellent way.”
And that still more excellent way was the prelude to the beautiful words of 1 Corinthians 13 – to live in the way of love, and to realize that no great abilities, no prophetic powers, no noble sacrifices — in short, no great achievement in any part of the one Body — meant anything if they were done without love. It was love towards which every part of the Body, every member of the church, was called to strive.
The irony, of course, was that these beautiful words about love were being written to the members of the church in Corinth – a church community that was known for many things – but love was not high on the list of its defining attributes.
To the contrary, from the very opening passages of this letter, we are offered a glimpse of a contentious, divided, controversy-plagued, morally dubious, factionalized, fractious group of people. By midway through the opening chapter, Paul was already addressing these difficulties openly and pointedly – “it has been reported to me by Chloe’s people that there are quarrels among you, my brothers and sisters. What I mean is that each of you says, ‘I belong to Paul,’ or ‘I belong to Cephas’, or ‘I belong to Christ’. Has Christ been divided?”
As the rest of the letter unfolds, we are offered a glimpse into a sordid mess of problems in that ancient community. Some were acting as if they were wiser than others, and lording their supposed wisdom over those that they considered fools. A faction had arisen in the community between those who were trying to follow the guidance of a character named Apollos and some who considered themselves followers of Paul. Paul appealed to them, in pleading tones, to put aside such differences and to work together in harmony and in unity. He then turned his attention to issues of sexual morality, including a situation in which one of the members of the church was either living with or having an affair with his own stepmother. Nor was that the only problem. Paul addressed issues of sexual morality, of idolatry, of greed, of drunkenness, of members of the church suing each other and taking each other to court, of the use of prostitutes, of rules related to marriage, of debates about dietary regulations and which foods should and should not be eaten, of how members of the community should even abstain from taking communion if they were in situations of conflict with other members of the church community.
The church in Corinth was many things, but a peaceful, harmonious, exemplary community of love it was not.
Which, to me, makes the words of 1 Corinthians 13 all the more powerful – because it was to that community, to those people, and into that context of a struggling, factious, controversy-plagued, divisive, morally dubious community of people that some of the most beautiful words about love were written. It was into their brokenness, into their struggle, into their reality that Paul was writing – and, it should be noted, it was the Corinthian church’s willingness to listen to what Paul was saying, to pay attention to his words, and to preserve this ancient letter – that gave to the church throughout the ages, and to the world, the most beautiful articulation of what love means. These words did not come to them as Scripture, they came as a letter — a letter that could easily have been ignored, discarded, set down, thrown out. But rather, the very fact that we still have this letter means that the Corinthian church was willing to read it, willing to ponder it, willing to hear what was being said – even though much of the letter was quite critical of them – but that openness and that willingness to be criticized, to be challenged.
And that should be inspiring for all of us.
And why? Because the church community in Corinth was not the last time that the church, in this world, experienced divisions, factions, controversies, debates about sexual morality, greed, idolatry, individuals vying for power and authority, conflicts, differences of opinion about rules and regulations. To the contrary, in every age and in every generation, such situations arise.
It is true in our own time – there are differences within the Church, scandals that still make the front pages of the newspapers, controversies about sexual morality, conflicts about power and authority, divisions about leadership and denominational affiliation, examples of greed and contention, opposing opinions about rules and regulations and practices. Criticism is levelled at the church from within and without – criticism that is just as pointed and just as accurate as the criticism that Paul levelled at the church in Corinth.
But, believe it or not, that is actually good news. Because if it was the imperfections, the challenges in the church in Corinth – not their perfections – that motivated Paul to write these beautiful words about love, perhaps it is still the case that the challenges and imperfections can still be the catalyst for the revelation of the light of love in this world.
To put it another way, if it was the cracks that let Paul’s beautiful vision of the light of love’s true nature shine in, maybe we can see the challenges, in every age, as opportunities to grow in love. Maybe the struggles that we face – in our personal lives, in our life together, in the wider world – provide us chances to grow towards a fuller vision of God’s love at work in this world.
Which is quite a biblical idea. After all, God’s love is – so often – most powerfully glimpsed in the midst of the brokenness of life in this world. To an enslaved people in Egypt; to a struggling, grumbling, wandering group of nomads in the wilderness; to a community of dejected exiles in Babylon; to an oppressed people under Roman imperial rule; to a crucified carpenter hung on a cross; to a divided church in Corinth — such were the contexts in which God’s power was powerfully revealed.
Which means that we need not be discouraged when we face challenges – in our lives, in the church, in the world — but rather we should find inspiration to wait more faithfully, to hope more confidently, to love more fully.
So listen again to these words – but hear them within the context of our own lives, our own struggles, our own challenges, our own reality. Because the same God who inspired Paul to write these words, so long ago, continues to be present among us, calling us – even now — to strive for the still more excellent way.
If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast,* but do not have love, I gain nothing.
4 Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant5or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;6it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. 7It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
8 Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. 9For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; 10but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. 11When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. 12For now we see in a mirror, dimly,* but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. 13And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.
