“THE GREATEST OF THESE …”
“If I speak in
the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding
gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom
all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains,
but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor
and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I
gain nothing. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not
boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not
self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love
does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects,
always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they
will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is
knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but
when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I
talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I
became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a
reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part;
then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. And now these three
remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.” (NIV
1Corinthians 13)
This passage
is read at weddings about as often as a bride wears a wedding dress. Perhaps
that is an over exaggeration but not by much. It is used because it has so much
so say about the qualities of love which are essential to the success of the
relationship between people.
Holly and I have
been married for just over thirty-two years but it very nearly came to an end
about seven years ago because we forgot the message of 1Corinthians 13.
The details
behind the cause of this rift are unimportant but to put it in the most general
terms the cause was that Holly was looking to me to fill all of her emotional
needs and I was looking to her to feel my need to respect. Needless to say
because we are both human each of us failed miserably to meet the expectations
of the other, which caused a death spiral of our relationship.
We spent a year
going to counseling both with Pastor Paul and with a Christian marriage
counselor but neither of these helped. Honestly, the reason that this did not work
was because my heart wasn’t ready. The emotions I was feeling clouded all the
other feelings I had towards her. The only thing I can say that I did right
during this time in our relationship was that I tried to treat her with
respect, perhaps because that is what I myself needed.
After a year of
counseling, I decided I could no longer live with Holly so I moved out. Shortly
after moving out I decided I was going to divorce Holly. I was so certain that
this was what I wanted I spent $4,000 on an attorney and filed for divorce.
During that time
of separation, I spent a lot of time working on my relationship with God and
examining my own life. Unknown to me at the time, Holly was doing the same
thing. How do I know this? Because even seven years later, I find post it notes
she placed around the house with Bible verses to help encourage her during that
time and her draw closer to God.
This time in my
life was easily the hardest times I have ever been through. Harder than any
break up I had in high school, harder than the deaths of my parents and harder
than the emotional turmoil I have experienced in the last year.
One day, I
received some news and my emotional response was completely unexpected. Once
again the details don’t matter but the effect it had on my life was a God
moment. In that instant, my heart changed and I was able to see Holly’s side in
what had happened along with her hurt and the turmoil she was experiencing.
That is not to say that it made what happened between her and me okay, but it
did open the door to reconciliation.
Holly and I ended
up reconciling without the help of a human counselor because we both had changed
and grown even closer to God, the God of love, the God who is love, the God who
provides the ultimate counselor in the Holy Spirit.
So today, Holly
and I wake up and make the decision to love each other. Our marriage is not
perfect but I believe it to be stronger than at any other time. I know that
having gone through this process I have received an even more Godly wife and one
whom I cherish. Hopefully, Holly can say the same about me as her husband.
I have grown
immensely because to this trial and hope that you might benefit from my
mistakes.
·
All relationship in order to reach their full
potential must begin with God as the head, Christ as the example, and the Holy
Spirit as the counselor.
·
God provides the direction and planning for the
relationship.
·
Christ provides the example of how to love each
other even in the hard times.
·
The Holy Spirit helps show two people how to work
through difficult times.
·
You cannot control the actions of the other
person in the relationship nor should you try. The only person’s actions you
can truly affect is your own and those should be guided by Godly principles.
Often times a spouse will try to fix the other person. That is not the spouse’s
job. The job of the spouse is to love their mate where they are at and allow
God to work on fixing both people in the relationship.
·
The closer you are to a person the greater the
potential to be hurt by the person. So
when you experience great emotional hurt, take a deep breath, step away for a
moment, then respond after reflecting on the previous two points. If you still
want to respond out of anger, then wash, rinse, repeat. In other words continue
the process of seeking God’s direction and examining your own actions before
responding to the hurt. Another way to look at hurt is to count it a blessing
to experience the hurt because it shows how much you care about the other
person.
WE CAN LOVE WELL BECAUSE WE WERE FIRST WELL LOVED.
The last thing I
would like for you to think about is that 1 Corinthians 13 was not written to a
couple getting married on a joy-filled day. It was written to a church that was
going through some very dark days of division and turmoil. This makes the
lessons contained in it about love all the more important because it shows the
importance of love in handling strife between people.
I end by reading
1 Corinthians 13 again but this time using
The Message
version.
“If I speak with
human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the
creaking of a rusty gate. If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his
mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to
a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing. If I give
everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr,
but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I
believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.
Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have.
Love doesn’t strut,
Doesn’t have a swelled head,
Doesn’t force itself on others,
Isn’t always “me first,”
Doesn’t fly off the handle,
Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,
Doesn’t revel when others grovel,
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.
Love never dies.
Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end;
understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth, and
what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our
incompletes will be canceled.
When I was an
infant at my mother’s breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew
up, I left those infant ways for good. We don’t yet see things clearly. We’re
squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won’t be long before the
weather clears and the sun shines bright! We’ll see it all then, see it all as
clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us! But for right
now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that
consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And
the best of the three is love.”
Jon Mayo – Sunday morning, Valentine’s Day February 14th,
2016, Benson Baptist Church, Omaha NE.
