The Supremacy of Love Over All Spiritual Gifts (1 Corinthians Sermon 46)

I’d like to ask that you turn in your Bibles to 1 Corinthians 13, and we’re gonna begin this next phase of our walk through this incredible book, 1 Corinthians. As we get to this chapter, I would say, perhaps one of the most famous chapters in all the Bible, I have the privilege again and again of officiating weddings, and I would say probably two-thirds of the weddings I’ve officiated, this has been one of the scriptures that people have chosen to read. And it’s right to do that. So we can celebrate Christian love at a Christian wedding, a Christian marriage. And yet, these words a long time ago ceased to be sweet wedding poetry for me, there is a toughness to 1 Corinthians 13.

Once you start meditating on this definition, this comprehensive definition of what love is and what love isn’t, how it affects us, and what will happen if we don’t have it, it is a very strong chapter. To some degree, you feel.…you know that expression, like we’re being put through the wringer. I think about that. I think over a century ago, my grandmother used one of those old-style washing machines. You can picture a big kind of tub with sudsy water and you’re taking the dirty garment and putting it in there, and you’re racking it and rubbing it on this rack and pulling it up and it’s dripping and you’re rubbing it some more and then you put it through the wringer as it squeegees out all of this dirty water and you look at it and it needs to be washed again. And so it is, I feel like, we go carefully step by step through 1 Corinthians 13, we feel like we’re being put through the wringer, and I think we need to have not too light a view or too heavy a view of this chapter.

And so week after week, I’m going to wanna go both sides, I want this chapter to have its way with us, I want it to work us over, I’m going to make an argument in the weeks that we have to study this chapter that this is a pure distillation of the Law of God horizontally, one to another, the second great commandment. And as law, it’s gonna work us over, it’s not here to tell us how wonderful we are and how incredible we are and how good at loving, it’s to show us our faults and our flaws and our deficiencies. So we can’t have too light a view of it as a kind of fluffy wedding poetry, but we can’t be crushed by it either. It ends up.…1 Corinthians 13 ends up in heaven. It ends up with heavenly love, and we someday, brothers and sisters, through the ministry of the gospel and through the transformation of glorification, we are going to be perfected in love, so we don’t wanna be crushed by it either, we wanna have a serious walk through this chapter and find ways that we need to grow and develop in love, but we also need to be filled with hope, and so to that end, let’s look at the heaviness of this chapter and let’s try to understand.

“And as law, it’s gonna work us over, it’s not here to tell us how wonderful we are and how incredible we are and how good at loving, it’s to show us our faults and our flaws and our deficiencies. “

And as I look at it, I feel like this chapter is designed to put sin to death in our lives, that we would mortify loveless-ness in our lives, it’s designed to kill us, that it may give us life. Jesus said that the Christian life really is a life of learning how to die. He said in Luke 9:23, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.” So there is a daily dying to self, and this chapter which defines perfect horizontal love toward other people, it commands me to die to myself constantly. I’ve said many times before that we sinners from birth, from infancy, have a fanatical commitment to self. Recently, my daughter, Jenny and her husband Steven, gave birth to our first grandchild, Sola. Sola Grace, named after “by grace alone”, what a wonderful name. And she’s a sweet baby, she’s….she seems relatively easy to care for and has a sweet disposition, but she is, like all babies, fanatically committed to self, and her mom and dad know this, that very much she is going to get her own way or want her own way and demand it. And it’s gonna get more and more.

So it is with all children, we have been that way from infancy. Now, 1 Corinthians 13 is a powerful remedy to that relentless bent of the flesh toward selfishness, toward feeding of the self, if you look at the 15 statements that Paul makes about what love is and what love isn’t, you realize the flesh is opposed to all of them, the flesh is impatient, the flesh is unkind and jealous, the flesh is boastful and arrogant and rude, the flesh most definitely seeks its own pleasure relentlessly, the flesh is easily provoked, the flesh definitely keeps a record of wrongs done to it. The flesh does not delight in the truth, but rejoices in evil, the flesh bears nothing, it believes the worst about other people, it has no hope in the relationship and gives up on other people quickly. That’s what the flesh does.

Every single one of the 15 assertions that Paul makes about love calls us to a kind of death, to spiritual warfare, that we would put the flesh to death. Now, the good news of the gospel, as I’ve said, is that God knows that we can never produce or manufacture this kind of supernatural love on our own, our salvation is a work of grace from the beginning to the end. It is the very thing, the cross and the empty tomb of Jesus Christ are brought into the world and into our lives to produce that we would become supernaturally loving people. This is the work the Spirit wants to do in us. So for a number of weeks, we are going to be walking through this chapter. We’re gonna slow down. We’re not gonna hurry through it. I already have written, I think, four more sermons on this, and I’m not even beyond verse seven, I think, or six, something like that, so we’re gonna take our time and we’re gonna let the Holy Spirit do its work on us in reference to love. Now, other than the Holy Spirit, and our dear friend, the Apostle Paul, one of my guides through these sermons will be Jonathan Edwards, a great Puritan, New England Puritan pastor from the 18th century who preached.…now get this, 16 sermons through these 13 verses in the year 1738. The revival at Northampton, Mass. had already happened a few years before that, the first Great Awakening was still a few years off, and so in between, he preached this series of sermons to exhort the church to a life of daily love with one another, and it’s a marvelous work, a detailed work. I’m not gonna preach, I don’t think, 16 sermons in 13 verses, but I’m gonna lean heavily. These sermons were gathered in a volume called “Charity and Its Fruits”, and I would commend it to you. You can read it online, it’s public domain, and I’ll be leaning on his insights again and again.

I. Love is the Supreme Goal of Our Salvation

Now, I wanna begin by saying that love is the supreme goal of our salvation, this is what our salvation is meant to do to make us love. Edwards put it this way, all the virtues that are saving and that distinguishes true Christians from others are summed up in Christian love. He also says, notice what excellent things are being mentioned as worthless without love, the most excellent things that have ever belonged to natural man, the most excellent privileges and the most excellent performances are nothing without love. So things such as speaking in tongues, prophesying fathoming the deepest mysteries of the Christian faith, possessing all true knowledge, laying down one’s life as a martyr, giving everything that one possesses to the poor and needy, these are some of the greatest privileges. And some of the greatest performances there could ever be on earth.

And Paul says all of them are worthless without love, if even these most excellent things, privileges and performances are worthless without love, then love must truly be the sum and substance of our Christian religion. And I think it is. Now, I think if we look at the two great commandments that Jesus gave, he was asked, What are the greatest commandments of the law, or which is the greatest commandment in the law? Matthew 22:36-40, Jesus replied, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind.This is the first and greatest commandment, and the second is like it, Love your neighbor as yourself. All the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments.”

So therefore, love really is the sum of what God is working in us by His grace. Paul makes a similar assertion in Romans 13:8-10, “He who loves his fellow man has fulfilled the law. The commandments, Do not commit adultery, Do not murder, Do not steal, Do not covet, and whatever other commandments there may be are summed up in this one rule: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ Love does no harm to his neighbor, therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.” So everything that Christian salvation works in the soul is ultimately summed up in this one word, love, now love vertically for God above all else, that we would love God more than any creature. Above all things that we would love God with all of our heart, soul and mind. But 1 Corinthians 13 is not primarily or first and foremost about vertical love, love for God, it is definitely about horizontal love that we should have for one another. Now, what do we mean by love? We use this word all the time, don’t we? It’s remarkable how the same four-letter word, the same English word for love is used for such a wide range of experiences.

Like, I love my wife, I love our dog, I love my new suit, I love going to the beach, I love seafood. I love college football, I love chocolate chip ice cream. I love Jesus Christ. Now if any of you know me, you know that that list does not entirely refer to me, but we use those expressions for everyday life experience. The same word, really, I love chocolate chip ice cream and I love Jesus Christ who died for me. We use the same word.

Now, the Greeks had different words for love, for example, sexual love, eros. Family affection or natural affection like a parent would have a mother would have for her infant, storgē. Brotherly affection that we would have for friends, philía, and then a morally pure self-denying love, agápe, which is the focus here. Sometimes those words are used interchangeably in various verses, but those are different aspects of love, but we in English, we just have this one word, love. Now, Jonathan Edwards defined love in this way, that by which.…love is that by which something is dear or precious to another, that by which something is dear or precious. But he goes into much greater detail in another great work he wrote, which is Treatise on Religious Affections and in Treatise on Religious Affections, he said that the human heart has a twin ability, a capacity first to understand something in terms of its nature and its behaviors, etcetera. That’s more of a scientific knowledge and evaluation of something. And then secondly, to be attracted to or repulsed from that thing, to a greater or less degree. So attraction would be that by which we use the word like, or liking or love, and then repulsion by which we use the word disliking even to hatred. And in my own heart, I’ve had a sense of a number line of affections with zero being perfect indifference and then the positive being liking on into loving, and then the negative being disliking on into hating.

We do this all the time, and so therefore, I tend to think of it as the heart’s capacity to be attracted like a magnet, or conversely to be repulsed, but we’re talking about positively love, that our heart is attracted, that by which something or someone is dear to us or we’re drawn to it. Now, when applied to human beings as in this chapter, it has to do with a heart disposition. Affections toward other people. Now, what you love and what you hate ultimately define you as a person.

In Hebrews 1:9, it speaks of the Father’s love for the Son and why he loves him and esteems him so highly. In Hebrews 1:9, it says, “You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness. Therefore God, your God has set you above your companions by anointing you with the oil of joy.” That’s the Father’s commendation of the Son. Dear son, my son, whom I love. It’s because you love righteousness and hate wickedness, that you’re the greatest of all human beings, it defines you as a person, what you love and what you hate. Now, let’s take this chapter 1 Corinthians 13 and set it in context.

We are walking through 1 Corinthians, been doing that for a long time now, took a break, but now we’ve come back to it, and we’re in the middle of a section in which Paul is writing to this sadly very, very talented gifted church, but dysfunctional in so many ways, he’s writing them. 1 Corinthians 12:1 about spiritual gifts. Special abilities that God gives through the Holy Spirit to build up the body. Special abilities. Like speaking in tongues, prophecy, giving administration, special abilities. So we’ve got three chapters on this, 1 Corinthians 12, 13 and 14, Now the Corinthians were fractious and divided and prideful and arrogant, and some of them are very boastful about their spiritual gifts, they thought very highly of themselves, they really effectively could say to others, I don’t need you, like my gifts are so great, I don’t have any need for you. And others were kind of buying into that and feeling very crushed by the whole thing and were saying, You don’t need me, and so Paul gives this beautiful image in 1 Corinthians 12 of the body with many members, and the members are all working together. 1 Corinthians 12:12, “The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts, and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ.”

And so he is working on this arrogant attitude or this crushed attitude that you would not think either too highly or too lowly of your gifts. As he gets to 1 Corinthians 13, he’s looking at the heart attitude you have toward your brothers and sisters, toward other people, while you use your gift, this is vital that they would use their gifts in love for one another, so he introduces this love chapter at the end of chapter 12:31 with these wonderful words, I will now show you the most excellent way. So this is the most excellent way that you should use your gifts, and that is love.

II. Tongues Without Love is Empty Noise

Now, he begins with the gift of tongues. Tongues without love, he says, is empty noise. Look at verse 1, “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I’m only a resounding gong or a clanging symbol.” So I think the Corinthians, those that had the gift of tongues were very proud of that gift, it was a supernatural gift, it elevated them like in their pagan days, the frenzy in the Oracle of Delphi and all that to be touched by the divine of the supernatural and be able to speak in tongues, it elevated, they were very arrogant, very proud of their gifts, so Paul shows them how vital love is compared to the gift of tongues, and he uses extreme language really in all three of these verses, if I take the gift and push it to its extreme.

And I don’t have love. It’s really worthless ultimately. So he uses the word if. If, if, if, if, if… Kind of like this, even though I were to have the gift of tongues up to the nth degree, the tongues of men and of angels, even if I had the most excellent speaking gift ever. So he zeros in on the tongue of men and of angels, whatever that could be, what are the tongues of angels? Just we could imagine eloquence, the ability to just move people with our language and to be able to speak languages immediately and with a flourish. Just a gift of communication, preachers in particular, I think are known and celebrated often for their eloquence. John Chrysostom, the archbishop of Constantinople lived from 347 to 407. His name literally means “golden mouth”, wouldn’t you love to be called the golden mouth? Like you can just speak and people melt, just amazing. Or John Bunyan, who is a tinker, that is a repairer of pots and pans and sharpener of knives, very much a blue collar guy, not educated. But he had an amazing gift of language, he was an incredible preacher, and we see his gift of language, of course, in Pilgrims Progress, but he was an amazing preacher, and John Owen the great Puritan theologian loved to go hear him preach.

Well, John Owen was an aristocrat, very well known, and a friend of the king, and the king said to him, “Why do you go hear that tinker prattle?” He was very disdainful of Bunyan, ’cause he’s a low class lower class person, and Owen said, “May it please Your Majesty, if I could possess that tinker’s ability to move men by words, I would surrender immediately all of my learning.” Just his ability to move people by eloquence. George Whitfield, perhaps one of the most eloquent, passionate preachers of the Gospel in church history, had an amazing gift of eloquence, so much so that an actor named Garak said these words… Heard him preach and said he could move… Whitfield could move men to tears by simply pronouncing the word Mesopotamia.

It’s like, wow, I mean to have the ability to melt people by saying Mesopotamia. Charles Spurgeon was known as the Prince of Preachers, probably one of the most eloquent speakers of the English language ever. He went up without any notes at all, and just all you have to do is read a Spurgeon sermon and say, how could this level of eloquence flow through anyone’s mind? But he said this about eloquence, “Let eloquence be flung to the dogs rather than souls be lost.” What we want is to win souls, they’re not won by flowery speeches. So eloquence, the tongues of men and of angels, highly esteemed among human beings. But Spurgeon’s right, souls are not saved by eloquence, they’re saved by the spirit of God, mediated through people who really care about other people, who deeply love other people who are shattered by the spiritual lostness and the condition of other people.

Robert Murray-M’Cheyne was one such man. He ministered in the first half of the 19th century. He moved thousands in Scotland to faith in Christ and died young, very young, but it was not his eloquence that saved souls. I read an account once of a young pastor that went to the site where M’Cheyne had ministered years and years later, and he didn’t see the spiritual power in his own ministry and wanted to connect with whatever it was that was happening in M’Cheyne’s ministry. And there was an old man there who actually had heard M’Cheyne preach, and he was the caretaker at M’Cheyne’s church, and this young pastor went and he said, “Tell me what is the secret of the amazing influence of Robert Murray M’Cheyne.” And the old man took the young pastor inside the church into M’Cheyne’s study, he said, “Sit down here at the desk, now put your elbows left and right here, prop your face up on it and weep, weep, weep for the people you’re about to talk to. Weep for those who will hear you. Weep for their souls, then get up and preach.” So as I look at that and it’s like my heart has to be knit together with the work that God is doing through the words, it’s not enough to have the tongues of men and of angels, if there’s no heart of love for other people, tongues without love is worthless.

Paul said, “I would be a tinkling brass or a clanging gong if I had no love.” So you can picture that. I’ve been near Buddhist temples, I was near one in Kathmandu, Nepal, and there’s all these little tinkling things like wind chimes everywhere. You can picture that and same thing in Shinto shrines in Japan, there’s these gongs and it’s nothing, it’s meaningless, just empty noise, maybe for in our culture, you know these little wind-up monkeys that have those little cymbals going…[vocalization] Like that.

So that you could picture, it’s just what truth, what power is coming from that? None. It’s just empty noise. Tongues that do not flow from love are worthless. So imagine then, let’s make it very practical, someone getting up in front of the Corinthian congregation filled with pride, filled with self-focus, filled with self-love, speaking in tongues better than anyone ever has before, he has no love for the congregation at all, the only thing he wants from the congregation is praise and commendation back for himself, completely selfish. Paul’s saying, “That whole display is worthless, worthless.” It’s a wind chime at the time, it achieves nothing of eternal significance. Then he goes from tongues to prophecy and knowledge. Prophecy and knowledge without love are nothing.

III. Prophecy and Knowledge Without Love Are Nothing

Look at verse 2, “If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, but have not love, I am nothing.” And Paul will argue in the next chapter that prophecy is the greatest, the most impactful of all spiritual gifts. Prophecy is the ability to speak the word of God directly by revelation from God through the prophet to the people, so that the prophet can say, “Thus says the Lord” and out comes the Word of God. Though the Corinthians greatly esteemed tongues, Paul will want them, he’ll argue in chapter 14, that they should yearn even more and esteem even more of the gift of prophecy because of the impact it has on people’s hearts. 1 Corinthians 14:24-25, it says, “If an unbeliever or someone who does not understand comes in while everybody is prophesying, he will be convinced by all that he is a sinner and will be judged by all, and the secrets of his heart will be laid bare so he will fall down and worship God exclaiming, “God is really among you.”

That’s the impact of prophecy used by the power of the Holy Spirit, but what Paul is saying here in chapter 13 is, “The prophet who has no love is nothing.” Now, certainly a genuine prophecy from God, the words can have impact even if the prophet himself is a worthless man, and we know this. For example, Balaam, Balaam spoke true prophecies about Jesus centuries out. “I see him but not near. A star will arise in Jacob.” The words were true, but Balaam was worthless, he was a worthless man. Though he spoke true prophecies, he led Israel into sin with Moabite women and was slaughtered as a result, he ends up a quintessential example of a false teacher and false prophet in 2 Peter 2.

So he can speak true words, but himself, he is worthless. Or again, think of Caiaphas, the high priest, who was Jesus’s bitter-sworn enemy. But amazingly, John says that he opened up his wicked mouth and spoke a true prophecy about Jesus saying it would be better for one man to die and the nation not perish. And then John interpreted the prophecy. By this, he was speaking of Jesus’s death not only for the Jewish nation, but also for the scattered children of God to bring them together and make them one. But Caiaphas himself was a wicked person and it gained him nothing. So it is with a prophet who has no love, he is nothing.

Paul takes this gift even up to the extreme, not only if a prophet speaks God’s words, but even if he can probe the deepest mysteries of the Christian faith, he can fathom all mysteries, he can plumb the depths of the infinite mysteries. Another word, mystery, in The New Testament has to do with something secretly determined in the heart and mind of God as part of redemptive history before the foundation of the world, but then revealed in time. That’s how the word mystery is used in the New Testament. And so along comes this prophet who can fathom it right away, he understands exactly what God’s doing in all of these New Testament mysteries, and not only that, but he possesses all knowledge, all doctrinal knowledge, he speaks of an individual with the greatest prophetic gift, with a theological perceptivity to be able to probe the deepest mysteries of the Christian religion, and there’s no question that stumps him.

Anything you could ask him about Christian doctrine, he can answer. Much like Solomon on issues of wisdom, when the Queen of Sheba came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon’s wisdom. First Kings 10:3, it said, “Solomon answered all her questions, nothing was too hard for the king to explain to her.” Now, such a giftedness would be mind-boggling to have an individual, this level of prophetic gift, you’d think a person like this would be extremely valuable, worthy of tremendous reward in Heaven. But Paul says, “Even such an extraordinary person, if he has not love, he is nothing.”

IV. Faith Without Love is Nothing

Now, we want to be a church that knows doctrine, we want to be a church that knows the deepest mysteries of the faith, we want to be able to have accurate knowledge, but Paul said in 1 Corinthians 8, “Knowledge puffs up, but love edifies” or builds up. We want knowledge, it’s true, we wanna learn as much of the Bible doctrine as we possibly can have, it’s not a good thing to be doctrinally ignorant. The church is the pillar and foundation of the truth. We want to know the truth, but truth without love is nothing. And then Paul goes beyond that to the gift of faith. Faith without love is nothing. Look at verse 2, “If I have a faith that can move mountains but have not love, I am nothing.” This is the gift of faith now, the gift of faith is something beyond justifying faith, all Christians have faith, but some have the gift of faith, and that’s the ability to perceive the hidden things that God is doing, and then even to be instrumental in moving the mighty arm of God to do those things that he’s going to do, especially by prayer.

So the gift of faith exerts itself through prayer. By faith, we’re not making God do something contrary to his will. But Jesus said in Matthew 17:20, “I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there and it will move.’ Nothing will be impossible for you.” So like Elijah, who we just studied in James 5, was a man of faith in prayer, and God laid it on his heart, the corruption of the Jewish nation, and he laid it on his heart to pray that there would be no rain and fulfillment of the curses of Moses, and there was no rain, and he linked the the going of the rain and the coming back of the rain to a man, a man of faith, a man of prayer. And so we saw this in James 5:17-18. “Elijah was a man just like us. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. Again, he prayed, and the heavens gave rain and the earth produces crops.”

So this is great. It’s a great gift. The gift of faith. So a man or a woman with a faith that can move mountains would be amazing, an extraordinary gift, an incredible blessing we would think to the church, a mover and a shaker in our time, somebody that actually is almost shaping history right before our eyes, by his or her amazing prayers. I think about John Knox, the great Scottish rWeformer in the 16th century, he was a fiery man, but also a man of strong faith, and who pled in prayer, saying, “Give me Scotland or I’ll die.” He’s gonna passion. He wanted to win his countrymen fellow Scots to a genuine faith in the reformed gospel, in the true gospel, away from medieval Catholicism and its wrong understandings of the gospel. He wanted to win individuals. He was a man of prayer, fiery preacher and fiery man of prayer, but Mary, his lifelong enemy was Mary Queen of Scots, and she said, “I fear John Knox’s prayers more than all the assembled armies of Europe.” So talk about a man of great faith in prayer, but Paul says, “Even such a man or a woman of faith exerted in this kind of prayer is nothing if not moved by love.”

V. Self-Sacrificial Generosity Without Love Gains Nothing

And now we get to verse 3, which I consider one of the toughest verses in the entire Bible, it’s really quite remarkable. Talk about being put through the wringer. Look at it. Sacrificial, self-sacrificial generosity, even to the nth degree, even to the farthest degree is… Without love is nothing. Verse 3, “If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love I gain nothing.”

“Sacrificial, self-sacrificial generosity, even to the nth degree, even to the farthest degree is… Without love is nothing.”

This is probably the most extraordinary statement of all that we’re gonna study this morning, the gift of giving, pushed to the absolute extreme, here is an individual who actually does what Jesus urged or commanded the rich young ruler to do, sell all you possess and give to the poor and you’ll have treasure in heaven, then come follow me. He wouldn’t do it. But this individual, in Paul’s statement, verse 3, does do it, he gives everything he possesses to the poor. More than that, that’s not enough, he lays down his life as a martyr, and not just any martyr, but one who dies an agonizing death in the flames, to be burned at the stake. It’s a horrible death. The level of giving here in this verse is almost incalculable, it’s almost inconceivable, it’s almost immeasurable.

Everything this man has on earth, he gives away, but if he has not love while he’s doing it, he actually gains nothing. Now that may be taken one of two ways. The Kingdom of Heaven is not advanced at all by such a gift, that he gains nothing for Christ, or that he himself on judgment day in terms of rewards will gain nothing, and I think it’s more likely the second, that he himself will get nothing for it. Like Jesus says in Matthew 6, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you have received your reward in full. You get nothing on Judgment Day.” Do you not feel the way to this? Very few of us would ever get to this level of self-sacrifice and self-denial and love, but if you don’t have love while you’re doing it, then you gain nothing.

So this past week when we’re doing… Talking about the doctrine of rewards, I added this as a key plank in understanding what God rewards, you have to have a loving demeanor in your heart, a love in your heart while you do what you do, or you gain nothing. Now, it’s very important for us to understand, therefore, love is defined both as an action and an attitude, both sides are important, not the one without the other, not the other without the one. The Bible makes it very plain that a loving feeling that never results in any actions is worthless, too. First John 3:16-18 says, “This is how we know what love is. Jesus Christ laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue, but with actions and in truth.”

Well, that’s true as well. So love that does not sacrifice and produce actual works, actual money given, if that’s the need, actual service, works of service is worthless. Faith without deeds is dead. We understand that. Love inevitably produces actions and love actually the greatness of love can be measured in the level of sacrifice, the more of a self-denying sacrifice it is, the greater love it is. Jesus said that in John 15:13, “Greater love has no one than this that he lay down his life for his friends.” So true love always results in sacrificial actions, that is true, but 1 Corinthians 13 gives the other side of the equation, there has to be a demeanor, an attitude, a heart of love behind the action, or it’s worthless.

There’s a heart aspect, an affection, a horizontal delight in the other person. Think about the 2 Corinthians 9, the Macedonians, who gave money to the poor among the saints in Jerusalem. You remember that? And Paul talks about their attitude. Second Corinthians 9:7, “Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion. Because God loves a cheerful giver.” So there it is, there’s a heart of affection, a heart of delight in the giving, the Macedonians begged for the opportunity to give, they yearned to be able to give because their hearts were knit together with their brothers and sisters among the Jews in Judea, in Jerusalem.

So therefore, it is possible to give even a ton and do it without love, to do it in an unloving manner. There could be a guilt manipulation side to it, kind of like this, “I hope you realize what this has cost me, you do know. This was a big deal for me.” That kind of thing. So there’s that manipulation that, “Do you understand what the cost was to me?” Proverbs 23:6-8 talks about such a person. Gives us some advice. It says Proverbs 23:6-8, “Do not eat the food of a stingy man, do not crave his delicacies, for he’s the kind of man who’s always thinking about the cost. ‘Eat and drink,’ he says to you, but his heart is not with you, you will vomit up the little that you have eaten, and you will have wasted your compliments.”

So this is fundamental to love, the person giving has to expand his own heart to take in the person and delight in their blessedness through the giving. That’s what Paul means by love. Jonathan Edwards said this, “In some sense, the most benevolent, generous person in the world seeks his own happiness in doing good to others, because he places his happiness in their good. His mind is so enlarged as to take them as it were into himself, thus when they are happy, he feels it, he partakes with them, he’s happy in their happiness.” This is so far from being inconsistent with the free-ness of love, that on the contrary, free benevolence and kindness consist in it. This is what love actually is, your heart expands to someone’s suffering or somebody going through something, and you want to take them in and make them blessed, make them happy.

Now, I believe a lot of Christian teaching that I’ve heard in my life is against this. I’ve heard again and again, love is an action. It’s an action. It’s not a feeling. Love is not a feeling. Christian love is not a feeling, it’s an action. You’ve heard that, and I know it’s leaning so heavily on 1 John 3 that I just read, but what I’m saying is, no, that’s not true. Christian love is an action and a feeling, it’s a feeling or a sense in the heart that leads to action, and without the one, it’s worthless. That’s the very point that Paul’s making here in verse 3. John Piper makes much of this in his book, Knowing God, in his chapter on love, I know some of you have read it, and you remember that phrase, “dutiful roses”.…remember that? Where the husband says to his wife, “So I want you to know, I get nothing out of this. We’re told that this is Christian love, is what we call disinterested benevolence. I get nothing out of it. I just want you to realize I get nothing out of this. I’ve read on the calendar that today is our anniversary, and in our culture there is the giving of roses on anniversary, so I am hereby giving you 12 roses in fulfillment of the rules of our culture. I want you to know I feel nothing, no personal delight out of this given. Here you are. Happy anniversary.” I mean, who wants roses like that?

Honey, if you don’t enjoy giving them, then don’t give them, you need to expand your heart and say, “I’m happy because you’re happy, and the roses are a means to that end.” So 1 Corinthians 13 implies our hearts must be engaged, they need to be delighted. Like Jesus died on the cross for the joy that was set before him, ’cause he wanted to expand his heart and include wretched, miserable sinners like you and me. And so there was a joy even in the sorrow of giving up his body on the cross. That’s what love is.” So as we look at this, we think, “How could this even happen? How could love to this nth degree be done without… Or how could gifts to this nth degree be done without love? How could someone speak in the tongues of men and of angels without love?”

Well, there’s no horizontal expansion, it doesn’t take his brothers and sisters in and say, “I want you to be blessed by this.” How does someone have the gift of prophecy and an ability to fathom all mysteries and all knowledge and have not loved? Well, it’s all about him, it’s all about his exquisite knowledge, his heart is enlarged or expanded to take in others and say, “I want you to be blessed by the truths of God’s word.” How does someone give all they possess to the poor and surrender his body to the flames, but have not loved? His heart’s not expanded to include them in the sacrifice. That’s what it is. Fundamentally then, love is a heart disposition, an attraction in the heart toward another human being or a group of human beings, so that our blessedness is included in their blessedness. We want them to be blessed, and so we give. And it’s described in the words that will follow, we’ll study, God willing, over the next few weeks. “Love is patient, love is kind, it doesn’t envy, it doesn’t boast, it’s not easily angered. It’s not proud, it’s not rude, it’s not self-seeking, it keeps no record of wrongs.” These things we’re gonna walk through. If that’s who you are, while you do your spiritual gift ministry, then you will be blessed.

“Fundamentally then, love is a heart disposition, an attraction in the heart toward another human being or a group of human beings, so that our blessedness is included in their blessedness. “

VI. Applications

So applications. First and foremost, I’m very aware that God in his kind Providence brings all different kinds of people to this live stream to hear this, and I wanna speak first and foremost to you who are not yet a Christian. If I could just say before anything else can happen, before you can genuinely love, you need to be loved by God through Jesus Christ. We love because He first loved us. And so, God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. And so I plead with you, repent of your sins, repent of all of your loveless-ness, all sin is loveless-ness. Repent of the ways you’ve been selfish, and the way that you’ve fed your flesh, and the way you’ve not loved others, all of these things are sins more than we could count. David said, “My sins are more numerous than the hairs of my head.” All of them are atoned for in an ocean of God’s grace and love through the death of Jesus Christ on the cross and His resurrection from the dead. So repent of your sins, trust in Christ, and then see what God will do. He will take out your heart of stone and he’ll give you a heart of love, and out of that heart of love, you will be able, finally, to love others as the Lord has loved you.

Now, if you are a Christian, I just wanna say let 1 Corinthians 13, first and foremost, be hard on you, let it work you over, let it put you through the wringer, let it show you the ways that you have not been loving, let it show you the loveless-ness in your life. And then let it move you to prayer. Say, “Lord, as I see this pattern of loveless-ness in me, as I see this happening, would you please transform me? Would you please work in me a genuine heart of love for others? A genuine heart of love for my wife, for my husband, for my kids, a genuine heart of love for my brothers or my sisters, a genuine heart of love for other church members? Work this in me.” Go through each element of 1 Corinthians 13 and pray it back to God. And then finally, be hopeful, like I said, I don’t want to be crushing you, but I don’t want to be too light on you either, so that did not crush you. I want you to know if you’re a genuine Christian, if you’re born again, someday, these words will be perfectly fulfilled in you. Heaven is a world of love, and you will spend all eternity loving your brothers and sisters perfectly as the Lord Jesus has loved you. Close with me in prayer.

Father, thank you for the time that we’ve had to study your wonderful word. I’m delighted in it, even though it’s hard. First Corinthians 13:3, one of the hardest verses I’ve ever meditated on, but Lord, I want to have that level of self-denying sacrifice in my life, I want to have that kind of love in my life, and I want my brothers and sisters who are hearing me, to be willing to deny ourselves and to give as much of ourselves and our money as we can, but to do it with a heart of love in the pattern of Jesus Christ. Father, I thank you for this time. And we pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

We come this morning to perhaps the most famous chapter in the Bible. This chapter is read at more weddings than any other portion of scripture. And as I’ve had the privilege of officiating at many weddings, I have heard these words again and again. A long time ago, however, they ceased to be a piece of sweet romance poetry. I consider this chapter one of the toughest, most convicting, most relentlessly challenging set of verses in the entire Bible. These words work us over with great power… they put us through the ringer… as in the sense of the old time washing machines that my grandmother used over a hundred years ago… with the rough washboard that the launderer would use to rub the garment vigorously, and to plunge the dirty garment again and again into the basin of soapy water, and then scrub with great strength… and eventually to “go through the ringer” squeegeeing out all the soapy, dirty water… then the launderer would hold up the shirt or pants, shake her head, and plunge it again and scrub it again, and put it through the ringer again.

Every phrase in this brief chapter is designed by the Holy Spirit of God to put us all through that process. It is not designed to make any of us feel wonderful about how loving we are.

Behind each of the phrases in this short chapter is a kind of death.

To follow Christ as his disciple means this:

Luke 9:23 Then he said to them all: “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.

Philippians 3:10 I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death

Basically, to love like this chapter commands means to DIE TO MYSELF constantly… that fleshly desire

I have said many times that as sinners, we are all fanatically committed to SELF. God has recently blessed Christi and I with a delightful little granddaughter… Sola Grace. She has a very pleasant demeanor for a newborn; she’s very mild-mannered and doesn’t really cry very much. But I can tell you, like all babies born in Adam since the fall, she is fanatically committed to self.

1 Corinthians 13 is a powerful remedy to that relentless bent. To learn how to love is to learn how to die

Look at the fifteen statements Paul makes about love:

1.      Love is patient,

2.      love is kind

3.      love is not jealous;

4.      love does not boast

5.      love is not arrogant,

6.      love does not act rudely;

7.      love does not seek its own,

8.      love is not easily provoked,

9.      love does not keep a record of wrongs,

10.  love does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but

11.  love does rejoice with the truth;

12.  love bears all things,

13.  love believes all things,

14.  love hopes all things,

15.  love endures all things

The flesh is relentlessly committed to the opposite of each of these…

The flesh is impatient, unkind, jealous, boastful, arrogant, rude. It most definitely seeks its own pleasure relentlessly. It is easily provoked, and it keeps a careful record of wrongs it has suffered. The flesh does not delight in the truth, but loves evil. It bears nothing, believes the worst about other people, has no hope in the relationship and gives up on people quickly.

Every single assertion in this piece of delightful wedding poetry calls us to spiritual warfare, and to spiritual death.

Like this text:

John 12:24 I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces much fruit.

So, 1 Corinthians 13 calls us to die to self that we might live in Christ to prove that, John Piper made these observations:

§  Being long-suffering means dying to the desire for an untroubled life.

§  Having no jealousy means dying to the desire for unshared affection.

§  Not boasting means dying to the desire to call attention to our successes.

§  Not acting unbecomingly means dying to the desire to express our freedom offensively.

§  Not seeking our own way means dying to the dominance of our own preferences.

§  Not being easily provoked means dying to the need for no frustrations.

§  Not taking account of wrongs means dying to the desire for revenge.

§  Bearing all things and enduring all things means dying to the desire to run away from the pain of obedience.

The good news of the gospel is that God knows we can never produce this death on our own… our salvation is a work of his grace from beginning to end… this is the very thing the cross of Christ is designed to do, the very work the indwelling Spirit was sent to do in us all.

So, for a number of weeks, we are going to walk through this amazing chapter.

Other than the Holy Spirit and the apostle Paul, my guide will be Jonathan Edwards, who preached sixteen sermons from these thirteen verses in 1738. The revival at Northampton, MA, had begun four years earlier; the First Great Awakening was still a few years off. These sermons stood in between to point his local church to a daily life of godliness that is actually lived out in their homes, their town, their church. Sixteen sermons!

Assembled into a single book called Charity and its Fruits… 368 pages!!

I do not intend so much detail, but it is well worth each of you buying and reading

I will be leaning on his insights again and again

I.   Love is the Supreme Goal of Our Salvation

Edwards put it this way:

“All the virtues that is saving and that distinguishes true Christians from others is summed up in Christian love.”

“Notice what excellent things are being mentioned as worthless without love… the most excellent things that ever belonged to natural men… the most excellent privileges, and the most excellent performances.”

These things are speaking in tongues, prophesying, fathoming the deepest mysteries of the Christian faith, possessing all true knowledge, laying down one’s life as a martyr, giving all your worldly good for the poor and needy… these are some of the greatest privileges and performances in the whole of the human experience… but all are said to be worthless without love

If even these most excellent things are worthless without love, then love must truly be the sum and substance of our Christian religion

A.   Two Greatest Commandments

Matthew 22:36-40 Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” 37 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

B.   Paul’s Assertions

Romans 13:8-10  Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for he who loves his fellowman has fulfilled the law. 9 The commandments, “Do not commit adultery,” “Do not murder,” “Do not steal,” “Do not covet,” and whatever other commandment there may be, are summed up in this one rule: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” 10 Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

1 Timothy 1:5 Now the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith.

Everything that Christian salvation works in the soul is ultimately summed up in this one issue… LOVE

Love for God above all else; but secondly, love for others…

1 Corinthians 13 is about this second love, horizontal—love for other human beings

C.   What Is Love?

1.   The same English word is used for many things

“I love my wife, I love our dog, I love my new suit, I love going to the beach, I love seafood, I love college football, I love chocolate chip ice cream, I love Jesus Christ my Savior.”

The same word!! I love chocolate chip ice cream, and I love Jesus?!

2.   Greeks had different words

a.   Sexual love

b.   Brotherly affection

c.   Morally pure self-denying love

3.   Edwards:

a.   Simple definition: that by which something is DEAR or PRECIOUS to another

b.   More deeply… Treatise on Religious Affections

i)   Heart has two basic abilities: understanding, and affection

(i)    To know something—its attributes, nature, etc.

(ii) To be attracted to that thing to a greater or less degree such as liking or loving; or to be repulsed from that thing to a greater or less degree, such as disliking or hating

ii)   Heart attraction vs repulsion

4.   When applied to human beings, as in this chapter, it has to do with heart disposition toward other people—affections, attractions

D.   Love is the PINNACLE of the work of grace God seeks to do in our hearts

E.   See the way Christ is exalted in the eyes of God the Father by what he loves and what he hates

Hebrews 1:9 You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness; therefore God, your God, has set you above your companions by anointing you with the oil of joy.

F.   Context in Corinthians

1.   The Corinthians were esteeming the spiritual gifts themselves above each other

2.   They were arrogant and fractious and hostile and angry and selfish

3.   Some were boasting over their spiritual gifts as though they made them inherently superior to their brothers and sisters in Christ

4.   1 Corinthians 12: the body and its members

1 Corinthians 12:12-13 The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ. 13 For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body– whether Jews or Greeks, slave or free– and we were all given the one Spirit to drink.

Some were arrogant toward others, saying “I don’t need you!” Others were humiliated and felt they had no real role in the Body of

Christ because their gifts were inferior… “Because I don’t have this or that gift, I am not a member of the Body”

Paul has to show them the essential unity of the Body:

1 Corinthians 12:27 Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.

So, he must teach them the HEART ATTITUDE they should have toward one another as they use their gifts, because they were missing the whole point of spiritual gifts… EDIFYING ONE ANOTHER in Christ

So he introduces this glorious “love chapter” with these memorable words:

1 Corinthians 12:31 And now I will show you the most excellent way.

II.   Tongues Without Love is Empty Noise

1 Corinthians 13:1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.

A.   The Corinthians Were VERY PROUD of the Gift of Tongues

B.   Paul Shows Them How Vital Love is compared to the gift of tongues

C.   He uses EXTREME language in all these examples of spiritual gifts

1.   If = “Even though I might… “

2.   Even if I were to have the MOST EXCELLENT speaking gift ever

3.   He zeroes in on eloquence

a.   Preachers are esteemed for their eloquence

b.   Some have stood out in all Christian history for their speaking gifts

John Chrysostom, the Archbishop of Constantinople who lived from 347 to 407… his name literally means “golden mouthed”; esteemed all around the Christian world for his stunning eloquence in preaching

John Bunyan was an amazingly gifted preacher, despite the fact that he was a common laborer—a tinker (repairer of pots and pans) by trade;

When the great theologian John Owen was asked by the King of England, “Why do you go hear that tinker prattle?” Owen, the most learned of all the Puritans

“May it please your Majesty, if I could possess the tinker’s abilities to grip men’s hearts, I would gladly give in exchange all my learning.”

George Whitefield was the most effective evangelistic preacher in church history… he was extremely eloquent; an actor named

Garrick who heard him preach said “He could move men to tears simply by pronouncing the word ‘Mesopotamia.’”

Charles Spurgeon: known as the “Prince of Preachers,” he had an astonishing facility with the English language; magnificent words flowed from him with stunning ease;

BUT he said this about eloquence:

“Let eloquence be flung to the dogs rather than souls be lost. What we want is to win souls. They are not won by flowery speeches.”

Eloquence… the tongues of men and of angels… is highly esteemed among human beings; but Spurgeon is right—souls are not saved by eloquence, but by the Spirit of God

Another great preacher was Robert Murray McCheyne, a man who moved thousands in Scotland to seek salvation through faith in Christ

But it was not his eloquence that saved souls… I read an account once of the true power of McCheyne

A young minister visited Dundee, Scotland, deeply concerned that his ministry had very few results. He decided to visit the scene where years before Robert Murray McCheyne had ministered in such evident power of the Spirit of God. McCheyne died at the age of 30, but not before he had moved Scotland towards God. The visitor asked the caretaker at the church if he could tell him the secret of the amazing influence of Robert McCheyne. The old man led the young minister inside the church to

McCheyne’s study. “Sit down here,” he said. “Now put your elbows on the desk.” He did so. “Yes, that was they way McCheyne used to do it,” said the old man. “Now put your face in your hands.” The visitor obeyed. “Now let the tears flow! That was the way McCheyne used to do!”

D.   Tongues without Love: WORTHLESS

1.   Paul says: I would be a “Tinkling brass, a clanging gong” without love

2.   A loud lifeless sound… like one of those gongs I’ve heard in a Buddhist temple—

3.   Or one of those wind-up monkey dolls with cymbals that they repeatedly clang together

4.   Tongues that do not flow from love are that worthless

5.   Imagine someone getting up in the Corinthian congregation, filled with pride and self-focus, speaking in tongues better than anyone ever has before. He has no love for the congregation except what that congregation thinks of his performance.

6.   It’s like a lifeless windchime, accomplishing nothing of eternal

III.   Prophecy and Knowledge Without Love Are Nothing

1 Corinthians 13:2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge… but have not love, I am nothing.

A.   Prophecy is the Greatest of All Spiritual Gifts

1.   Prophecy is the ability to speak the word of God directly by revelation from God through the prophet to the people

2.   To be able to say, “Thus says the Lord…”

3.   Though the Corinthians greatly esteemed tongues, Paul will make it plain in chapter 14 that prophecy is far greater

a.   He will say that tongues that are not interpreted make no sense to those who hear them

b.   But anyone who speaks a word of prophecy is speaking directly from God and is able to expose the hearts of those who listen

1 Corinthians 14:23-25 So if the whole church comes together and everyone speaks in tongues, and some who do not understand or some unbelievers come in, will they not say that you are out of your mind? 24 But if an unbeliever or someone who does not understand comes in while everybody is prophesying, he will be convinced by all that he is a sinner and will be judged by all, 25 and the secrets of his heart will be laid bare. So he will fall down and worship God, exclaiming, “God is really among you!”

B.   But a Prophet who Has No Love is NOTHING

1.   Certainly a genuine prophecy from God always has value no matter who speaks it

2.   Balaam’s prophecies were true about the coming of a star in Jacob who would rule in the distant future… but Balaam himself was a corrupt person who was slaughtered because he enticed Israel to sin with the Moabite women worshiping the Baal of Peor

3.   So also Caiaphas’s prophecy about it being better for one man to die and the whole nation not perish was eerily true about Jesus… John said as High Priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus would die for the Jews and Gentiles as our atonement… but Caiaphas himself was a wicked man who was not rewarded for his words, however true they were

4.   So it is with a prophet who has no love… he speaks true things from God, but he has not love… HE IS NOTHING

C.   Paul Takes this Gift UP TO THE EXTREME

1.   Not only if a prophet speaks God’s words… but even if he can probe the deepest mysteries of the faith… he can “FATHOM ALL MYSTERIES”

2.   Mystery is a word used frequently in the New Testament to speak of things that were ordained by God before the foundation of the world but are now revealed to the human race; often they feel like mysteries because they surprise people and go beyond anything that anyone

3.   Not only that, he possesses ALL KNOWLEDGE!

4.   Paul speaks of an individual with the greatest prophetic gift in history—there is no theological question he cannot answer, nothing too difficult for him to understand

5.   He is the wisest man in history; an oracle of knowledge that everyone in the world would seek out to speak with… like Solomon and the Queen of Sheba

1 Kings 10:3 Solomon answered all her questions; nothing was too hard for the king to explain to her.

6.   This is just MIND-BOGGLING! You would think such a person would be extremely valuable, worthy of a tremendous reward in heaven

7.   It is vital to know things… to be able to answer the deepest questions of life

1 Timothy 3:15 the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth

8.   BUT Paul says, even such an extraordinary person, if he has not love he is NOTHING!!

9.   Effectively he already addressed this very same issue back in chapter 8

1 Corinthians 8:1-2 Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. 2 The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know.

We want to be a church that KNOWS doctrine, that KNOWS the deepest mysteries of the faith, that can ANSWER the questions of life that everyone asks… but it must be combined with LOVE

IV.   Faith Without Love is Nothing

1 Corinthians 13:2 if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.

A.   This is the GIFT of Faith… as all of these are spiritual gifts

B.   The Gift of Faith is the ability to perceive what God is doing and be instrumental as a tool in bringing it about… BY PRAYER

Matthew 17:20 I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.

C.   Like Elijah, when God wanted to bring a drought… then remove it… he did it through a MAN… through his faith and his prayers

James 5:17-18 Elijah was a man just like us. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. 18 Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops.

1 Kings 17:1 Now Elijah the Tishbite, from Tishbe in Gilead, said to Ahab, “As the LORD, the God of Israel, lives, whom I serve, there will be neither dew nor rain in the next few years except at my word.”

D.   So, a man or woman with a faith that can move mountains would be amazing… an extraordinary gift, astonishingly valuable… a “mover and shaker”, someone who changes history by his faith-filled prayers

Example: John Knox, the 16th century Scottish reformer… a fiery man, who prayed once “Give me Scotland, Lord, or I die!” He yearned to see the people of Scotland won to the genuine Reformed faith in Christ away from Catholic superstitions; his lifelong enemy was Mary, Queen of Scots… she said “I fear John Knox’s prayers more than all the assembled armies of Europe.”

E.   BUT Paul Says… even such a man or woman of faith is NOTHING if they have not love

V.   Self-Sacrificial Generosity Without Love Gains Nothing

1 Corinthians 13:3  If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.

A.   This is the most extraordinary of all… the gift of giving, pushed to the absolute extreme

1.   Here is an individual that actually did what Jesus asked of the rich young ruler… “Sell all that you possess and give to the poor”

2.   That man balked and couldn’t do it

3.   But here’s someone that actually DID… everything they owned on earth, given away for the poor

4.   More than that… dying the death of a martyr… and not a quick death, but a slow, torturous agonizing death of being burned alive

5.   The level of GIVING here is almost incalculable, immeasurable… everything he has on Earth he is giving away

B.   BUT if he HAS NOT LOVE, he actually GAINS NOTHING

1.   This is why I say this chapter is such a rough one, so vigorous with all of us

2.   Paul is saying he “gains” nothing

a.   Either, there are no actual gains for the Kingdom of God to loveless giving such as this

b.   OR that the person himself or herself GAINS NO REWARD in heaven

c.   I think it’s more likely the second

3.   This is extremely difficult! Especially since we are told “Love is an action, not an emotion”

a.   Couples “fall out of love” with each other and get a divorce… we Christians know that’s wrong

b.   Also there are key verses on the ACTION side of love

1 John 3:16-18 This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. 17 If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? 18 Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.

James 2:15-17 Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. 16 If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? 17 In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.

c.   That is TRUE… love inevitably produces ACTIONS… love can be measured in self-sacrifice

John 15:13 Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.

d.   True love always results in sacrificial actions… that is true…

C.   BUT 1 Corinthians 13 gives the other side of the equation… there has to be LOVE behind it… there is a heart aspect, an affection, a delight in the other person

2 Corinthians 9:7 Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

The Macedonians who gave to the poor in Judea did so out of the overflow of their heart affection for their fellow believers…they BEGGED for the chance to give; it brought them delight to give; that’s why their giving was so wonderful

D.   It is possible to give, even give a ton, and have no love at all… there could be a guilt manipulation side: “I hope you realize all that I have done for you.” Or “Do you know how much this cost?” Or like the rich man laying out a feast, but only doing it BEGRUDGINGLY

Proverbs 23:6-8 Do not eat the food of a stingy man, do not crave his delicacies; 7 for he is the kind of man who is always thinking about the cost. “Eat and drink,” he says to you, but his heart is not with you. 8 You will vomit up the little you have eaten and will have wasted your compliments.

E.   This is fundamental to love… that the person giving has to in some sense DELIGHT to give or it is not welcome; there has to be a heart connection

Jonathan Edwards: “In some sense the most benevolent, generous person in the world seeks his own happiness in doing good to others, because he places his happiness in their good. His mind is so enlarged as to take them, as it were, into himself. Thus, when they are happy, he feels it; he partakes with them, and is happy in their happiness. This is so far from being inconsistent with the freeness of beneficence that, on the contrary, free benevolence and kindness CONSIST IN IT.”

John Piper: Desiring God… “dutiful roses”

F.   Much Christian Teaching Counters This

1.   That we should not expect to get anything out of our giving to others

2.   That we should be “disinterested” in our benevolence; “For the Christian, happiness is never a goal to be pursued. It is always the unexpected surprise of a life of service.”

3.   BUT 1 Corinthians 13 implies that our hearts MUST be engaged, even delighted in the giving of our possessions to the poor; we must even be delighted to lay down our lives for others, because of the JOY SET BEFORE US of the good it will do them

G.   So… how do these gifts get used “without love”?

1.   How does someone speak with the tongue of men and of angels and HAVE NO LOVE?

2.   How does someone have the gift of prophecy, with an ability to fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and HAVE NO LOVE?

3.   How does someone give all they possess to the poor and surrender their body to the flames, and HAVE NO LOVE?

4.   Love is a heart disposition… an attraction in the heart toward other people; a desire to do them good and see them blessed by the spiritual gift

5.   It is described like this:

1 Corinthians 13:4-5 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.

6.   So, if the one speaking in tongues has no particular desire to bless his brothers and sister in Christ, and if the one prophesying is impatient and unkind to the ones he’s speaking to, and if the one giving to the poor is RUDE and easily angered while serving them… such a person IS nothing and GAINS nothing for their service

7.   It MATTERS what our heart’s disposition is, and our demeanor… were we patient, kind, humble, and gentle while we used our gifts, or were we not?

VI.   Applications

A.   Come to Christ!!

1.   We cannot love others until we have been transformed and saved by the love of God for us

1 John 3:16 This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.

1 John 4:19 We love because he first loved us.

2.   Feel the amazing love of Jesus Christ for you as a sinner… how he was delighted to die for you and me that our sins would be forgiven

3.   He did it “for the joy that was set before him”… the joy of having you in heaven

B.   Christians: Allow This Chapter to WORK YOU OVER!

1.   The best way to read 1 Corinthians 13 is not as a piece of wedding poetry for a young couple to begin their lives together

2.   It is for all Christians to be stripped and humbled and made low, that we might go as spiritual beggars and ask to be transformed

3.   We need to realize how loveless we all naturally are

4.   We need to let go of all pride in our spiritual gifts and achievements

5.   We need to say, “Lord, would you please work in me a genuine love for others… a love for my brothers and sisters in Christ, a love for my neighbors, a love for the lost?” Would you change my heart of stone for a heart of love?

6.   Go through each element of this love chapter with a heart of humble prayer… ask God to work each part in you

C.   Be Hopeful!

1.   God does not mean to hurt us but to heal us

2.   The Holy Spirit inspired Paul to write these words to a very imperfect church—the Corinthians—who needed to hear these things as much as any Christians who have ever lived

3.   Paul introduced the topic with the word, “And now I will show you the most excellent way!”

4.   Ask God to work this most excellent way in you!

5.   Be filled with HOPE… you will spend eternity perfectly loving toward all other Christians, and they will all be perfectly loving toward you

6.   Therefore, every step we make in that direction will be blessed by God