If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. 4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. 11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. 12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. 13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love. 1 Corinthians 13
A. The Necessity of Love: 1 Cor. 13:1-3
1. Gifts without love are self-serving and Christ distracting: 1 Cor. 13:1
2. Works and ministry without love are worthless and fruitless: 1 Cor. 13:3
TONIGHT
B. The Qualities in Love: 1 Cor. 13:4-7
1. Love is patient
Our identity as Christians: John 13:34-35
Our health as Christians: 1 John 3:16-18
a. Patience exercised in our relationship with God
– Submission to God’s mysterious providence: Genesis 12:1-5, Habakkuk 3:17-19
– Submission to God’s painful processes: 2 Cor. 12:8-10, Phil. 4:11-13, Isa. 48:10, Ps. 119:67, 71
b. Patience in relationship to others
– Contributing to the unity among believers: Eph. 4:1-3, John 17:20-23, Ps. 133
– Quickness to reconcile, forgive, and move on: Col. 3:12-14
– Earnest in lovingly serving God’s people: Heb. 6:9-12