Where Is The Love?

“Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become a sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.  And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.  And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, ad have not charity, it profited me nothing.”  I Corinthians 13:1-3

From Paul’s mentioning first the proclivity of folks to speak abundantly, that is to talk too much and not listen enough, we can gather that the Corinthian church members were a little too proud of their ability to speak in tongues.  I would guess that this gift was one of the most highly favored gifts among these believers.  Because of their competitive nature, they likely tried to outdo each other in the amount of languages they could speak or in the abundance of speaking in unknown tongues.  However, Christianity is not a competition.  What good did it do to speak in languages or speak with the eloquence, gentleness, and knowledge of angels if the motive was not love?  Paul compared speaking for the sake of speaking or to impress others as “sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal”.  They both make noise, but they don’t say anything of value.  Our words should be measured by our motive.  Is what we are about to say spoken out of love and a desire to lift up another, heal, or give godly advice?  Or is it to uplift ourselves at the expense of another?  People won’t really listen and take advice from us unless they know the words were spoken in love.

Paul then brought up the gift of prophecy, of understanding the mysteries of God’s ways, and the gift of knowledge to emphasize the need of love by which to use these gifts.  Someone could know just about everything there is to know about God found in the pages of scriptures, but if he or she doesn’t show love, then these gifts are useless.  There is a saying, “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.”  Having knowledge without love is like having a new car without gas.  You might look pretty sitting in it, but you are not going anywhere.  God certainly desires for us to study His word so that we can know Him better, and knowledge of Him and His ways are certainly of much value to us, but unless we take what we have learned and use it to reach out to others in love, it is basically nothing but head knowledge.  It must penetrate the heart so that we can use this knowledge to spread God’s love to others.

Faith, too, must operate from love.  If one’s faith was so strong that they could move mountains, what good is that kind of faith if it doesn’t operate out of love?  Is it really true faith without love?  Does not faith in Christ originate out of love? “We love Him, because He first loved us” (I John 4:19).  God gave us the ability to have faith because He loves us.  Jesus died on the cross because He loves us.  We place our faith in Him because we know that He loves us.  True faith can’t truly operate apart from love.  Faith is displayed in serving God and others, thus “faith without works is dead’ (James 2:20) and so is faith without love.  Love is the catalyst that keeps faith growing.

Good works spring from a heart of love or at least it should.  We hear about wealthy philanthropists who give great sums of money to various causes.  Some of them truly help people physically, like clean water projects in third world countries or efforts to feed the world’s hungry people, but most of these efforts are done through a secular mindset, that is, not done in the name of Christ.  I believe that because I have never heard any of these wealthy folks say they give because they are honoring Christ in their giving.  Some may contribute vast sums of money in order to make a name for themselves and others for a tax write off.  Some know how unfavorably most of the world views those who are extremely wealthy, and thus they likely give away vast sums of their wealth to soften their image.  But then there are those who use their wealth for destructive purposes, like the ones funding the anarchy and riots taking place in our nation.  I see no love in that, only hate.

Paul was very adamant that love must be the motive in serving others and spreading the gospel.  Even if someone gave away all they possessed to others, but not out of love, it would be like they had given nothing.  If the gospel was preached for any other reason than love, the effort would likely not be recognized by God.  Love is the measure by which all efforts of service are valued.