1 Corinthians 13:8-13

 

So far in chapter 13, Paul has established the nature of love and shown that it is essential. Now he turns to make one final point; we might call this the scope of love. We know it is necessary, but how far does it go? How long do we need love for? What is the expiration date for love as an ideal? That is the point of these final verses:

Paul states his proposition for this section in the opening words. “Charity never faileth.”

Barnes says that the word translated faileth here means “to fall out of, to fall from or off; and may be applied to the stars of heaven falling... or to flowers that fall or fade... or to chains falling from the hands... Here it means to fall away, to fail; to be without effect, to cease to be in existence.” The NET Bible translates it: “Love never ends.” Robertson explains it as “Love survives everything.” There will never come a point in time or in eternity when the book of love is closed and put back on the shelf. Love will never be wrapped up and put away; never shoved into a trunk at the back of God's attic.

Love is the most excellent way because it is eternal; it is permanent. This is the big idea of this passage; the main point Paul is trying to convey here.

He explains more in the words that follow. The permanence of love is a big deal because this cannot be said of everything. Obviously, we realize this world is not permanent and everything that is purely earthly is temporary. But this applies even to some of the things of God.

Remember, we are still in the context of spiritual gifts and their place in the church. And the thing is, most, if not all, spiritual gifts are very temporary. The gift of prophecy will not always be necessary. The gift of tongues will not be active. When the church's work is completed and the new heaven and the new earth have been founded, there will be no need for these things, which exist only to help build the church. Many believe these gifts weren't even needed for the whole of the church's life.

All our knowledge, spiritual or otherwise, is partial. One of L. Frank Baum's characters comments: “Seems to me as how the more we know, the more we find we don't know. Those as knows the least have a habit of thinkin' they know all there is to know, while them as knows the most admits what a turr'ble big world this is. It's the the knowing ones that realize one lifetime ain't long enough to git mor'n a few dips o' the oars of knowledge.”

Everything we can learn by our own efforts in this life—even everything God could supernaturally reveal—is very limited, limited by the mere fact of being in this life. We have this treasure in earthen vessels, and earthen vessels aren't very big. All the massive libraries of man, whether scientific or theological, are only a few scrawled notes on index cards.

And where there is perfect knowledge, there is no longer any need for partial knowledge. I don't know exactly what this means; it seems unlikely that we will know everything even in the resurrection. Probably there will still be learning and knowledge. But the greatest gifts of knowledge anyone has here will be long left behind. The light of the stars vanishes when the sun rises. 

Paul illustrates that with a couple of pictures. First, he points to the difference between a child and an adult. A toddler can do many of the things an adult can do. They can talk; they can think; they can move around. This is a perfectly normal and natural part of life. But the toddler grows up. If a man of thirty still talks and thinks and moves like a 2-year-old, that is a grave matter. And while you could draw out a lesson about maturity here, that isn't Paul's main point. The point is this.

There may be some adults who are still immature and act too much like children. But I've never known an adult to use a pacifier. (Though it might be a valuable alternative to chewing gum.) Some things are natural and necessary to a toddler that naturally fade away as we grow up or are preserved only as a memento. Some people keep their baby shoes in bronze; nobody tries to wear them. 

And all these spiritual gifts—all these things that some in the Corinthian church prized so highly—are only the baby shoes to help the church take her first steps; they are the training wheels on her first bicycle. There is coming a time when the church will grow up and no longer need them.

In verse 12, Paul compares the difference between seeing in a mirror and seeing directly. The common mirrors in ancient times were not made of glass, like a modern mirror, but of polished metal. You can imagine that they didn't give a very good reflection. To see in a mirror was to see darkly or obscurely. That is all our spiritual knowledge now. It may be true, in so far as it goes, but it is dark and obscure. There is so much we don't know; so much we can't see or understand about God and God's work.

But there is coming a time when we will see God face-to-face, with nothing to cloud or confuse the vision. Someday, we will see God as clearly as God sees us. That is the perfect knowledge that will swallow up all partial knowledge.

Knowledge, tongues, prophecy—all these things will pass away. But love never ends.

Paul ends with this exultant statement: “And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.” 

For such a simple statement, there is a surprising amount of disagreement about it. Some commentators think that when Paul says these three remain, he means they remain in this life and that love is the greatest because it will survive even when faith and hope are no longer needed. John Wesley put it that faith, hope, and love are “the sum of perfection on earth; love alone is the sum of perfection in heaven.” And then that opens up the question of whether we will still have faith or hope in the resurrection.

Other commentators take Paul to be saying that these three virtues are immortal. Gifts shall pass away; knowledge shall pass away; but these three remain. And yet, even in that, love is the greatest.

Why? I think it is because faith and hope both exist for the sake of love. If you have a car, it probably has tires. They are an essential part of the car; driving around without tires doesn't work all that well. But the tires exist for the sake of the car; the car does not exist for the sake of the tires. You may occasionally decide to buy new tires for your car. I question how often you decide to buy a new car for your tires.

Faith is the foundation of our relationship with God. Hope pulls us towards God. Faith is the phone by which we talk to Him; hope is the car that takes us to His house. But why would those be necessary; why would we need or want them if we did not love Him and He did not love us? Everything in the church, even spiritual virtues, exists for the sake of love and the relationships of love. 

And therefore it is something more essential and more excellent than any of the lower, more transitory gifts. A church that has all gifts but not love has not made a small mistake, but the greatest mistake it can make. And Paul wanted to make good and sure that this was not a mistake the Corinthians made.