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!
1Co 13:13 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.
1 Corinthians 13:13
1Co 13:12 We don't yet see things clearly.
And now abideth faith, love, hope, these three; but the greatest of these (Gr. ‘greater than these’) is love. Most modern interpreters take “abideth” here to mean ‘are of equal duration’—eternal. Some (as De Wette, Stanley, Alford) understand “faith” and “hope” as eternally “abiding,” inasmuch as they pass in the future world into sight. But in that sense (as Meyer replies) it should rather be said that they disappear than “abide.” See Rom_8:24; Heb_11:1. The only other sense in which these graces could be said to “abide” eternally is, that since the whole of the unseen future can never be taken in at once, there must ever be room for “faith” in a coming future, and “hope” of what bliss will then be disclosed and experienced. But though there is a truth in this, it seems to us a more metaphysical thought than the apostle was likely to mean here; and he who wrote Rom_8:24—“What a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for?”—would scarcely have put “faith” and ‘‘hope” in the same category with so very different a grace as “love,” as having a common independent existence and eternal duration. A far simpler and more natural interpretation, we think, may be given to this verse. The instincts of some of the early interpreters (as Chrysostom) guided them rightly, we believe, to put the emphasis upon the first word “Now”—in contrasting the supernatural gifts, which were soon to disappear from the Church, with the permanent graces of “faith and hope and love:—” All these supernatural gifts were designed only for the first starting of the Church, and are gradually to cease; but the cardinal graces of faith and hope and love, without which the Christian character cannot exist, will abide on earth as long as the Church itself is left there.’ In this view concur some modern expositors (as Neander). But what—it may be asked—is to become of “faith” and “hope” hereafter? A reasonable enough question in itself, but one on which no light is cast by this verse, as we understand it; the one object being to affirm that those three graces will outlive all mere gifts. As to the future of those graces, the truth would seem to be that since “faith” and “hope” will certainly pass into sight, and so be lost in any distinctive sense, they are to be viewed as, in their very nature, temporary means towards something else into which they are destined to pass; while love, from its very nature, though admitting of indefinite increase, can never pass into anything else and higher, and so is necessarily eternal.
Note.—When one surveys the ethics of Paganism, even at its best, and observes how fragmentary it is, and how halting, how it glorified revenge as sweet and noble, while the patient endurance of wrong was regarded as unmanly and pusillanimous, in how Divine a light does that Religion stand forth which gives such a view of Love as we have in this chapter! In every other Religion and Ethical system, the true foundation of such a character is wanting, and the true source of the power to realise and exemplify it is unknown. Those Jewish scholars who refuse to accept Christians may produce from their rabbinical writings single passages embodying maxims akin to those of the New Testament; and wonderful indeed it would be if their writings should contain no such passages with the Old Testament in their hands, and those “read in their synagogues every sabbath day,” not to speak of the light of the New Testament reflected on them and insensibly influencing them. But the two have only to be put together to shew which alone has the stamp of Heaven upon it. Whoever will read this chapter with a simple mind will be unable to resist the conviction that the true secret of what alone unites all hearts was in possession of the writer of it, that he felt himself commissioned to open this secret to others, and that he even exulted in doing it. Christians in the first ages of the Gospel were proverbial for their love one to another. Now, alas, many would think them proverbial rather for the reverse. In view of this may we not hear the apostolic inference as verified in ourselves, “Whereas there is among you jealousies and strife, are ye not carnal, and walk as men?”
1Co 13:13 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.
1 Corinthians 13:13
1Co 13:12 We don't yet see things clearly.
And now abideth faith, love, hope, these three; but the greatest of these (Gr. ‘greater than these’) is love. Most modern interpreters take “abideth” here to mean ‘are of equal duration’—eternal. Some (as De Wette, Stanley, Alford) understand “faith” and “hope” as eternally “abiding,” inasmuch as they pass in the future world into sight. But in that sense (as Meyer replies) it should rather be said that they disappear than “abide.” See Rom_8:24; Heb_11:1. The only other sense in which these graces could be said to “abide” eternally is, that since the whole of the unseen future can never be taken in at once, there must ever be room for “faith” in a coming future, and “hope” of what bliss will then be disclosed and experienced. But though there is a truth in this, it seems to us a more metaphysical thought than the apostle was likely to mean here; and he who wrote Rom_8:24—“What a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for?”—would scarcely have put “faith” and ‘‘hope” in the same category with so very different a grace as “love,” as having a common independent existence and eternal duration. A far simpler and more natural interpretation, we think, may be given to this verse. The instincts of some of the early interpreters (as Chrysostom) guided them rightly, we believe, to put the emphasis upon the first word “Now”—in contrasting the supernatural gifts, which were soon to disappear from the Church, with the permanent graces of “faith and hope and love:—” All these supernatural gifts were designed only for the first starting of the Church, and are gradually to cease; but the cardinal graces of faith and hope and love, without which the Christian character cannot exist, will abide on earth as long as the Church itself is left there.’ In this view concur some modern expositors (as Neander). But what—it may be asked—is to become of “faith” and “hope” hereafter? A reasonable enough question in itself, but one on which no light is cast by this verse, as we understand it; the one object being to affirm that those three graces will outlive all mere gifts. As to the future of those graces, the truth would seem to be that since “faith” and “hope” will certainly pass into sight, and so be lost in any distinctive sense, they are to be viewed as, in their very nature, temporary means towards something else into which they are destined to pass; while love, from its very nature, though admitting of indefinite increase, can never pass into anything else and higher, and so is necessarily eternal.
Note.—When one surveys the ethics of Paganism, even at its best, and observes how fragmentary it is, and how halting, how it glorified revenge as sweet and noble, while the patient endurance of wrong was regarded as unmanly and pusillanimous, in how Divine a light does that Religion stand forth which gives such a view of Love as we have in this chapter! In every other Religion and Ethical system, the true foundation of such a character is wanting, and the true source of the power to realise and exemplify it is unknown. Those Jewish scholars who refuse to accept Christians may produce from their rabbinical writings single passages embodying maxims akin to those of the New Testament; and wonderful indeed it would be if their writings should contain no such passages with the Old Testament in their hands, and those “read in their synagogues every sabbath day,” not to speak of the light of the New Testament reflected on them and insensibly influencing them. But the two have only to be put together to shew which alone has the stamp of Heaven upon it. Whoever will read this chapter with a simple mind will be unable to resist the conviction that the true secret of what alone unites all hearts was in possession of the writer of it, that he felt himself commissioned to open this secret to others, and that he even exulted in doing it. Christians in the first ages of the Gospel were proverbial for their love one to another. Now, alas, many would think them proverbial rather for the reverse. In view of this may we not hear the apostolic inference as verified in ourselves, “Whereas there is among you jealousies and strife, are ye not carnal, and walk as men?”
1 Corinthians 13:1-13
Nevertheless there was something more excellent than all gifts. They were the manifestations of the power of God and of the mysteries of His wisdom; love, that of His nature itself.
They might speak with all tongues; they might have prophecy, the knowledge of mysteries, the faith which can remove mountains; they might give all their possessions to feed the poor, and their bodies to be tortured: if they had not love, it was nothing. Love was conformity to the nature of God, the living expression of what He was, the manifestation of having been made partakers of His nature: it was the acting and feeling according to His likeness. This love is developed in reference to others; but others are not the motive, although they are the object. It has its source within; its strength is independent of the objects with which it is occupied. Thus it can act where circumstances might produce irritation or jealousy in the human heart. It acts according to its own nature in the circumstances; and by judging them according to that nature, they do not act upon the man who is full of love, except so far as they supply occasion for its activity, and direct its form. Love is its own motive. In us participation in the divine nature is its only source. Communion with God Himself alone sustains it through all the difficulties it has to surmount in its path. This love is the opposite of selfishness and of self-seeking, and shuts it out, seeking the good of others, even (as to its principle) as God has sought us in grace (see Eph_4:32; Eph_5:1-2). What a power to avoid evil in oneself, to forget all in order to do good!
It is worthy of note that the qualities of divine love are almost entirely of a passive character.
The first eight qualities pointed out by the Spirit are the expression of this renunciation of self. The three that follow, mark that joy in good which sets the heart free also from that readiness to suppose evil, which is so natural to human nature, on account of its own depth of evil, and that which it also experiences in the world. The last four shew its positive energy, which — the source of every kind thought — by the powerful spring of its divine nature, presumes good when it does not see it, and bears with evil when it sees it, covering it by longsuffering and patience; not bringing it to light, but burying it in its own depth — a depth which is unfathomable, because love never changes. One finds nothing but love where it is real; for circumstances are but an occasion for it to act and shew itself. Love is always itself, and it is love which is exercised and displayed. It is that which fills the mind: everything else is but a means of awakening the soul that dwells in love to its exercise. This is the divine character. No doubt the time of judgment will come; but our relationships with God are in grace. Love is His nature. It is now the time of its exercise. We represent Him on earth in testimony.
In that which is said of love in this Chapter we find the reproduction of the divine nature, except that what is said is but the negative of the selfishness of the flesh in us. Now the divine nature changes not and never ceases; love therefore abides ever. Communications from God; the means by which they are made; knowledge, as attained here below, according to which we apprehend the truth in part only, although the whole truth is revealed to us (for we apprehend it in detail, so that we have never the whole at once, the character of our knowledge being to lay hold of different truths singly); all that is characterized by being in part — passes away. Love will not pass away. A child learns; he rejoices too in things that amuse him; when he becomes a man, he requires things in accordance with his intelligence as a man. It was thus with tongues and the edification of the assembly. The time however was coming when they should know even as they were known, not by communications of truths to a capacity that apprehended the truth in its different parts, but they should understand it as a whole in its unity.
Now love subsists already; there are faith and hope also. Not only shall these pass away, but even now, here below, that which is of the nature of God is more excellent than that which is connected with the capacity of human nature, even though enlightened by God, and having for its object the revealed glory of God.
Believers therefore were to follow after and seek for love, while desiring gifts, especially that they might prophesy, because thus they would edify the assembly, and that was the thing to aim at; it was that which love desired and sought, it was that which intelligence required, the two marks of a man in Christ, of one to whom Christ is all.
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