"Love suffereth long, and is kind."
14. Now Paul begins to mention the nature of love, enabling us to
perceive where real love and faith are to be found. A haughty teacher
does not possess the virtues the apostle enumerates. Lacking these,
however many gifts the haughty have received through the Gospel, they
are devoid of love.
First, love "suffereth long." That is, it is patient; not sudden and
swift to anger, not hasty to exercise revenge, impatience or blind
rage. Rather it bears in patience with the wicked and the infirm until
they yield. Haughty teachers can only judge, condemn and despise
others, while justifying and exalting themselves.
15. Second, love is "kind." In other words, it is pleasant to deal
with; is not of forbidding aspect; ignores no one; is kind to all men,
in words, acts and attitude.
16. Third, love "envieth not"--is not envious nor displeased at the
greater prosperity of others; grudges no one property or honor.
Haughty teachers, however, are envious and unkind. They begrudge
everyone else both honor and possessions. Though with their lips they
may pretend otherwise, these characteristics are plainly visible in
their deeds.
17. Fourth, love "vaunteth not itself." It is averse to knavery, to
crafty guile and double-dealing. Haughty and deceptive spirits cannot
refrain from such conduct, but love deals honestly and uprightly and
face to face.
18. Fifth, love is not "puffed up," as are false teachers, who swell
themselves up like adders.
19. Sixth, love "doth not behave itself unseemly" after the manner of
the passionate, impatient and obstinate, those who presume to be
always in the right, who are opposed to all men and yield to none, and
who insist on submission from every individual, otherwise they set the
world on fire, bluster and fume, shriek and complain, and thirst for
revenge. That is what such inflating pride and haughtiness of which we
have just spoken lead to.
20. Seventh, love "seeketh not her own." She seeks not financial
advancement; not honor, profit, ease; not the preservation of body and
life. Rather she risks all these in her ... [text missing from this
edition] ... is no such thing as the Church of Christ nor as true
Christians. Many erring spirits, especially strong pretenders to ...
[text missing from this edition]
21. Eighth, love "is not [easily] provoked" by wrong and ingratitude;
it is meek. False teachers can tolerate nothing; they seek only their
own advantage and honor, to the injury of others.
22. Ninth, love "taketh not account of [thinketh no] evil." It is not
suspicious; it puts the best construction on everything and takes all
in good faith. The haughty, however, are immeasurably suspicious;
always solicitous not to be underrated, they put the worst
construction on everything, as Joab construed Abner's deeds. 2 Sam 3,
25. This is a shameful vice, and they who are guilty of it are hard to
handle.
23. Tenth, love "rejoiceth not in unrighteousness [iniquity]." The
words admit of two interpretations: First, as having reference to the
delight of an individual in his own evil doings. Solomon (Prov 2, 14)
speaks of those who "rejoice to do evil." Such must be either
extremely profligate and shameless, characters like harlots and
knaves; or else they must be hypocrites, who do not appreciate the
wickedness of their conduct; characters like heretics and schismatics,
who rejoice when their knavery succeeds under the name of God and of
the truth. I do not accept this interpretation, but the other. Paul's
meaning is that false teachers are malicious enough to prefer to hear,
above all things, that some other does wrong, commits error and is
brought to shame; and their motive is simply that they themselves may
appear upright and godly. Such was the attitude of the pharisee toward
the publican, in the Gospel. But love's compassion reaches far beyond
its own sins, and prays for others.
24. Eleventh, love "rejoiceth with [in] the truth." Here is evidence
that the preceding phrase is to be taken as having reference to
malicious rejoicing at another's sin and fall. Rejoicing in the truth
is simply exulting in the right-doing and integrity of another.
Similarly, love is grieved at another's wrong-doing. But to the
haughty it is an affliction to learn of uprightness in someone else;
for they imagine such integrity detracts from their own profit and
honor.
25. Twelfth, love "beareth all things." It excuses every failing in
all men, however weak, unjust or foolish one may be apparently, and no
one can be guilty of a wrong too great for it to overlook. But none
can do right in the eyes of the haughty, who ever find something to
belittle and censure as beyond toleration, even though they must hunt
up an old fence to find the injury.
26. Thirteenth, love "believeth all things." Paul does not here allude
to faith in God, but to faith in men. His meaning is: Love is of
decidedly trustful disposition. The possessor of it believes and
trusts all men, considering them just and upright like himself. He
anticipates no wily and crooked dealing, but permits himself to be
deceived, deluded, flouted, imposed upon, at every man's pleasure, and
asks, "Do you really believe men so wicked?" He measures all other
hearts by his own, and makes mistakes with utmost cheerfulness. But
such error works him no injury. He knows God cannot forsake, and the
deceiver of love but deceives himself. The haughty, on the contrary,
trust no one, will believe none, nor brook deception.
27. Fourteenth, love "hopeth all things." Love despairs of no man,
however wicked he may be. It hopes for the best. As implied here, love
says, "We must, indeed, hope for better things." It is plain from this
that Paul is not alluding to hope in God. Love is a virtue
particularly representing devotion to a neighbor; his welfare is its
goal in thought and deed. Like its faith, the hope entertained by love
is frequently misplaced, but it never gives up. Love rejects no man;
it despairs of no cause. But the proud speedily despair of men
generally, rejecting them as of no account.
28. Fifteenth, love "endureth all things." It endures whatever harm
befalls, whatever injury it suffers; it endures when its faith and
hope in men have been misplaced; endures when it sustains damage to
body, property or honor. It knows that no harm has been done since it
has a rich God. False teachers, however, bear with nothing, least of
all with perfidy and the violation of plighted faith.
29. Sixteenth, love never faileth; that means, it abides forever, also
in the life to come. It never gives up, never permits itself to be
hindered or defeated by the wickedness or ingratitude of men, as do
worldly individuals and false saints, who, immediately on perceiving
contempt or ingratitude, draw back, unwilling to do further good to
any, and, rendering themselves quite inhuman, become perfect
misanthropes like Timon in his reputation among the Greeks. Love does
not so. It permits not itself to be made wicked by the wickedness of
men, nor to be hindered in well-doing. It continues to do good
everywhere, teaching and admonishing, aiding and serving,
notwithstanding its services and benefits must be rewarded, not by
good, but by evil. Love remains constant and immovable; it continues,
it endures, in this earthly life and also in the life to come. The
apostle adds, "Whether there be prophecies, they shall be done away;
whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be
knowledge, it shall be done away." Love he commends above all other
endowments, as a gift that can never pass, even in the life to come.
Those other gifts, the boast of the false apostles, are bestowed only
for this present life, to serve in the administering of the
ministerial office. Prophecy, tongues, knowledge, all must cease; for
in yonder life each individual will himself perceive perfectly and
there will be no need for one to teach another. Likewise, all
differences, all inequalities, shall be no more. No knowledge and no
diversity of gifts is necessary; God himself will be all in every
soul. 1 Cor 15, 28.
30. Here Paul gives utterance to the distinction between the life of
faith here below and that heavenly life of divine vision. He would
teach that we have in this life and the other the same possession, for
it is the same God and the same treasures which we have here by faith
and there by sight. In the objects themselves there is no difference;
the difference consists in our knowledge. We have the same God in both
lives, but in different manner of possession. The mode of possessing
God in this life is faith. Faith is an imperfect, obscure vision,
which makes necessary the Word, which, in turn, receives vogue through
the ministry, tongues and prophecy. Without the Word, faith cannot
live. But the mode of possessing God in the future life is not faith
but sight. This is perfect knowledge, rendering unnecessary the Word,
and likewise preaching, tongues and prophecy. These, then, must pass.
Paul continues,
"We know in part, and we prophesy in part."
31. "We know in part"; that is, in this life we know imperfectly, for
it is of faith and not of sight. And we "prophesy in part"; that is,
imperfectly, for the substance of our prophecy is the Word and
preaching. Both knowledge and prophecy, however, reveal nothing short
of what the angels see--the one God. "But when that which is perfect
is come, that which is in part shall be done away."
He proves this by way of illustration and contrasts the child with the
man. To children, who are yet weak, play is a necessity; it is a
substitute for office and work. Similarly, we in the present life are
far too frail to behold God. Until we are able, it is necessary that
we should use the medium of Word and faith, which are adapted to our
limitations.
"For now we see in a mirror [through a glass] darkly; but then face to
face."
32. Faith, Paul tells us, is like a mirror, like a riddle. The actual
face is not in the glass; there is but the image of it. Likewise,
faith gives us, not the radiant countenance of eternal Deity, but a
mere image of him, an image derived through the Word. As a dark riddle
points to something more than it expresses, so faith suggests
something clearer than that which it perceives. But in the life to
come, mirror and riddle, faith and its demonstration, shall all have
ceased to be. God's face and our own shall be mutually and clearly
revealed. Paul says, "Now I know in part; but then shall I know fully
even as also I was fully known [know even also as I am known]." That
is, God now knows me perfectly, clearly and plainly; no dark veil is
upon myself. But as to him, a dark veil hides him from me. With the
same perfect clearness wherewith he now knows me, I shall then know
him--without a veil. The veil shall be taken away, not from him, but
from me; for upon him is no veil.