Tag Archives: 1 corinthians 13

Love like this

1 Christ is All, Stuff I Actually Think, , , , ,

Love never fails. 

If I have the words of men and angels and can argue all my cases and can even do God’s bidding for Him, but I don’t have love (to give), I end up just being a bunch of loud, imposing and worthless communications.  And if I have the gift of prophecy and can reveal to everyone what God’s next move is, let everybody know the secrets of the ages, and yet do not love people {{what?!? a prophet without love?  is that possible?? // pure sarcasm}}; and while we’re at it – what if I am the latest, greatest spiritual- hoo-ha, laying hands on people and moving mountains, or totally different – what if I am dancing all over injustice and rescuing the exploited and raising money for the poor and saving everything in the world and on the earth that needs saving, but I can’t manage to love…can’t just put it into action {{love.is.a.verb. so sang DC Talk}} towards the person in the room with me, then what?  What is the point if I can’t show it, be it, live in it, allow God’s own love through me…to you, then?

I don’t get love, after all this time, still.

1 Corinthians 13.  Image taken by Stormie.  From her view while lying on the patio swing.  On a sweet Sunday afternoon.

God, help me learn to love like this, no hidden agendas, no manipulating, just free of self-focus and selfishness.  Teach me to be hope-full, trustful, protecting at all times.  Give me opportunity to become patient (but be merciful, too, here, Lord, please) and by the end, can You help me to be, so I will be remembered for being, kind?  I so appreciate kindness, I would like to be kind, too.  I really would.  So I wanna learn to L O V E like this, like 1 Corinthians 13 talks about.  It will have to be Your love.  Yours.  Through me.  Let it be.

When I was a Child…

1 Christ is All, 4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, Stuff I Actually Think, , , ,

When I was a child, I thought Miracle Whip was the way to go.  But now that I have become a woman, I know Hellman’s Real Mayonnaise is heaven on a sandwich.  Especially a tomato sandwich, with kosher salt and fresh ground black pepper.  O yeah, baby.

I also saw things, when I was a child {situations, memories, people, past wounds and relationships}, without understanding and the wisdom of years.  Some things now, I have to ask God to help me see as redeemed and as He saw it, from His vantage point.  Like a grown-up.  And because of love.

When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me.   1 Corinthians 13.11 NIV

I wasn’t a big tomato fan as a kid, either.  See?  Maturity does help.

Lust {not love} Hurts

1 Christ is All, 5 Songs I am Singing, Stuff I Actually Think, , ,

From Half-Broke Horses, a book she is reading, Erin shared this quote:

“By loving you, I have destoyed you” he said. 

 “…you have a mighty high opinion of yourself,”  I told him….You don’t love me and you haven’t destroyed me… You dont have what it takes to do that.”

What we were taught:

We spent an entire 2 days in junior English at Hammond High School dissecting the words to the Nazareth song, Love Hurts, its’ imagery, its’ angst.  I heard it every single day on the school bus, to and from home.  It sunk into my heart as fact – if you love some one, it will eventually hurt you – irrepairably.  Having been around the block, I know now this is not true..  This is not love. 

But if you replace the word “love” with the word “lust,” the song holds a lot of insight.  Because while lust comes to take, to consume, to use, {true} LOVE comes to give, to nurture, to sacrifice.  It isn’t that there isn’t risk and pain in maintaining true love, but love, real love, covers so much.  It is the greatest thing of all that will remain (1 Cor 13).  Lust is a passing-fancy while love is an unbroken covenant.  Lust hurts, but love heals.

LOVE HURTS by Nazareth

love hurts, love scars,

love wounds, and marks,

any heart, not tough,

or strong, enough

to take a lot of pain,

take a lot of pain

love is like a cloud

holds a lot of rain

love hurts, ooh ooh love hurts

I’m young, I know,

but even so

I know a thing, or two

I learned, from you

I really learned a lot,

really learned a lot

love is like a flame

it burns you when it’s hot

love hurts, ooh ooh love hurts

some fools think of happiness

blissfulness, togetherness

some fools fool themselves I guess

they’re not foolin’ me

I know it isn’t true,

I know it isn’t true

love is just a lie,

made to make you blue

love hurts, ooh,ooh love hurts

ooh,ooh love hurts

Truth:

1 Corinthians 13 (New Living Translation)

1 If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. 3 If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.

4 LOVE IS patient and kind. LOVE IS not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. [LOVE] does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. 6 [LOVE] does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. 7 LOVE never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.

8 Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages and special knowledge will become useless. But LOVE WILL LAST forever! 9 Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture! 10 But when full understanding comes, these partial things will become useless.

11 When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things. 12 Now we see things imperfectly as in a cloudy mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.

13 Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and LOVE—and the greatest of these is LOVE.