"The Love Chapter"

Last week and this week, I've been working on memorizing I Corinthians 13:4-7, from the well-known "love chapter." In addition to finding those verses really hard to memorize (so many little phrases, and not organized into neatly ordered categories as I might like them to be!), I am finding these principles of love to be a little overwhelming. Let's have a look...

"Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things."

I am reminded of Romans 13:8-9, where we find (in part), "for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. For ... are all summed up in this saying, namely, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'” No, I am not suggesting anything like law-keeping here. I was struck by how important, how foundational, how pivotal, how pervasive LOVE is in practical righteousness. How vital it is in the Christian life. How love embodies God's ways with us, and should also embody our own ways with each other -- especially our spouse!

And with that in mind, how can I take this description of love and what it does and doesn't do here, as anything other than important? It would be so much easier to take these verses lightly; as romantic poetry; as something rich and literary, and yet superficial. But that is not God's intent -- could I rightly think that way about anything in His Word?

There are very few things about love, listed specifically here, that are not convicting to me now. Perhaps I never gave them individually or collectively much thought as being the very underpinning of "love." Shame on me. I definitely have not mastered any of them, and fall far short in most of them. As I allow God to work in me and in my marriage with Cherie, I can see how many of them apply to me, and how sadly I have failed in them. And I can see some of the impact from my failure.

Just to give you a teeny example: "is not provoked." Wow, that's a tough one. How easily I am provoked, and why? Because I am proud and stubborn, I suppose. If I am in the right, then I have a right to be annoyed, right? Wrong. If I am in the right, I am more likely to be proud of it, and very easily frustrated and provoked to anger, for example. That is not love.

Or look at it from the standpoint of temptation to lust, which I have struggled with. When Satan brings temptation, he is seeking to provoke my fleshly lusts. Those can be stirred up without too much trouble, and provoked with a bit more work, and captured with a bit more effort on his part -- apart from God's grace and His Spirit's transforming work in my life (for which I am very thankful!). That is not love. Love is not provoked. Instead, love rejoices in the truth and temptations are lies. Love does not seek its own but that of my wife -- her honor, for one.

So, as I memorize these verses, it is with a great sense of my own need to learn and grow in love. Love that is part of the fruit of the Spirit. Love that comes from God purely and is to flow out in my life in so many ways. Love that testifies that I am saved and transformed by the loving and gracious hand of God through Jesus Christ. Love that honors Him and does His work here. Love that seeks and upholds the truth. Love that is not self-centered by Christ-centered and other-centered.

Oh the deep, deep love of Jesus!