1 Corinthians 13:1 – 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. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. 6 It 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. (NLT)

This chapter is probably the most familiar of all Pauline passages.  It is certainly the high point of Paul’s description of the Christian life.  There is a major difference between the King James Version and more modern translations.  The KJV uses the word charity, while other translations use the word love.  The word used in this passage is agape, and it was often used to mean unmerited love.  Most modern commentators call it unconditional love.  Perhaps, in 1611, when the KJV was written, the word charity carried more weight, but today we can best understand this passage when we use the word love.  

This unconditional love is certainly the type of love that God offers to us.  We do not earn God’s love, it is given freely and without conditions.  As Christians – imitators of Christ – we must seek to change our very nature so that we can extend this unconditional love to others.  This is possible through the presence of the Holy Spirit.  We are not to love others because they make us feel a certain way, we are to love without conditions.

Let me share something that I often share with my church.  To measure how we are doing in our Christian walk, replace the word love in verses four through seven with your name.  Read it aloud to yourself.  When we go through this little exercise, these verses become a bit more challenging, don’t they?  These verses certainly describe Christ, and as Christ followers we must change what we can about ourselves so that these verses begin to describe us.

Today, let us love others without any conditions.  Let us love like God loves us. 

Posted by Ramón Torres