1 Cor 13:13

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

From Background Notes [BN] for May 12^th & 13^th written by Pastor Bob Brown:

The word "abides" (Greek: menei) underscores the persistence and permanence of agapē. Such love does not depend on human personality or temperament; it does not require constant self-assurance.

 
As 13:8 puts it even more clearly, "Love never ends" (oudepote piptei: "does not ever fall down"). Of course, such a quality does not exist within human beings, at least not naturally. By nature, we can fall and have fallen! Human history tells the tale of the Fall in both text and sub-texts. Marriage constantly grapples with the fear of falling. More practically, we talk about "letting each other down." Disappointment is a common companion of marriage. On the other hand, marriage lived by the power of agapē love promises better things.

1. When Paul offers his "list" of Love's heroic triumphs, he uses words like: patient and kind ― the pair of positives which anchor the marriage enterprise! Holding up and holding close! God's love does not abandon marriage partners to their own devices when it comes to patience and kindness. Are these not the bulwarks of personal salvation, that God's patience and His loving-kindness bring us to repentance (Romans 2:4)? The God who is long-suffering and not willing that any should perish (2 Peter 3:9) pours his Love into marriage partners from the moment they exchange their vows and say the telling words, "I do." Strengthened by patience and kindness they receive from God the first-fruits of His saving Love.

2. Strangely, more of Love's activity is spent stemming the tide of the foes to marriage. Repeatedly Paul tells what Love does not do: envy, boast, be arrogant, be rude, insist on its own way, be irritable, be resentful, rejoice in wrongdoing. How many are the enemies of marriage! How necessary is the bulwark of divine Love against them!

3. As if to add flourish to his love-symphony, Paul applauds Love's achievements: Bears all, believes all, hopes all, and endures all. Some of us would gladly settle for lesser accomplishments: Help us bear some, believe some, hope some, and endure some of marriage's hardest trials! But God's Love is rich and lavish (Ephesians 2:4), and he sheds it broadly and deeply into the heart of our marriage.

4. Coping with immaturity in marriage is a familiar theme: "Grow up!" we'd like to say to our partner from time to time. "When I was a child…" Paul remembers. Marriage begins that way, and in those early days we "speak like a child" to each other, think about each other in "childish terms," and lay plans together as novices engaging in a new vocation. As time passes, however, the weight of marriage starts to stretch the fiber of our "childish ways," and we start to expect from each other much more than before. Is the marriage person equal to this task? Paul tells us that Love is!

5. Early in the marriage not all is yet clear. "In a mirror dimly," Paul reminds us in 13:12. Will we ever see "face to face" as the passage hopes we will? Or better, will we ever see "eye to eye"? What we need in the marriage journey is the wisdom of the heavenly parent who knows us better than we know ourselves; who knows our marriage person better than we can even begin to imagine it. And Love stands ready to make known to us what ordinary knowledge fails to communicate. Love is a form of knowing which partners in marriage desperately need when a great deal about their relationship (and each other) makes no sense at all. [BN, 7-8]

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* Saturday 6:00pm
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