A beautiful passage of scripture This morning we gather in the presence of some of the loveliest words in scriptures, right here in chapter 13 of Paul's first letter to the Corinthians. Here in a few well-chosen, simple words, Paul's language and thoughts soar to unparalleled heights.
People who do what I do are constitutionally inclined to string together sentence after sentence, paragraph after paragraph, page after page, droning on and on with explication after explication, story upon story, in an unsatisfying attempt to say what Paul writes so elegantly, so eloquently, and yet so simply.
Love is patient. Love is kind. Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will come to an end. As for tongues, they will cease. As for knowledge, it will come to an end. Now we see in a mirror dimly, but then we shall see face-to-face. Now I know only in part, but then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love. Where is Jesus? Paul was a passionate Jesus follower, a man who had been convicted dramatically and convincingly of his former legalistic ways, in order to turn and embrace the itinerant political radical, the wandering poetic wonder-worker, the humble story-teller Jesus. He found in him a reason to live, he found salvation, he found hope. And he found a love that reflected God's love, a love that was less ethereal and characterized more by a steel-willed determination to seek the well-being of the other, no matter who or what.
And in this famous, beloved chapter God is never mentioned. In these verses we never read the name of Jesus. We don't have to hear those names spoken. We don't have to see them in print. The heart of God, expressed most fully in Jesus our Lord, shines through.
The times we live in Turn on the news, read the paper, listen in on many conversationsand you are bound to hear some commentary on the difficult times we live in, some reflection on how we've never been in exactly this place before.
In significant part the concern revolves around the state of the economy. Everyone's savings, retirement funds, and investments are worth dramatically less than just a year ago. The property we own has dropped in value. Most businesses are hurting. The unemployment rate is growing up as people are laid off, or have their hours reduced.
A family sees their work and their value shrinking so they don't go out to eat as much and they decide, these clothes can last me another year, I don't have to replace the roof quite yet, we can just stay at home rather than go to a concert. And so the restaurant owner doesn't have as much business and this impacts their suppliers. The clothing store doesn't need as much inventory as before. Roofers don't get quite as much business. We're all interconnected and the economic downturn has its way of linking to all of our lives.
There is a looming sense of uncertainty in the air. What will the world be like for my children or my grand-children? Many Americans have become so accustomed to life feeling stable and secure, and indeed, life getting gradually ``better'' over time, that we've come to assume that's the way it will always be.
We've preached for a long time, in the Mennonite circles we run in, to be wary of the culture and environment of materialism in our society, of the way in which the unquenchable quest for more things can eat away at our very soul.
And we've warned each other for a long time of the creeping militarism of our culture and environment, our unthinking way of placing our trust in massive military strength.
But these isms are so much a part of our lives, the air we breathe, that it's seemingly impossible to live purely and separately apart from them. How to live in distinctively Christ like ways in the midst of the complexities of modern American life, the time and place within which, through no choice of our own, we are plopped intothis is our challenge.
The environment of the early church inCorinth The early church in Corinth appealed to their founder Paul for some advice on how to live in their own time and place. The Corinthians, in some respects like us, lived in a complicated, pluralistic environment.
In one sense Paul was concerned about signs of (what some have called) ``spiritual elitism'' forming among them. People endowed with enthusiastic spiritual gifts tended to reduce Christian faith to slogans and catchphrases and diminished the moral imperatives of the gospel message.
In another sense, the young churches of Corinth were constantly dealing with their own religious past. In embracing Christ they were charting a new religious identity, something apart from the pagan gods and temples (with their own ecstatic expressions and experiences) they had left behind. The challenge was, how to maintain a particular, special identity within a rough and tumble, pluralistic environment.
Furthermore, another dynamic within the early church in Corinth had to do with the sociology within these early house-churches. They tended to defy the patriarchal household structures of the Greco-Roman culture they inhabited. There was more social mixing of poor and wealthy, men and womenthe normal signs of status were put to the side in these early churches.
It's within this environment that Paul sings the praises of agape love. Spiritual gifts will finally pass away but love will endure. I understand that mirrors, made of polished bronze or silver, were made in Corinth. They were polished and allowed a reflection, but not a perfect reflection, just a dim one. This image Paul compares to our imperfect way of knowing.
So what endures, what lasts, what can we count upon? The gifts of faith, hope, and love, he says, all last, all are special, all our worthy. And the greatest of these, Paul concludes, is love.
This is a love that is more practical than abstract. A love that is purposeful in seeking the well-being of the other person. A love that is anchored in God's love for us. A love that seeks out and cares for the needy. A love that flows freely from ourselves to others.
Remembering love in our troubled times We live in a difficult time but it is no time to set love to the side and say, love is all well and good but it is something that is only actively practiced when the times are good. No, in fact now is precisely the time when we are called to inhabit and practice agape love.
In 2001 the Mennonite Church in Argentina faced a crisis. The economy was in the throes of a massive meltdown. Church members, including strong middle class families, found themselves suddenly without jobs.
Mauricio Chenlo tells the story of how members were struggling to know what to do when someone came up with the idea that right now, in the midst of our own difficulties, we should do something for the ``poorest of the poor.'' They developed a co-op and helped provide food for people who were struggling even more than they. They put into practice their faith with practical acts of compassion and love.
In our own time we can choose whether to be guided by the fear we feel in a time of uncertainty, or by our faith that beckons us to practice love irregardless of our circumstances.
Fear propels us to hang on jealously to what we have, to do all we can to insulate our selves from pain, to strike out against any perceived threat, to accumulate more for a perceived sense of security.
But love knows that all that I have ultimately comes from above. My talents, my time, my possessions, all that I am and have is ultimately to be shared for God's glory, and for God's kingdom, with the people who cross our pathsthe weary and the lost, the hungry and the troubled, the prisoner and the oppressed. We are called to respond to them with deeds of mercy, compassion, and love.
If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
May we be found, even in hard times, as people who do not shrink, but rather find joy in the practice of love whether to the neighbor or the stranger. May we encourage each other in finding visible, real, practical ways of expressing the truth that there are many fine gifts, including faith, hope, and love, and the greatest of these is love.
