1Corinthians 12:27-13:13
There was a movie some years ago where one of the characters was talking to a computer program. The program spoke to the man about love. The man began to say that he had never heard a program speak of love. He wanted to ask “How can you know love?” Instead he says “It’s a human emotion.” The program answers, “No, it is a word. What matters is the connection the word implies.”[1]
This reading from 1Corinthians is probably the most common piece of scripture read at weddings in America
That’s what Paul was talking about, Christian love not romantic love. This is why as well as we know these words, we often don’t consider them in context. Paul is not telling the Corinthians how to live as husband and wife, but as the body of Christ.
He begins, “Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.” He continues that God has appointed specific people to specific roles in the church. God appoints apostles, prophets, teachers, miracle workers, healers, deacons, leaders, and communicators. No one person is called to do all of the work of the church; that would be impossible. He then tells us to strive for the greater gifts and shows us how they are to be used in a most excellent way.
Paul tells us that the mightiest of us all, those given the most powerful gifts are nothing if the gift is used without love. Without love, nothing we do is worthwhile. Without love, screaming the Good News from the mountain tops is nothing but noise. If we are able to do everything but do it without love, we’ve done nothing at all. If we give everything without giving love, we have given nothing.
This describes how Christ loves the church and how he wants us to love him. Of course, in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians he reminds husbands to love their wives just as Christ loved the church; giving yourself up for her. So maybe it’s not far-fetched to read this at a wedding.
There’s a word I have used several times and will use several times more, covenant. Covenant is a distinctive word of faith. In scripture covenant takes the form of God making promises to his people. In Genesis God promised Noah never again to curse the ground nor to destroy every living creature. God promised Abraham would become a great nation. In Hebrews it is revealed Jesus is the mediator of a better covenant.
The special element to biblical covenant is that these are not contracts. Contracts are between two parties who give up something to receive something else. A covenant is a promise made one to another; a promise made without condition. Today you do not make a contract with each other. Today you each make a covenant, one to the other.
Today you give yourself one to another. Today you give yourself one to another for the sake of something better. Today you give yourself to one another to become one family. This is only possible by love; love that is patient and kind, love that is not envious or boastful, love that is neither arrogant nor rude. Love that does not insist on its own way; isn’t irritable or resentful. Love that does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.
Above all, love never ends. Yes all things of this earth end, but that’s because what we know we only know in part; like a mirror dimly. This is why God gives us family. This is why God gives us the church; the church that has made a covenant with you, giving you our blessing as the assembled body of Christ and promising to uphold you and your family. We take this covenant very seriously. (Amen?)
We receive so that we may have a glimpse into God’s unending, overflowing love.
Love is a word, this is true. Love is a human emotion, but in the hands of God it is far more. The joy and the glory of love is the connection, the relationships that spring from God’s love. Love is a way of life that in its fullest never fails. Love is more than a word or an emotion. Love is why God sent his Son, to redeem us with love that never fails.
It is from the past work of God that we have faith. And it is in assurance in things to come that we have hope. But it is in God’s work here and now that we have love. And as Paul writes, now faith, hope, and love exist side by side, these three. And the greatest of these is love.
May the love of God bless you and your family.
Amen.
[1] “The Matrix Revolutions” http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0242653/quotes, retrieved June 18, 2011.
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