1 Corinthians 13:13 (ESV)
So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
In chapters 12-14 of this letter to the churches in Corinth, Paul is outlining how to use spiritual gifts, especially tongues and prophesy. In chapter 12 Paul makes the case that all gifts are for the Body of Christ and everyone in the Body of Christ has different gifts. His point is that the gifts are to be used to edify the body. In chapter 14 we read about the specifics of the gift of tongues and, a bit, about the gift of prophesy. As important as these two chapters are, however, sandwiched in between is chapter 13, which gives us the overriding principle for all gifts. We are not to practice any gift, no matter what we may think its importance in the church, if we are not governed and powered by love, that God supplies. Operating any gift, without love, is like trying to drive a car without gas. Love is the power behind all of God’s gifts. We are to be empowered by love and our use of God’s gifts ought to demonstrate God’s love in all we do. It is amazing how people can claim this and that about gifts and entirely skip chapter 13. When we attempt to use any gift for our own personal use and glory we have left love at home. When we use a gift and don’t have the love of others as our focus we are not really being empowered by the Spirit to operate the gift. We can’t have the Spirit of Christ give us the gift, empower the gift and not, also, have the aspect of God’s love reigning in the gift. It just does not happen. We are to use the gifts of the Spirit of God what demonstrating and being empowered by the love of God.
No comments:
Post a Comment