Importance of Spiritual Love
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August 26, 2012 |
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 "If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing." (1 Corinthians 13:1-3)
The 13th chapter of First Corinthians is called the 'Love Chapter'. It puts an emphasis on the importance of love before the detailed explanation about spiritual love. Even though we have enough food, clothing, shelter and lack nothing; if we have no love, all our hope and reason to live are gone. In other words, love is the most important factor in our lives.
1 Corinthians 13:13 says, "But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love." Even if we speak beautifully like the angels speak, have the gift of prophecy, possess the faith to remove mountains, give all our possessions to feed the poor, and can surrender our bodies to be burned, we need true love to make all our deeds perfect.
1. Even if I speak with the tongues of men and of angels
Here, "The tongues of men" do not refer to the gift of tongues that is one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, but to all languages used on the Earth such as English, Chinese, and Russian. When we see how human civilization has been improved and passed down onto descendants by language, we can see the tremendous power of words.
Languages have the power to move people's hearts so we can achieve many things. If we could just speak good words with beautiful voices like angels do, how amazing it would be!
If we speak with the tongues of men and angels but do no have spiritual love, we have become like a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. A gong makes sound when it is empty or it is light. In the same way we are just like chaff when we are empty and without spiritual love. Only when we are full of love as God's children who resemble Him can we be valuable as wheat before God who has cultivated mankind. When we say something, we should give life to the listeners and think, "With what words can I encourage him/her?" and "How can I help him/her come into the truth?"
In the Book of John chapter 8, the scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman caught in adultery before Jesus and said to Him, "Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women; what then do You say?" If He had told them to stone her, they would have said that He had no love. If He had told them to forgive her, they would have said that He ignored the Law. Jesus began to write their sins one by one on the ground. Seeing the list of their sins on the ground they had qualms of conscience and left the place. Only Jesus and the women were there. Jesus said to her, "I do not condemn you, either. Go. From now on, sin no more."
Words with spiritual love have power to revive lives. But if you try to force your ideas on others or point out others' fault with words, you can't truly change them or give true life, even if your words are perfectly right.
2. Even if I have the gift of prophecy, know all mysteries and all knowledge, and have all faith, so as to remove mountains
In general, prophecy is to speak about something that will happen. In the Bible, men prophesied that something would happen by receiving the heart of God in the inspiration Holy Spirit for some particular purpose. It couldn't be done by men's will but men in the inspiration of the Holy Spirit could receive prophesy from God (2 Peter 1:21).
But here "The gift of prophecy" in the Love Chapter doesn't refer to the gift given specifically to such people. Here it is to foreknow and proclaim that saved souls will be caught up into the air when the Lord comes in the air and then they will have the Seven-year Wedding Banquet whereas unsaved souls will suffer in the Seven-year Great Tribulation and go to Hell after the Great Judgment of White Throne.
Here too "Mysteries" refers to the mysteries hidden before the beginning, that is, the message of the cross. The message of the cross is God's providence prepared before the beginning to save mankind. God foreknew that men would sin and go the way of death so He prepared Jesus who is our only Savior before the beginning. God let it be hidden as a mystery because if Satan had known about it the mystery couldn't have been fulfilled because of Satan's interruption.
The enemy devil and Satan thought that they could have kept the authority given to them due to Adam's sin if they killed Jesus. So, they instigated evil men and caused them to crucify Him. Contrary to their expectations, however, the way of salvation was opened by their killing of Jesus who had no sin at all. Although we know this amazing mystery, if we do not have spiritual love and preach about it, it is of no use.
The same applies to knowledge. "All knowledge" doesn't mean only academic knowledge, but also all knowledge of the truth written in the Bible. If we know God, we should believe Him from our hearts by meeting and experiencing Him. Otherwise, our knowledge is just knowledge and it even plays the role of our standard to pass judgment and condemnation on others. Thus, knowledge without spiritual love is also useless.
If we have "All faith" capable of removing mountains but do not have love, we are nothing. Peter walked on the water for a while with faith when Jesus walked on the water. But he had no spiritual love and eventually in face of threats to his life he denied Jesus since he had neither received the Holy Spirit nor had he yet become sanctified.
When we experience God, faith can grow; however, spiritual love grows in us only when we try hard to cast away sins. It doesn't mean that faith and love are not interrelated. It is by faith that we want to cast away sins and love God.
3. Even if I give all my possessions to feed the poor and surrender my body to be burned
Those who help the poor to flaunt themselves will become more arrogant when they are praised. They mistakenly think they are righteous so they don't try to circumcise their hearts. It is harmful to them. But those who help the poor out of love don't mind whether someone recognizes their deeds or not. This is because they believe that God, who watches them in secret, will repay their deeds with blessings and rewards according to their deeds (Matthew 6:3-4).
It is the same with sacrifices. To 'surrender my body to be burned' means complete sacrifice of self. Of course, we can make self sacrifices when we have love. But, we can make sacrifices even if we have no love. In other words, we complain after working faithfully or we feel uncomfortable when nobody recognizes our efforts, devotion, time, or financial contribution. We judge others who don't work faithfully thinking, "How could they do nothing although they say they love God?" With hearts like these, we ourselves feel troubled and break peace with others. Thus, the sacrifice profits us nothing.
Why do we give sacrifice without love even though we have faith? This is because we don't have a sense of ownership that 'what's God's is mine and what's mine is God's.' If our hearts are filled with spiritual love, we can devote ourselves for the Lord whether or not someone sees us and recognizes us.
Dear brothers and sisters, I pray in the name of the Lord that you will achieve spiritual love by unsparingly giving yourselves for others like a candle that burns sacrificing its self to drive away darkness and brighten it up around it.
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