1 Corinthians 13
The Way of Love
1 If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. 2If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing. 3-7If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.
Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have.
Love doesn’t strut,
Doesn’t have a swelled head,
Doesn’t force itself on others,
Isn’t always “me first,”
Doesn’t fly off the handle,
Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,
Doesn’t revel when others grovel,
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end. 8-10Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end; understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth, and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.
11When I was an infant at my mother’s breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew up, I left those infant ways for good.
12We don’t yet see things clearly. We’re squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won’t be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We’ll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!
13But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love.
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OK. So I have been thinking about this a lot lately. The items that are in red are things that I have been guilty of doing. And I feel like talking about them, item by item. Forgive me, I am just trying to work some stuff out in my head.
Love never gives up. Ahhh But I have given up. In fact sometimes (most of the time) it is easier for me to just give up then to actually keep beating my head against the wall when trying to love someone who JUST DOESN’T WANNA BE LOVED.
Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have. Well. I think that we are all guilty of this every once in a while. You see a relationship that *seems* perfect and you can’t help but compare things. Often times when I am in a relationship I am just FINE, until I see what Suzie down the block has and then I start making comparisons. NOT GOOD. I know I do this. But gosh it sure is hard not too.
Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others. I am VERY guilty of this. I think most girls are. I find it so hard to forgive and forget. Plus how gratifying is it to be in a fight and be able to bring up (POINT BY POINT) all the bad sh*t they have done that they should forever be atoning for. You know what the bad part is (besides all of it)? I usually feel pretty guilty when I am doing it, but IT DOESN’T STOP ME! I am trying though. Very hard.
Puts up with anything, trusts God always, always looks for the best, never looks back, but keeps going to the end. I haven’t always trusted in God. And I haven’t always put up with the things that really shouldn’t have been a big issue. Now SOMETHINGS I don’t think were included in this, ie abuse in ANY form be it physical, sexual, or emotional. The last major relationship I was in was rife with emotional abuse. And I know that he would never agree. But case in point, if I wanted to leave because he wouldn’t do anything he would threaten to kill himself. He freaked me out so much one night that I even called his mother WHO WAS AT HIS GRANDPARENTS HOUSE FOR HIS UNCLES FUNERAL. That’s emotional blackmail which is tantamount to emotional abuse. It was always ‘If you love me then….’ and then I felt guilty for not being the good spouse. I FELT GUILTY! WTF?! I am starting to see that it was he who wasn’t the good spouse. Who didn’t treat me the way I should have been treated. NOW, in saying that I realize that I was FAR from perfect. Like I said above, I tended to hold his past crimes against him, which was not good of me to do. In fact it was down right bad. To err is human to forgive, divine. Isn’t that the saying. And I haven’t always trusted in God. Anyone who knows me knows of the religious struggles I have been through in the past several years.
Ugh that is it for now…
