THE ART OF LOVE
Why go through this information on a chapter about love? Corinth marks a very similar resemblance to where the United States is now. Although we do not have a temple where one thousand prostitutes serve in sexual immorality, the idea that intimacy is reduced to a sexual experience, or to take what love is and reduce it to a feeling or a sexual encounter, produces a generation (or two, or three) that looks at love as something that fluctuates and depends on how someone feels toward another. If I “fall out of love” with someone, I can just find someone else to “fall in love” with.
So, Paul sends his letters to the Corinthians, a chapter of which is dedicated to love. We call it the “Love Chapter” of the Bible. It is called this because the theme of this chapter does, in fact, have to do with love. We must, however, understand why Paul decides to move his letter to Corinth in such a direction.
Apparently, some believers in the church at Corinth were seeking some sort of status through the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Many people were seeking the gifts to get noticed and to bring attention to themselves. All of these motives have to do with ourselves and not with others. They were not based in love— they were very self-seeking.
In answer to those people who may have been seeking the gifts of the Spirit with the wrong motives, Paul says in verse 31 of chapter 12, “Eagerly desire the greater gifts.” In other words, it is okay to desire those gifts that seem to be more public. However, we are not to seek them for our own benefit or for any of the glory, but to edify or to build up others in the family of God, the body of Christ, the church—and to do so in love.
Then Paul says, “And now I will show you the most excellent way.” Chapter 13 exists here because Paul desired to show the Corinthians, and now us as we look into it, the correct way to exercise all spiritual gifts. We are to exercise them in love toward others.
Notice how he does not refer to love as a gift of the Spirit but as a fruit of the Spirit. A fruit by definition is something that is produced. What is it produced from? It is produced from the life and work of the tree firmly rooted in good soil. Good fruit can only come from a tree that has good nutrients, water, and a constant source of the sun.
If our lives are rooted in Christ, in his love, and in his sacrifice, and we receive our sustenance from his word, his life, his truth, and his light, we will produce good fruit. Love will be evident in our lives for God, for ourselves, and especially for others. Through our lives and through what we do for the Lord, love should be the motivating factor for what we do for others.