Love Never Fails

 

Read 1 Corinthians 13

While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

Love God with everything you’ve got. Love your neighbor as much as you love yourself.

Let’s raise the bar. Love each other with everything you have.

If you can get this love business right, you have fulfilled the demands of the law. You have fulfilled the heart and essence of the law.

The story was improbable if not impossible. Jesus had to go to the cross. The Jews wanted to stone him, but that would not align with prophetic parameters. His bones could not be broken.

He had surely angered the self-righteous, but had not sinned against his Father. He and the Father were and are one.

Two choices were available to those who wanted to maintain the status quo.  They could throw in the towel and follow this guy or kill him.

Killing seemed more palatable to the self-proclaimed righteous people than seeing the truth and adjusting their own lives.  These people were oblivious that God used their sinful natures to facilitate the sacrifice required to atone for sin once and for all.

There is one constant in all of this: God’s love. God’s love wins every time.

This early morning service and present excitement over something that took place two millennia ago is all rooted in love.

Some years, we break from whatever homiletic course we are on for Palm Sunday and Resurrection Sunday. This year, our journey through Paul’s letters to the church in Corinth put us on Chapter 13 for this Sunday.

It’s the love chapter. We find it between two chapters about Spiritual Gifts. It begins at the end of Chapter 12 with these words: And yet I show you the most excellent way.

 Hear it once more.

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

But today is about Jesus rising from the dead. Today is about the promise of our resurrection and eternal life in the reality of his resurrection.

Remember his words: I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live even though this body that carries us around in this life will die.

Today we sing, He Lives! He Lives! Christ Jesus lives today!

Remember his words. The moment you believe in Christ Jesus, you have crossed over from death to life.

Today is about resurrection, life, and for us, life eternal.

But why?

All of this life business has been rooted in love from the beginning, for God is love. In his very essence, God is love.

If I can do all sorts of impressive stuff but don’t have God, I am nothing. If I am putting points on the scoreboard of life but don’t have God, I gain nothing.

God is all of the qualities that we desire—patience, kindness, honor, selflessness, and joy in what is good.

Everything we can touch, feel, see, and taste will melt away one day. Only God is eternal.

We know a little, but not everything, but one day our eyes will be opened to so much more.

Once my thoughts were governed by the world that I had been conformed to, but now I have put away those immature thoughts for the ways of God.

One day, it will make more sense to me, and this choice to abandon the ways of the world might just make sense to those who condemn me now.

I won’t paraphrase the last part. It’s too good just as it is.

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Consider these two statements. God is love. Love never fails. God never fails.

God never fails!

Love never fails!

That means that we can count on his promises. His word never fails. It will not return void.

We have some powerful promises. Today, we focus on one.

Your belief, which today we recognize mainly in our professions of faith and the act of obedience we know as baptism, shows that you have crossed over from death to life. These are the visible signs. God sees the heart and knows the moment that you believe.

You didn’t surprise him. He knew you would come around and receive the gift.

His heart desires that you spend eternity with him. That part of eternity you live now is to be engulfed in and governed by love.

Yes, today we celebrate resurrection, but there is no atoning sacrifice in the blood of the Lamb without love, and there is no resurrection without the death and burial of our Lord.

There is nothing without love. God is Love. With Love all things are possible.

And Love never fails.

When you have those conversations we are commissioned to have with others we encounter, introduce God as your best friend, Love. Introduce people to Love.

This whole story is rooted in love.

Celebrate resurrection as the best victory ever. Jesus conquered the grave.

Now live a life of love.

Set aside the world's worries and consider the One who overcame the world. Consider love. Listen and rest in these verses one more time as we close.

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Celebrate resurrection.

Live a life of love.

Love never fails!

Amen.