1 Corinthians 13

Though I speak with the tongues of men and angels but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. Though I have the gift of prophecy and can understand all mysteries and knowledge but have not love, and though I have all faith so that I can remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing.
Love suffers long and is kind. Love does not envy, love does not parade itself, is not puffed up, does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil, does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.
Love never fails, but whether there are prophecies they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. For now we know in part and we prophecy in part, but when that which is perfect has come, that which is in part will be done away.
When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, and I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. For now I know in part, but then I will know just as I also am known. 
And now abide faith, hope, and love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
~1 Corinthians 13

It's been really really good for me working hard to memorize scripture lately. I've been responsible for memorizing Romans 8, but on Thursday I really felt prompted to memorize this chapter, so I did it. It's been a long long time since I've sat there and memorized a whole chapter in a day, and it was a struggle from the beginning. I was only a few verses into it on the bus, then right next to me this lady started talking on her cell phone (inappropriately loudly I might add) to one of her girl friends about how it's good to try and work at a marriage, but if it doesn't work out, you need to make sure you do all these things in advance to protect yourself and set up secret finances and get living arrangements figured out just in case something happens and you don't feel like it's good for you to be in the relationship anymore. I wonder how many people have that mindset toward their marriage. "It's great when it's good, but if it gets to the point where it's not making me happy anymore, it's time to just cut my losses and leave." It's no wonder marriages don't last anymore. We set up prenuptual agreements and set up a legal framework against the other person before the marriage even starts. To me, that seems like the best way to make sure it fails.
I think people are so confused about what love is. Almost everyone has felt that heart-pounding passionate infatuation that makes you unable to think about anything else other than the person you love. There are no fights because nothing else matters and the most significant event in your life becomes a kiss or a touch form that person. I've been there and felt that. It's amazing. It's like for a little while your heart and head and hormones are all in agreement and nothing is strong enough to come against the way you feel.
Is that love though?
What about this picture of love from the Bible? Suffering? Enduring? Giving my body to be burned? Dim mirrors? Do these really belong in a chapter devoted to describing the attributes of love?

I'll tell you what's really convicting and inconvenient about this chapter. "When I became a man, I put away childish things." When you really start thinking about the place this has in the chapter, you might start looking at the way you love and it makes you uncomfortable. That's what it did for me.
Kids are very uncomplicated. Everything is about them. I will share MY toy if you share YOUR toy that I want to play with more anyway. I will listen to you only because you have the ability to inflict pain on me because you're an adult. I will scream if you don't give me what I want exactly when I want it. I like you because you give me things. I refuse to walk because when you carry me it's much easier.
Basically if you take that verse in the context of the chapter, Paul is saying there is an understanding of love that is immature like a child's way of thinking.
I'll be really honest. I want my love to be reciprocated. When I perform an action out of love for someone, I want something back. Generally if I extend love and it is not reciprocated, I withdraw it and my energy is spent on someone who I know will love me back. In some situations that's not possible. Family, marriages, etc.
Love suffers long. Love does not seek its own. Love endures all things. 

I've come to understand some things about suffering love. I think that a love that suffers has to be one of the most painful things you can endure. Sometimes you pour out more and more until you feel like there is nothing left to pour out. You're trying to get a reaction that shows that your worth and efforts are validated by the person you're pouring into, but there is nothing. You wonder if your love isn't good enough, if you're just not doing the right things, if YOU'RE not good enough. At that point you have to make a decision.
Why do you love?
A love that exists to get reciprocation, in other words, a love that's only there as long as love is returned, is childlike and immature. I don't think very many people understand that and they're always stuck in a place where love isn't self-sacrificial, not really. Does your love suffer long, or is it willing to be inconvenienced for a while as long as it is made up for later? I have to say that that's really convicting for me. What 1 Corinthians 13 implies is something that I want to plug my ears to. I can't say that on my own free will that I'm willing to suffer long or endure without some kind of compensation soon. It hurts a lot to really love someone and by their actions, you're not sure if they even love you back. It hurts for a day much less months or years, and I think a lot of people experience that. How long would you last? What choice would you make?

I think the first level of application we look to this chapter for is our interpersonal relationships. We think about being kind and patient with each other, not being selfish in our love for each other. What about God? When I was memorizing it, that thought popped into my head when I was almost done. "Yeah, I understand a lot of ways that this applies to how I love my wife and family, but I love God right? This would probably apply to that too right?"
The answer is yes in two ways. The first way is that without a genuine love for God, all of our faith and gifts and sacrifice are nothing. All the way through the New Testament, we're told by Jesus and Paul and others that the greatest and really only commandment in humanity's post-law relationship with God is to love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. Are your gifts to the poor for your own ego or are they originated with a pure love for God? Do you have faith and exercise your gifts through a genuine love for God and to see Him glorified, or yourself glorified? Would you suffer long for Jesus, are your words and thoughts kind toward Him? are you seeking your own when you pray? Are you easily provoked to anger against God when things happen that you don't understand? Do you rejoice in the Truth we have about who God is in the Bible?
The second way this chapter applies to our walk with God, and probably the more profound of the two, is that this models directly how Jesus loved and still loves. He suffered long when we as humanity rejected Him. Really, we still reject Him. If we're honest, how many times do we who profess to be Christians reject Him? Jesus never sought His own, He sought us. He wasn't provoked, not even when He was tortured before going to the cross because His love was such that He would endure even that, with no repayment on our part, just for the sake of giving us a chance to just have a relationship with Him.
If you find yourself in a relationship where you feel like your love is not reciprocated either short term or long term, think about how long Jesus needs to wait for you to reciprocate His love. Do you ever? If you were in a marriage, how long would you be happy if your spouse talked to you once or twice a week, and then only to ask you to do something for them? What if once a week your spouse sang you the words to a great love song, and then you tried to talk to them about how much you love them and your plans for the future and they started nodding off because they were bored and just not really into it? Would the songs mean much? What if that's the only time you saw your spouse and you were trying all week to call them and did all kinds of things to show them that you loved them? What if you always provided for them and gave them really meaningful, thought-out gifts and they took the gifts and ignored you for days? Isn't that how we treat God?
There isn't a difference between our love for each other and our love for God, except that God is the only one who loves perfectly. In fact, there are a lot of references in both the Old and New Testaments describing how our relationship with Jesus is like a marriage. That's on purpose, and it's a deep analogy.

So What?

I think we are allowed pain in our relationships to teach us what real love is. If your love is tested by you not getting something back, does it fail? That's not love. If your love can't endure when your emotions aren't there to make it feel good, is it really worth anything? Does it have any real strength? Is it childish and always wanting to be indulged? If so, that's not real love, but a counterfeit emotion. Emotions are constantly coming and going and swaying back and forth with circumstances and hormones and the weather. Can anything based on that be trustworthy and strong? I would say no. It's a great, great thing when our emotions back up what we know is right, but man those times seem to be so few and far between.
I'm not trying to be hard on people who give up or be flippant about what people can go through. I KNOW that pain. I KNOW the temptation of giving up the hard love that doesn't feel good a lot of the time, especially when there are more places you could go where the acceptance and good feelings come at a lower cost. You have to be strong and use your head in spite of your feelings though. What is fought hard for is worth much more, if for no other reason than it makes you stronger and better and it makes your love more true.
If you struggle with pain caused by love, remember the love Jesus has for you and try to identify in His pain caused by His love for you. He always wants us and unlike us to other people, is always 100% available to give His attention to us. Be happy when love comes with pain, because it's a chance not only to refine your own ability to love, but also to identify with Jesus, who will always have a more real love than we are capable of.