Salty Love

Most will recognize that 1 Corinthians 13 is the (so called) chapter on love. In fact you don’t even have to be a casual reader of the Bible to recognize the sentiments recorded there because these verses are often read at weddings and popularized in music.

I’m okay with reading these verses at weddings but when done so they are a secondary application of these verses and I’m not okay if our primary knowledge of Bible passages is based on a secondary application/understanding of said verses.

Note chapter 13 is found squarely in the middle of chapters 12 and 14.

Chapter 12 is about jealousy and envy among Christians in the Corinthian church about which gifts they had been given. Imagine that… God gives you something and you are envious of what God gave someone else. Sometimes someone will complement me on some attribute or the other that I might have and I’ll respond… it’s a gift and I can’t take credit for a gift. Nor can you accept a gift from God and wish it were a better gift.

Chapter 14 is about the misuse of these gifts during the assembly of the church. Their assembly had become a chaotic assembly characterized by people interrupting and demanding attention for themselves.

So Paul didn’t take a break from talking about spiritual gifts to have a dialogue on love so that we could have nice weddings surrounded by the release of butterflies and white dove and a reading of 1 Corinthians 13.

Note in chapter 13 that Paul personalizes what he says… “If I (Paul) speak with the gift of the languages of foreigners and angels and have not love…” etc. etc. etc.

Things that love doesn’t do… does not envy, does not elevate itself above others… etc. etc. etc.

Things that love does… bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things… etc. etc. etc.

Paul is contrasting his behavior with their behavior especially as it is found in chapters 12 and 14 but really in the whole letter to the Corinthians. The Corinthians were childish, envious, jealous, tolerated sin, judged improperly and some of them charged Paul with not being a true Apostle and therefore not worthy of monetary support.

Paul was striving for spiritual perfection and if he suffered all that he suffered and responded to their mistreatment of him in an unloving manner then all was for naught.

Paul records the 13th chapter of 1 Corinthians to illustrate the stark contrast between his behavior which was characterized by actionable love and their behavior which was in many ways worse than the behavior of the pagans whom they lived among and which bordered on Blasphemy.

So in summary I don’t mind at all the secondary applications that are based on 1 Corinthians but as Bible students we’re not worth our spiritual salt if we neglect or fail to understand the primary application of what we read.

Let’s be salty.