1 Corinthians 13:7; Love Believes, Hopes, Bears, Endures

02/01 1 Corinthians 13:7 Love Believes, Hopes, Bears, Endures; Audio available at: http://www.ephraimbible.org/Sermons/20150201_1cor13_7.mp3

1 Corinthians 13 [SBLGNT]

4 Ἡ ἀγάπη μακροθυμεῖ, χρηστεύεται ἡ ἀγάπη, οὐ ζηλοῖ ἡ ἀγάπη, οὐ περπερεύεται, οὐ φυσιοῦται, 5 οὐκ ἀσχημονεῖ, οὐ ζητεῖ τὰ ἑαυτῆς, οὐ παροξύνεται, οὐ λογίζεται τὸ κακόν, 6 οὐ χαίρει ἐπὶ τῇ ἀδικίᾳ συγχαίρει δὲ τῇ ἀληθείᾳ· 7 πάντα στέγει, πάντα πιστεύει, πάντα ἐλπίζει, πάντα ὑπομένει. 8 Ἡ ἀγάπη οὐδέποτε πίπτει.

1 Corinthians 13 [ESV2011]

12:31 But earnestly desire the higher gifts. And I will show you a still more excellent way.

13:1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. 4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 8 Love never ends...

Paul is painting the picture for us of what love looks like, what God’s love looks like, how Jesus loves us, and how we are to follow in his footsteps and love others. The Corinthians may have been spiritually gifted, but they lacked the essential characteristic of love. They wanted to know what is the primary evidence of being spiritual; Paul tells them it is not supernatural manifestations like tongues speaking or prophesy, but the supernatural manifestation of love.

This verse is concise and powerful. It consists of eight words, four verbs and the direct object ‘all’ repeated with each verb. It is structured in what is called a chaism or X shaped structure, where the first verb is parallel to the last, and the middle two verbs are paired together. At the center love believes and hopes. On the outside, love bears and endures. Each verb is has its object in the word ‘all’. What does love bear? What does love endure? What does love believe? What does love hope? All. Love bears all, believes all, hopes all, endures all.

All – Love Never Stops

How do we understand this ‘all’? Does it mean that love puts up with all offenses without complaining, love believes whatever it is told -true or not, love hopes for things that most likely will not come true, love endures even the worst abuses without doing anything about it? Remember, this phrase comes right on the heels of ‘love does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth’. Would Paul then contradict himself and say that love willingly tolerates wrongdoing and is naïve and gullible, believing all things, even false teaching and lies, without discernment or discrimination? Certainly not! So what is the best way to understand this ‘all’? Translators have suggested that the ‘all’ here means the ‘absence of all limits’, and the best way to convey this meaning into English is with double negatives. So, where the ESV has:

7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.(ESV)

And where the NIV takes the direct object adverbially:

7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. (NIV)

Some other translations use a negative construction to convey the idea of removing all limits to love.

7 Love never gives up on people. It never stops trusting, never loses hope, and never quits. (ERV)

7 Love never stops being patient, never stops believing, never stops hoping, never gives up. (GW)

7 Love knows no limit to its endurance, no end to its trust, no fading of its hope; it can outlast anything. (Phillips)

There are no limits to the endurance of love. Love never gives up. Love bears and endures all. When Peter asked Jesus how often he should forgive a brother who keeps on sinning against him, Jesus said to him, ‘I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven’ (Mt.18:22). Remove the limits to love. How? How does love put up with so much? We have learned that love has a long fuse, love extends kindness to those who don’t deserve it, love is not offended when good comes to others instead of self, love exhibits humility, love is not indecent, self-seeking, or irritable even when provoked, love does not keep records of offenses, love does not celebrate when others fail but rejoices with the advance of truth. How does love act this way? Because the foundation of love is faith and hope. Its faith and hope are in God.

Bears All Things

Lets start from the outside and work our way inward. Love bears all things. This word is differently translated. The ESV has ‘bears all things’; then NIV has ‘always protects’; The CEB has ‘puts up with all things’; the OJB has ‘covers all things’. This word comes from a root which means ‘roof’ – the roof on a house or building. A roof covers and protects, which is one possible meaning of the word, in the sense of covering, passing over in silence, keeping confidential.

If this is what the word means here, Paul would be saying something like what the Proverbs say (using a different word)

Proverbs 10:11 The mouth of the righteous is a fountain of life, but the mouth of the wicked conceals violence. 12 Hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all offenses.

And similar to what Peter (also using a different word) says in

1 Peter 4:8 Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.

So if this is how Paul is using the word, he is saying that love hides from view the sins of others, covering them over, protecting them from view, and thus protecting the sinner from some of the consequences of his sin.

This is how the word is used in the apocryphal book of Sirach

[apocrypha] Sirach 8:17 with a foolish one do not consult, for he cannot cover up a secret

While this is what the proverbs and Peter teach, that love does not parade around the sins of others, putting them on display, humiliating the sinner, (and this would fit the context here that love ‘does not rejoice at wrongdoing’), this is not the way Paul uses this word. The only other occurrences of this verb in the New Testament are 1 Thessalonians 3:1 and 5, and 1 Corinthians 9:12.

1 Thessalonians 3:1 Therefore when we could bear it no longer, we were willing to be left behind at Athens alone, 2 and we sent Timothy, our brother and God’s coworker in the gospel of Christ, to establish and exhort you in your faith, 3 that no one be moved by these afflictions. For you yourselves know that we are destined for this. 4 For when we were with you, we kept telling you beforehand that we were to suffer affliction, just as it has come to pass, and just as you know. 5 For this reason, when I could bear it no longer, I sent to learn about your faith, for fear that somehow the tempter had tempted you and our labor would be in vain.

Paul uses the word here in the sense of carrying a load or bearing up under difficulties. He could carry the burden no longer; we might say ‘he could stand it no longer’. The other place Paul uses this word is in 1 Corinthians 9, and there it has the same direct object ‘all things’ as it has here in chapter 13.

Corinthians 9:11 If we have sown spiritual things among you, is it too much if we reap material things from you? 12 If others share this rightful claim on you, do not we even more? Nevertheless, we have not made use of this right, but we endure anything rather than put an obstacle in the way of the gospel of Christ.

He says we voluntarily give up our rights and we carry any load, we bear any burden, we endure any hardship rather than hindering the gospel. Paul is holding up his own conduct as an example of how he wants the Corinthians also to put the advance of the gospel in first place, so much so that they become willing to endure anything, even the violation of their own rights, to see the lost come to Christ. Paul has said, in 4:16 and again in 11:1 ‘be imitators of me’. He has held himself up as an example of what enduring anything for the sake of love looks like, and now he tells us that love is willing to bear any load for the good of the one loved.

Endures All Things

The other end of the parallel is love ‘endures all things’. This is a very similar concept to ‘bears all things’. This word carries the idea of patience, and means to remain behind. In Luke 2:43, the young boy Jesus ‘remained behind’ in Jerusalem. In Acts 17:14, Silas and Timothy ‘remained behind’ in Berea while Paul went on ahead to Athens. The idea of ‘staying behind’ does not mean being left home when everyone else goes off to battle. Quite the opposite, they shipped Paul off for his own protection, because the Jews from Thessalonica had followed them to Berea and were ‘agitating and stirring up the crowds’ against them. So to stay behind means to stand and fight, to hold your ground, to be steadfast, to persevere. In classical Greek it was often used in military contexts. Jesus points his followers to the need for this kind of perseverance

Matthew 24:9 “Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake. 10 And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. 11 And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. 12 And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold. 13 But the one who endures to the end will be saved.

Endurance here is in the context of hatred, persecution, betrayal, execution, false teaching, lawlessness and a love that had grown cold. Endurance means remaining faithful to Jesus whatever the cost, holding steadfastly to the truth of the gospel as Jesus taught it, tenaciously persisting to love others even when that seems irrational and dangerous.

The author of Hebrews holds Jesus up to us as the example of patient endurance.

Hebrews 12:2 looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. 3 Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.

Jesus endured the cross. He endured hostility from sinners. We can take heart and stand our ground steadfast in love.

If there is a subtle difference between bearing all things and enduring all things, we could say that bearing all is like a roof that supports a limitless load, where endurance puts up with abuse for a limitless duration.

Never Stops Trusting

How do we do this? How can we love like this? What motivates a love that supports a limitless load and endures for a limitless duration? A love that remains steadfast in the face of hatred, betrayal, false teaching, even the threat of death? This is love that is beyond my capability. This is supernatural love. Where does it come from? I think the text answers our questions as we move from the outer pair to the inner pair. Love is able to bear all and endure all today because love looks forward to eternity believing all and hoping all.

What does it mean to believe all things? Or maybe it would be less easily misunderstood to translate it negatively ‘love never stops believing’. What does it mean to believe? The ‘believe’ word group in the bible means to trust in, depend on, or rely on. The noun form is often translated ‘faith’. We are told in Romans 4 that Abraham’s faith was credited to him for righteousness. His faith was believing the promise of God.

Romans 4:20 No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, 21 fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.

His faith, or his believing, was an unwavering conviction that God is who he claims to be and he will do what he has promised to do. Jesus promises eternal life to all who believe in him. In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul reminds us of the good news that Jesus died for our sins and rose from the grave.

1 Corinthians 15:1 Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, 2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you— unless you believed in vain.

Paul tells us that the believing that is not worthless and empty consists in receiving the good news, standing in the good news, allowing the good news to rescue us, and holding fast to the good news. How does this enable us to love, to bear all things and endure all things? Because we are taking our stand in the good news. Good news that promises us eternal life even if someone destroys our body. Good news that God is working all things, even the painful things, together for our ultimate good (Rom.8:28). Because we are believers, because we never stop believing in God, trusting him, depending on him, we can take the risk of loving others.

Never Stops Hoping

Love never stops believing, love never stops hoping. What is hope? We often use the word ‘hope’ to describe things that we wish might happen but have no reason to believe will actually happen. It is almost synonymous with ‘wish’. And sometimes it is used that way in the bible. Paul talks about his plans to visit churches using the word hope to describe something he desires to do and plans to do but is not confident that it will come to pass. But hope in the bible is often used as synonymous with believe. The prophecy pointing to Jesus Isaiah 42 says:

Matthew 12:21 and in his name the Gentiles will hope.”

To hope in the name of Jesus and to believe or trust in Jesus are saying that we put our confidence in Jesus. Hope brings out the aspect of desire and longing and eager expectation.

Hebrews speaks of forgiveness of sins through the sacrifice of Jesus, and confidence to enter the presence of God through the blood of Jesus. He says

Hebrews 10:23 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.

We might expect him to say ‘the confession of our faith‘. But hope expresses the confidence of believing in a God who is faithful to keep his promises.

Timothy helps clarify what is meant by hope. It says

1 Timothy 6:17 As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy.

There is a contrast between the different objects we hope in, we trust in, we place our confidence in, we look to with eager expectation. Many put confidence in riches. Paul warns ‘do not set your hope on riches, because they are uncertain. They will fail to deliver what they appear to promise. The big bank account might appear trustworthy, but it can be gone in an instant. Instead, hope in God. Place your confidence in God. God cannot fail to deliver what he promises. God is the one who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. God is the only risk-free place to put your hope.’

Love never stops hoping in God. Love does not hope for a return from the one it shows love to. That will let you down. Love always hopes or hopes in all things, because the hope is not short term return on the investment of love here and now, but a hope that reaches into eternity, a hope that is fixed on God himself. That is the only hope that will never disappoint.

Romans 5 connects faith with hope, and links it to endurance and love.

Romans 5:1 Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3 Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

We stand in grace – God’s good gift, by faith in Jesus, who grants us peace with God and access to him, and we rejoice in hope, confident that he will make good on all his promises. And then we see the link between suffering, which provides opportunity to bear up and endure, which produces tested character, which enhances our confidence in God, because we begin to see God’s supernatural love manifest in our lives, a result of the gift of the Holy Spirit at work in us to produce this love for others.

We never stop trusting in God, depending on him, relying on him; we never stop hoping in God, having confidence in him, with eagerly expectant longing for him, and this confidence and dependence in God flows out of us in risk taking love for people, people who will never be able to repay, who are needy, broken, hurting, and who will hurt us. We persevere in loving them, in bringing the good news about Jesus to them, we bear the insults, the abuse, the scorn, the disappointments, because our faith and hope are fixed not on temporary short term rewards, but on God who is love, who richly rewards all who hope in him, all who love with his love. Love moves out and puts itself out for the sake of the advance of the gospel and for the glory of Christ. Love bears all, believes all, hopes all, endures all.

Pastor Rodney Zedicher ~ Ephraim Church of the Bible ~ www.ephraimbible.org