Session 19 · 1 Corinthians 13:1-13
Charity: Love You Do, Not Just Love You Feel
What hating does to a person and what loving does
Book reading: Book Three, Chapter 9 (Charity)
Paul opens with a list of impressive things: speaking “in the tongues of men and of angels,” prophetic powers, “all mysteries and all knowledge,” “all faith, so as to remove mountains,” even giving away everything. Without love, he says, the first is “a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal,” and the rest add up to “nothing” and “gain nothing.” A person could be gifted, learned, and generous, and still miss the one thing.
Now read his description of love and watch the grammar. “Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful.” Nearly every phrase names something you do or refuse to do. Patience is something you practice. Kindness is something you show. Not insisting on your own way is a choice made in the middle of a disagreement. Paul never says love is a warm sensation. He describes behavior, and that fits how Lewis treats Christian love in his chapter on charity: as action more than feeling.
Lewis also weighs what hating does to a person against what loving does. Paul's list lets us look at both sides ourselves. “Irritable or resentful” is on the list of what love is not. Then the list closes with what love does: “Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.” Think about a person you resent. Resentment keeps that person in your head, rehearsing the argument in the shower and replaying the slight at night. It makes your days tighter. Now picture a stretch of days spent bearing, hoping, and enduring toward that same person, in a way that is safe for you. Those words describe a person who is steadier, not smaller. Lewis says his way of defining love makes loving our neighbours both easier and harder than a feelings-based idea. Test that in your own week and see what you find.
Notice, too, where Paul ends: “faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” Gifts and knowledge will pass away, but love is what lasts. That raises the stakes on small things. A patient word to a coworker is not a minor event. It is practice for the thing that “never ends.”
Who counts as a neighbour? Jesus answers that question in the story of the Good Samaritan, and the answer reaches farther than we would like. The neighbour is whoever is in front of you with a need you can meet.
A word of care. Love that “bears all things” does not mean you must stay in reach of someone who abuses you. You can will good toward a person from a safe distance. If you're unsure where that line is, a pastor, counselor, or trusted friend can help you think it through.
Key idea
Paul describes love mostly in things you do and refuse to do, and setting that beside what resentment does to a person shows why love is a matter of the will, not just the heart.
Questions to consider
- The book weighs what hating does to a person against what loving does. Think of someone you resent: what has holding that resentment done to your thoughts, mood, or days, and what might a week of patient, kind action (done safely) change?
- Which phrase in verses 4-7 describes an action you could take this week toward a specific neighbour, whether or not you feel like it?
Journal prompt
Write a short description of a time resentment took up room in your mind. Then write what one patient or kind act toward that person (or another neighbour) could look like this week.
Practice
1. Choose one specific neighbour (a coworker, family member, someone down the hall). 2. Pick one phrase from 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 and write one action that matches it (for example, a patient answer, a kind message, or letting them have their way on something small). 3. Do it within the next three days, even if you don't feel warm toward them. 4. Afterward, write two sentences about what it did in you.