THE PLAYWRIGHT AND THE PLAYERS | PART 5

By Jill Roberts and Michael Canalé

 

When we started “The Playwright and the Players,” series, Michael began it by saying that,

 

“The disciples were players in a play Jesus was writing.”

 

As set forth in Part 1 of these blogs, that play is best described as the Kingdom of God. Now, to further delineate, the solid foundation for this Kingdom is, more than anything else, one thing – love. If we were called upon to describe the Bible, in general, we would term it to be a love story between God the Father, Jesus, the Holy Spirit and mankind. The story began with a love so profound that we are created in their very image; we are beneficiaries of their very DNA. In Genesis 1:26, God said,

 

“Let US make man in OUR image, in OUR likeness…” (emphasis added), NIV

 

Their love for us is so deep that they bestowed on us a reflection of themselves. Therefore, love is the bedrock of the Kingdom, the play that Jesus is writing. How fitting then, that Michael and I close out this section on Paul, by focusing today on what is known as the Love Chapter or 1 Corinthians, Chapter 13. It is known far and wide, in both the religious and the secular worlds, as setting the standard for true, sustaining love. It is quoted at weddings, funerals, in greeting cards and at every manner of laudatory event where a person’s exemplary character is placed on display. Many can recite it by heart and heart is in its DNA. People who may know little about the rest of the Bible, know of it and approve of its high standard in explicating what real love is. Penned by Paul, it is not an exaggeration to say that it represents his finest hour in a panoply of writing that is vast, erudite and intellectually daunting.

 

BUT, having said all this, how well do we really know this Love Chapter? In our fervor to lay accolades at its and at Paul’s feet, have we mastered the understanding of this treatise on love which should underlie the reasons for our praise? Speaking only for Michael and myself, the answer is that we had not. Until now.

 

Every expositor of a given piece of writing knows the importance of three things: Context, Context, Context! What was the background for this literary Biblical passage; what were the circumstances underlying its birth? In short, what was going on behind the curtain with this starring chapter and verse? For our purposes, what is the backstory of 1 Corinthians, Chapter 13, the well-known but, perhaps, not so thoroughly understood, Love Chapter?

 

Once again, the answer begins with love. In addition to creating man in their image, God, working through the Holy Spirit, gave us certain spiritual gifts. This is the subject of the 1 Corinthians chapter which precedes the Love Chapter. In order to fully understand and appreciate Chapter 13, we must go back one chapter and briefly elucidate Chapter 12, in relevant part:

 

“There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them. There are different kinds of service…different kinds of working…To one, there is given through the Spirit a message of wisdom, to another a message of knowledge…to another faith, to another gifts of healing…to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another speaking in tongues and to still another interpretation of tongues…”

(1 Corinthians 12:4 – 10) NIV

 

Paul reiterated some of this list and then ends Chapter 12 with two critical and fascinating statements:

 

“Now eagerly desire the greater gifts. AND YET, I WILL SHOW YOU A MORE EXCELLENT WAY.”

( 1 Corinthians 12:31) NIV

 

Paradoxically, Paul is saying, “Yes, by all means, desire the greater spiritual gifts. They are powerful and good.” He then adds to this statement something quite extraordinary. While advising us to seek these great gifts, he then says, as above, in modern day parlance, that, “Oh yes, and, by the way, as wonderful as these Holy Spirit anointing gifts are, is my phrase, ‘And yet,” meaning, ‘Stand by, reader, actually I am going to show you THE MOST EXCELLENT WAY.” Paul is saying that, important as these gifts are, there is something better, something so superior, in fact, that he gives it this superlative – THE MOST EXCELLENT WAY! Only after having said this, does he end Chapter 12 and immediately begin Chapter 13 – the Love Chapter. In a Pauline stylistic technique, he announced, “Here it comes. Here is what I want you to read and never forget. I am going to give you something of such higher station than the great spiritual gifts. Reader, here it is!” Then, and only then, does he write the Love Chapter, the way of thinking and living that leaves the spiritual gifts in the dust. And here it is:

 

“If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, (this prized spiritual gift of tongues), BUT (emphasis added), do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging symbol. 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, (Wait, the coveted gifts of prophecy, knowledge and faith have a caveat?), but do not have love, I am nothing. (Astounding that with these gifts, one could end up a nothing, yet here it is.) If I give all I possess to the poor, (Who does this and yet ends disastrously?) and give my body to hardship, (The King James Version is more explicit here, saying ‘give my body to be burned’), that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. (Nothing, Paul? Really, after giving my body to be burned?‘ ‘Correct!”).

 

The chapter continues, describing what love looks like:

 

“Love is patient, love is kind. It doesn’t 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. (Seriously, Paul, not even a tiny record?) Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

 

Love never fails. But there are prophecies, they will cease. (This spiritual gift will be no more), where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. (All these are temporary). For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. (Completely gone). 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. (Tony Evans writes that in eternity,  ‘Faith will become sight and hope will be realized, ending the need for either.) But the greatest of these is love.” (Love will survive the test of eternity; it will never be outdated or a has been. It, alone, survives. Paul’s case for the superiority of love over all, including the gifts of the Spirit, faith and hope, is made.)

 

1 Corinthians 13) NIV

 

What a chapter! What a wake up call to us all! Michael said,

 

“When you’re full of love, it pours out of you.”

 

How apt is this observation, particularly with regard to this iconic Bible Chapter. Don’t the words of Paul just pour out of him in the flow of this chapter? It is almost musical, with the harmony of, “If I speak,” “if I have,” “if I give,” and then the repetition of the refrain, “but do not have love,” and all the nothingness associated with that state.

 

And, consider Paul, the man who let these words spill out of him. Once again, Michael called it when he said,

 

“Paul understood love so well, because he understood the other side.”

 

Paul had been Saul, the person, once again, described as follows:

 

“Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples.”

( Acts 9:1) NIV

 

The true viciousness of who Saul was, rounding up believers, women as well as men, and who he became – penning the bottom line of Christianity – love, reveals the power of God. Paul had proven his mettle in suffering indescribably for his Christ Jesus and, afterwards, wrote like the angel of love and mercy he had become. Michael states,

 

“Paul figured out that love is the key to God.”

 

Having done so, he lived accordingly.

 

The spiritual gifts are so important and we rightly consider them so, but, without the “key to God “ – love – they “profit us nothing.” (1 Corinthians 13:3) NIV. From the throne of God, the word comes to us: We are to be patient, kind, without envy or pride. If we fail at these, we can excel in every spiritual gift but to no avail. And how are we to approach this life of love which avails us all? We are guided by Paul. We are to live “all out,” in our love. He writes,

 

“Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize…they do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever.”

(1 Corinthians 9: 24,26) NIV

 

Michael says it so well:

 

“Reading the Bible and following Jesus’ practices and teachings, is your exercise to see and receive your crown. You need to see the crown to know where you’re going. If you see where you’re going, it’s much easier to get there.”

 

How do we see our crowns? Paul has guided us toward this with the insight of this amazing chapter, 1 Corinthians 13. As we strive to love well and truly, as we run to win the prize along Paul’s “most excellent way,” the way of love, may we remember that love trumps it all and, in the end, will be the only thing left still standing!