It seems that everyone is finding these verses somewhat harder to commit to memory than the recent block in Matthew 5!
These verses are, of course, extremely well known – I guess they feature as the most popular reading for weddings, and possibly are seen as related to marriage and little else which is a great pity as the context in which they are found is nothing to do with marriage!
These verses on love appear as a counter to the friction and abuses which abounded at the church in Corinth. That church boasted of the gifts of Holy Spirit that they had but failed to show any sign of the fruit of the Holy Spirit – what a tragedy. In response Paul sets forth the beauty and necessity of true agape love between brothers and sisters in Christ. This aspect of the Holy Spirit’s work in the person of a Christian is listed first (Gal 5:22) and is the clear evidence of the reality of a profession of faith in Christ.
Just look at these verses they lay out for us the nature of such love. Firstly it is ‘generous’ towards others – it is patient (another aspect of the fruit of Holy Spirit – the Greek work means literally “slow to anger” as we so often read of God) and kind, it guards us from envy, boastfulness, arrogance and pride. It accommodates others’ views, aspirations and needs, it protects us from that pettiness and small mindedness that results in irritableness and resentfulness.
But, and this is so important, it isn’t without rules, it doesn’t compromise with what is false or evil – v6 it sees nothing attractive or acceptable in what wrong doing, it always sides with truth.
And then most awesome comes v7 – this agape love shapes how we respond to all that comes to us – “we bear all things” – whatever befalls us, whatever our lot, in love we take it, we “believe all things” – firstly all that God says, all that the Bible contains, and then all that is good that said of others and by others – we are biased towards looking for, and expecting, that the good things we are told are the true things, rather than immediately believing and delighting in every evil thing that is said of someone. Love “hopes all things” – we hope in all the promises of God, we hope in the coming of Christ soon, we hope in all that will be ours in glory, but we also hope in people. We invest in them hoping that we will not be disappointed, we hope in their professions of faith, in their pursuit of holiness, in their words of repentance. And finally love “endures all things” – all that this life throws at us, all that results from the fall, all that is of the devil, all that comes from evil men, sickness, and even death – For Christ’s sake we endure it all and seek to glorify God in all!