Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant of rude.

Most of us cannot hear these words without thinking of bouquets, white dresses, tuxedos, flower girls and all the other people and pomp that make up the romance of weddings. I wonder whether Paul would be amused, appalled, or angered to find that his most challenging and grace-filled words on the love of God have become the staple of weddings. Of all things, weddings! I am sure Paul would wonder where he went wrong.

About half of the couples I have married have chosen this reading from 1 Corinthians as their New Testament lesson. Yet I always steer clear of preaching on this text. If I preached on this passage at a wedding, I would feel compelled to mention that these beautiful words about love have absolutely nothing to do with the romantic love we have gathered to celebrate.

Paul wrote these words to the church in Corinth. The church in Corinth was in conflict. Members of the church were refusing to share, scorning their neighbor’s spiritual gifts while at the same time boasting of their own gifts; they sought recognition for themselves and jockeyed for position in the church.

Imagine what St. Mary’s would be like if Deacon Martha, our treasurer and our prayer shawl knitters began boasting that the ability to knit is the most blessed of spiritual gifts and that knitting prayer shawls is the highest calling in the church. Suppose those knitters began to treat catechists and lay readers as inferior members of the church. What would happen if our singers got the impression that their gift of voice is not important and abandoned the choir to learn how to knit. We would have an abundance of prayer shawls, but St. Mary’s would be a sad and sorry place. This was the situation in Corinth.

Paul sought to counter this behavior by reminding the church in Corinth that all spiritual gifts are manifestations of the Holy Spirit. In the passage we heard read last week from 1 Corinthians, Paul likened the church to a body of diverse members, each playing a role for the good of the whole. Lest there be any doubt about the folly and dangers of taking undue pride in one’s knowledge, or one’s ability to knit or sing, or one’s capacity to speak in tongues or to prophecy, in our reading for today, Paul claims that love trumps all such gifts. Love is not another spiritual gift. Love is the way in which God intends us to practice all of our gifts.

Paul wrote his letters in Greek. During Paul’s lifetime, Greek was the language of commerce and education. In the world of ancient Palestine and ancient Rome, almost everywhere you went you were likely to find someone who spoke and understood Greek.

In the first century, the Greek language had multiple words for the English word love. Early Christian thinkers, like Paul, believed that the love of God experienced in the life, ministry and death of Jesus, was a very different and a very special kind of love. They were careful to differentiate the love of God from philia, the Greek concept of familial love, and from eros, the Greek understanding of romantic love. They took a Greek word for love, agape, that had fallen out of common usage and gave that word a distinctly Christian meaning.

Agape, the love Paul has in mind in today’s text, is the reality of God’s presence in our lives and the very basis of our humanity. For Paul, our capacity to flourish as human beings is realized to the extent that we can live in the love of God revealed in Jesus Christ. This type of love is expressed in our ability to be patient and kind. And when we are able to put others’ needs ahead of our own. This love is never envious, boastful, arrogant or rude.

Is such love humanly possible? As an individual character trait – NO. But as the presence of God revealed in a community of believers that live in that love – YES! To be a part of God’s church, in Corinth or here at St. Mary’s, is to be a bearer of God’s love in the world, not seeking one’s own advantage, but working on behalf of all of God’s creation. This love is not so much a feeling, but an action. An abundance of this love, is what makes St. Mary’s so special.

Today, Susan Tamborini Czolgosz steps down as your Senior Warden. While I think we would all agree that Susan’s leadership during the last four years, first as Junior Warden and then as Senior Ward, has been nothing short of incredible, I do not bring this up to make an exemplar of Susan. She would kill me for that! I offer Susan’s ministry as an example because her passion, vision and success would not have been possible without the love and the gifts of the whole body of St. Mary’s. Recently, I asked Susan what stood out to her most during her tenure as Senior Warden. She told me that you, all of you, made leading easy. Although she led during a time of tremendous transition – clergy and staff going and coming and coming and going, PADS, economic recession – St Mary’s never descended into turmoil. This community remained patient and kind and able to put the needs of the whole above personal gain. Susan said she never wondered if someone would step forward to help or worried whether a need would go unmet. This has been my experience as well. This is the love that Paul is talking about.

Paul ends his difficult and pastoral words about love with a picture of the endurance of love. “Every spiritual gift will end. All the monuments humans create will crumble away. Even human life will come to an end. In this life, human beings are given the opportunity to grow in love, from childhood to adulthood and from immaturity to full spiritual maturity. There is a beautiful irony in the fact that the one thing that lasts for ever is the love that is given away.”

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iJerry Irish, “Theological Perspective: I Corinthians 13.1-13,” Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary, Year C Vol. 1, David L. Bartlett and Barbara Brown Taylor, Eds., (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 302.
iiLewis F. Galloway, “Pastoral Perspective: I Corinthians 13.1-13,” Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary, Year C Vol. 1, David L. Bartlett and Barbara Brown Taylor, Eds., (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 302.
iii Irish, 304.
iv Galloway, 304.
v Galloway, 306.