Transcript
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Foreign.
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This is the Behemoth Podcast with Marty Solomon. I'm his co host, Brent Billings. Today I am with Reed Dent to close out this series in an unorthodox format.
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Yeah, we come to the final virtue, which is love, which of course we can't talk about without talking about 1 Corinthians 13. It's the crown jewel of, of texts on love. And so in first Corinthians there are just chapters and chapters. Paul is parsing lots of tricky issues like marriage and consuming meat sacrificed to idols and spiritual gifts. And it's a lot of if this, then that, but unless the otherwise. But then when you get to 1 Corinthians 13, his writing, it elevates, it changes. To me, it suddenly becomes kind of euphoric when he is talking about, he's writing this great hymn to love. And I think that's because the truth about love exceeds our ability to inform or to explain this passage. It's like a red tailed hawk. I recently saw one flying by the highway. It's soaring, it's full of wonder. And we are just kind of watching it, full of awe. And it's kind of like what we've talked about with parables in the past, where I'm afraid that the tendency of many preachers would be to kind of snare it and yank it to the ground and just dissect it. Like the Greek word for love is this and that has these components to it and this is the application for that. And like we said before, it's like, yeah, we all understand it better, but we kill the thing in the process. And so ending the series on virtues with love. I didn't want to do it that way. I wanted to try to, you know, watch the thing in flight, as it were. And so this episode is an attempt to do that. It's kind of an experiment in the bema format. It's not the typical conversation back and forth. This is actually a piece that I wrote a little while back and it comprises nine distinct, non linear but related entries on love. And so for the episode to the listener, Brent is going to be reading verses and quotes and then I will read my own contributions. And yes, admittedly, this is kind of a strange way to end this 14 part series on vices and virtues where we've had hours of conversation talking about all these different angles of our tendencies for good and harm, that form, you know, that kind of web of human nature. But if Paul is right when he says that you can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, you can possess every gift. You can even give away everything you have to the poor. And yet you. You remain nothing. If love is missing, then it seemed worth it to me to, you know, give it a try and let love have its own way. And so, with that, here we go.
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Brant, Part 1 Corinthians 13 if I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 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 but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship, that I may boast but do not have love, I gain nothing. Love is patient. Love is kind. It does not 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. Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease. Where there are tongues, they will be stilled. Where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part. But when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. 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. But the greatest of these is love. Part 2 Three stories about love the first stage is to believe that there is only one kind of love. The middle stage is to believe that there are many kinds of love. And that the Greeks had a different word for each of them. The last stage is to believe that there is only one kind of love.