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I make nothing of it.
(4)
Love is very patient, very kind.
Love knows no jealousy;
(5)
love makes no parade, gives itself no airs, is never rude,
(6)
never selfish, never irritated, never resentful; love is never
glad when others go wrong, love is gladdened by goodness,
(7)
always slow to expose, always eager to believe the
(8)
best, always hopeful, always patient. Love never disappears.
As for prophesying, it will be superseded; as for 'tongues'
they will cease; as for knowledge, it will be superseded.
(9)
For we only know bit by bit, and we only
(10)
prophesy bit by bit; but when the perfect comes, the
(11)
imperfect will be superseded. When I was a child, I talked like
a child, I thought like a child, I argued like a child; now
that I am a man, I am done with childish ways.
(12)
At present we only see the baffling reflections in a mirror, but
then it will be face to face;
at present I am learning bit by bit,
but then I shall understand, as all along I have myself been
understood.
(13)
Thus faith and hope and love last on, these three, but the
greatest of all is love.
It is John who tells us that 'God is Spirit' in his Gospel, and who
reveals that 'God is light' and 'God is love' in his first epistle. He who
knows in heart as well as head all the teaching of this first epistle, will
have a fairly complete presentation of Scriptural relationships of love.
(1)
The nature of God Himself (1 John 4:8,16).
'God is love'.
(2)
The relationship of the love of God with the sacrificial gift of
Christ (1 John 3:16; 4:9,10).
(3)
The need for the believer to manifest his love to God Whom he has
not seen by showing it to his brother whom he has seen (1 John
4:11,20).
(4)
Love has a perfecting effect and casts out all fear (1 John
4:17,18).
(5)
Our love is but the echo of God's greater love (1 John 4:19).
(6)
Love should be manifested in deeds not merely in words (1 John
3:18).
(7)
'Beloved' is a precious title of the redeemed (1 John 3:2,21;
4:1,7,11).