Now, from one area of controversy to another. Does Love cover all things? What should we do with that grating man standing in the corner, who tells us we are in error? His words are harsh, and he’s definitely not that loving.
For love is compulsory, it is essential, it is how others know that we are the disciples of Christ. But love has very little to do with what we mean by love today.
For both these passages speak of love, and one ends up with the disciples shaking dust at a village to damn it.
1 Corinthians (13:1-3) 13:4-13
1If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
4Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant 5or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. 7It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
8Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. 9For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; 10but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. 11When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. 12For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. 13And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.
5These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: “Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, 6but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. 7As you go, proclaim the good news, ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ 8Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. You received without payment; give without payment. 9Take no gold, or silver, or copper in your belts, 10no bag for your journey, or two tunics, or sandals, or a staff; for laborers deserve their food. 11Whatever town or village you enter, find out who in it is worthy, and stay there until you leave. 12As you enter the house, greet it. 13If the house is worthy, let your peace come upon it; but if it is not worthy, let your peace return to you. 14If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet as you leave that house or town. 15Truly I tell you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgment than for that town.”
I went and had a quick look at Calvin for a bit of guidance here, because there are two parts to this, and both are incredibly hard.
The first is that love is not to do with feelings. We use the word so freely to describe the pleasures we have — with our sensual appetites, from good food to the joy of a good spouse to our desire for them (or food) to how we feel about our parents and our children.
But love is much more being joyous when your friend triumphs, choosing words with care, and being patient, kind, and enduring.
Yet love rejoices in the truth. Love is intolerant of falsehood, for falsehood keeps people in error. Love sent the apostles into the villages of Israel, and this love for truth made Jesus say that rejecting them was worse than the multiple sins of Sodom.
In this modern-day, saying what Christ said would get the quite wealthy citizens of the modern Sodom arresting him for hate speech. (Well, hate speech is the new blasphemy). For the feelings of those who will not listen to the gospel are hurt but this saying.
But love is not about feelings. It is a continual act of will. I’m going to quote Songtwoeleven on this as an example.
A lot of the commenters here are married.and, to them, the question has to be asked, How often does a dispute come up that can’t be resolved? – Fuzzie Wuzzie
Well, in the first days of our marriage, we have many disputes that were not resolved. My husband would “do battle” with mindsets of mine that did not line up with the Word of God, and Mister wasn’t shy about it! He was confident and spoke with authority, but if I kept pushing him, he would quietly withdraw and leave me to be dealt with by our Lord. 99% of the time he has been correct in his initial assessment of any given situation. I am now more confident that I can trust him with anything in our lives. This took time, as I had a very difficult time trusting anyone. Submission is all about trust – not in our husbands, but in the God who gave us to our husbands.
Nowadays, when we disagree, I truly try to save him the trouble of having to withdraw emotionally, and I communicate my position to him. He either debunks my erroneous position with the Word of God, or he listens to me and considers what I am saying, and sometimes, he tells me I am right and he was wrong. He is no ogre; he does not ever abuse his God-given authority.
Now, sometimes there is a huge disagreement, and people fight unfairly. At times we are too harsh and too judgmental. At times we look at how another does things — writing in shorthand, going abstract, sounding cold — and assume that the person who does this is haughty, or conversely that the little single lady who is sweet and appears so caring and holy is that. The person who writes so abstractly may be incredibly humble in real life, and Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple knew all about what lay beneath the nice cakes in country villages.
Sometimes we simply don’t like people, and it is a sheer act of will for us to care for them. At times that dislike includes our children and our spouse and our parents. But we do what is needed.
As an act of will, we act lovingly.
Perhaps we should cherish those who act in this way, while feeling like the world’s biggest hypocrite, and ignore those who seem to set higher and higher standards before they consider you worthy of attention, be they the secular priests of the Green movement or the pastors of the feminist heresy.
