A Far Better Way.

I was reading 1 Corinthians 13 the other day.  I don't know about you, but I have a tendency to go autopilot with passages like "the love chapter."  Now I can't quote the whole thing verbatim or anything, but I could at least come close.  I've read/heard it a few times!  But since I committed to reading The Message Bible a couple years ago (to keep me focused on the point, and not taken away with the details) I think this was the first time I've really spent any time in this passage. And it really got me thinking.  Paul leads into this chapter with, "But now I want to lay out a far better way for you."  What he has just finished talking about is how before our life in Christ began, we lived separately and dependent only on ourselves, but that the life of The Church was to be found in the putting of all the parts together to make one body, the Body of Jesus, His expression on Earth, a full picture of who He is.  So Paul is saying rather than competing to be the best part, here is a far better way...

He goes on to talk about love.  Here is a chunk of that:

Love never gives up.

Love cares more for others than for self.

Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.  

Love doesn't strut,

Doesn't have a swelled head,

Doesn't force itself on others,

Isn't always "me first,"

Doesn't fly off the handle,

Doesn't keep score of the sins of others,
Doesn't revel when others grovel,
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.


He wraps up the whole passage and leads into the next chapter with the words:
But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation:  Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly.  And the best of the three is love.  Go after a life of love as if your life depended on it---because it does.


I noticed something this weekend.  It is precisely when I do not exhibit these love traits that God says, "Here, let me show you how it's done..."  When I have decided in my heart not to "put up with anything" or to "give up" or to "look back..."  That's when He reminds me what "extravagant love" is.  And that's when I realize once again that I have no chance of really fleshing out that kind of love without "trusting steadily in God" and "hoping unswervingly."  It's really just ridiculously amazing and wonderfully impossible the dependence that our Father calls for from us... on each other and on Him.  It just can't be done.  And yet it is.  I think that must be one of those things "so supernatural in and through us that only He can get the credit."(something I've been praying every day for months now for Hub City).

So here's the challenge.  Try it once.  Love somebody extravagantly this week.  And do it with trust and hope foremost in your mind, even when it doesn't make sense.  Your life actually depends on it.  It's an addiction you'll never regret.  Not when you realize you can never outdo your Father's love for you.