I’ve heard it said that even if I speak as eloquently as an angel, but I do not have love? I am just a noise maker.
If I have a crystal ball and even if I can explain the mysteries of the universe, but I do not have love? I am nothing.
If I give everything I have to the homeless, and work my body to sweat and tears, but do not have love? I gain nothing.
Love. What is love? Maybe love isn’t something you see. Maybe it is something you do. Love is patient. Love is kind. Love? Love does not envy, love does not boast, love is not proud.
Love does not dishonor others, love is not self-seeking, love is not easily angered, love keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil. Love? Love rejoices with the truth.
Love. Love always protects. Love always trusts. Love always hopes. Love? Love always perseveres.
Love never fails.
Where there are ideas about the future? “After all, tomorrow is another day?” Fantasies and fears of the future cease, when love comes to town.
Where today is filled with harsh words and tears? Those words end, when love comes to town.
Where there is holding on to promises and plays of yesterday? Those memories pass away, when love comes to town.
For we “know” the past only in part, we never have a complete picture. And we have ideas of the future only in part, we never know until time passages. And even then, we don’t.
But love? Love is completeness of one’s soul. Love is complete. When completeness comes, what is only known “in part”, the past, the future disappears.
You see, yesterday when I was even more of a child than I am today, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like an incomplete and incompetent child.
When I become an adult, I will put the ways of children behind me.
Today I see only a reflection as in a mirror. Tomorrow, when love comes to town, then we shall see completeness. Face to face.
Today I know in part. When love comes to town I shall know fully, as I will be fully, vulnerably known.
So I am left with three things remaining in my very small very short bucket called life. Faith, hope, and love.
And the greatest of these? Is love.
Happy Valentine’s day. 
1 Corinthians 13 revisited
Leave a Reply