1 Corinthians 12:31 - 13:13

In her wonderful volume of sermons entitled Help My Unbelief (Eerdmans, 2000, p. 87-88), Fleming Rutledge recounts Mike Wallace’s interview of the great French film star Jeanne Moreau. Cornelius Plantinga says that in it Moreau “completely locked Wallace up into inarticulate bafflement.” Wallace tried to get Moreau to bite on his conspiratorial statement, ‘There’s a feeling in America that passion in a woman of a certain age is unseemly.’ After a long pause Moreau said, ‘They’re right.’ This astonished Wallace: a French woman, veteran actress in R-rated films, downplaying passion? Wallace obvious discomfiture revealed itself in his ‘Passion is unseemly?’ ‘Oh, come on,’ Moreau replied. ‘Passion! When you get to sixty, you know about love. Love is not passion.’ ‘But there’s nothing wrong with passion,’ Wallace protested, his face a picture of disappointment . . . Moreau replied, ‘I would hate—I would hate to still be overcome with passion.’ As though she were a wise grandmother talking to a teenaged boy, Moreau explained, ‘I have passion for life, but I know about love. Love and passion don’t go together. Passion is destructive. Passion is demanding. Passion is jealous. Passion goes up and down. Love is constant.’ As Wallace tried to recover, Moreau added, ‘Compassion. That’s what love is about. You give even more than you receive.’ It was, summarizes, Plantinga, as if Wallace was talking from a “secular, sensualist perch, and Moreau from 1 Corinthians 13. He was talking about eros. She was talking about agape. And her preference for agape made Wallace ‘gasp and stammer’.”

Dave Simmons tells the story of taking his children to a shopping mall near their home. As they drove up, a big sign read, “Petting Zoo.” The kids jumped up in a rush and asked, “Daddy, Daddy. Can we go? Please. Please. Can we go?” Now this petting zoo was a great place for the kids to stay, fenced in with all sorts of furry creatures, safe and secure (children and pets) while mom and dad shopped. “Sure,” he said, flipping them both a quarter before walking into Sears. A few minutes later though, he turned around and saw his daughter walking along behind him, surprised that she preferred the hardware department to the petting zoo. But that was not the case. He asked her what was wrong. She looked up at him with those giant limpid brown eyes and said sadly, “Well, Daddy, it cost fifty cents. So, I gave Brandon my quarter.” Then she said the most beautiful thing I ever heard. She repeated their family motto. The family motto is in “Love is Action!” She had given her brother her quarter, and no one loves cuddly furry creatures more than Helen. She had done it because she had seen it played out. She had watched her mother give her father the last piece of steak and say, “Love is Action!” She had watched her parents do and say “Love is Action!” for years around the house. She had heard and seen “Love is Action,” and now she had incorporated it into her little lifestyle. It had become part of her. He goes on to tell the rest of the story. He writes...

He came to visit my mother in the hospital not long after she was transferred from Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center to Iredell Memorial Hospital. He has always considered her his “second mother.” The evening of his visit wasn’t a good one for Mom. She slept throughout his visit. He finally walked over to her bed and whispered, “I love you.” She slurred, “I love you, too. I always have.” He left before she finished what she had to say to him. Just after "I always have" came the words, “I always will.”...

I was reading about redwood trees the other day. Redwood trees can grow up to four hundred feet in height – roughly the same as a thirty-five-story building. They are the largest and tallest trees on earth. Interestingly, they do not reach these amazing heights by sinking their roots deep into the ground. They grow to these heights by sending their roots out horizontally and connecting with the other trees. They are tall, because they bear each other up...

Amy grew up in the First Presbyterian Church of Santa Fe, New Mexico. She was active in that congregation. She was known especially as one of the best ringers in their bell choir.Amy was also a very bright young woman. In the late 1980s, after graduating as valedictorian of her high school, she went off to study at Stanford University, where she was a member of the diving team.While at college, Amy became passionately concerned about the apartheidsystem in South Africa. She won a Fulbright Scholarship to study at the University of the Western Cape, in Cape Town.That’s where Amy was on August 25, 1993 when she offered to drive a friend home to Gugulethu, one of the notorious “townships” where black South Africans were then forced to live under the apartheid laws.Amy never made it to her friend’s home. Gangs of angry black youths were wandering the streets that day, causing mayhem. They were throwing stones at delivery vehicles and at cars driven by white people. They toppled one delivery truck over and set it on fire.The mob surrounded Amy’s car and pulled her out of it. There, on the streets of Gugulethu, they stabbed and stoned her to death. Yes: stoned her to death. Sounds positively biblical, doesn’t it? Amy was 26 years old...

"Back in November at a Zoo in Russia, a 3 year old Siberian tiger named Amur was awaiting dinner time. A goat named Timur was thrown into his pen. Amur would normally pounce on whatever was thrown into his pen, be it rabbit or goat. But for some reason these two seemed to give each other the once over. The animal experts said that this had happened once before - another goat, the prey, didn't demonstrate fear or weakness so the tiger, the predator kind of left him alone..."

"91 year-old, Johnny Barnes is a Bermuda native who embodies the LOVE that dwells in him. How might we embody the LOVE that dwells in us? What does, would, could, will the embodiment of LOVE look like in you?..." with video

"In his provocative study, The Politics of Discipleship, Graham Ward develops a nuanced account of Paul's political theology of the body in 1 Corinthians. Ward argues that when Paul deploys the ancient civic image of the body politic to the resurrected body of Christ, he announces 'a new ecclesial politics' which calls into question dominant social and cultural value systems concerning the human body—'class notions of embodiment, ethnic and sexual ideologies'. Significantly, Ward locates 1 Corinthians 13 at the heart of this political ethic..."

"theologian Leslie Weatherhead says that…‘Love in the New Testament is stern and strong and severe and virile. It is not sloppy and sentimental and weak…Love is all the things St Paul described…. , but it has steel in it as well as tears and a smashing power greater far than dynamite. Love suffers, entreats and endures, and fools think this is weakness. But those who oppose love take up arms against the whole universe. They will be broken, not love. For love is invincible..."

Last year, a news article from the New York Times was circulating quite a bit, showing results from a scientific study suggesting that – in completely non-scientific terms – two strangers might fall in love with each other by following a certain set of instructions: the pair answers 36 questions in a conversation with each other. The questions are increasingly more personal...The whole experiment even became the subject of an episode of Big Bang Theory.

"In a poem I have loved for years, British writer Cecil Day Lewis reflects on an episode that first showed him what it would be like to watch his son grow older. The poem is called Walking Away. 'It is eighteen years ago, almost to the day – A sunny day with leaves just turning, The touch-lines new-ruled – since I watched you play Your first game of football, then, like a satellite Wrenched from its orbit, go drifting away Behind a scatter of boys..."

At the age of 89, Dr. Mac had been very ill, in intensive care. He would not live much longer. He was home, briefly, and David took some time off to go stay with his parents and help out. Later, he wrote this recollection: One afternoon I sat with him in his study, winter sun streaming in across shoulders and brow that were more precious to me than I could count. I reached out a hand and touched him on his arm, needing to connect with him past the fear and loss that had rested on our doorstep and still roamed just out of sight. He turned to me, put his hand on mine, and smiled as slow tears ran down my cheeks. He looked out the window, out beyond the cedar moving there in the chill wind. “I haven’t had many friends in my life.” His statement startled me. I didn’t know where he was going or what he was trying to say…

I’ve been having great fun listening to the audio version of Bruce Springsteen’s new autobiography, Born to Run: narrated by the author himself. Far from the typical celebrity tell-all, Bruce relates his life story with humility and risky honesty. One of his most important relationships growing up — some would say the one that’s at the heart of the book — is his relationship with his father, Doug. Doug was a World War 2 veteran, a working-class kind of guy who held a variety of unsatisfying jobs, from janitor to factory worker. In the evening, after supper, he would sit at the kitchen table in their cold-water flat in Freehold, smoking cigarette after cigarette, downing more than a six-pack of beer each night. He’d say barely a word, except when he was angry. Then he would become verbally abusive. Bruce describes what it was like, as a teenager, to walk past that darkened kitchen, to see the cigarette glowing ominously red, never knowing whether he would be met with indifference or rage.

Years ago, Donald Rumsfeld, then Secretary of Defense, was answering some questions about the war in Afghanistan. The reporters wanted to know how certain Rumsfeld was, based on military intelligence, about the strategy he was proposing. Here’s how he responded: “There are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns — the ones we don’t know we don’t know.”

Let’s close with a little poem by the Pulitzer prizewinner, Maya Angelou. It’s called “Touched by an Angel,” and it goes like this: We, unaccustomed to courage exiles from delight live coiled in shells of loneliness until love leaves its high holy temple and comes into our sight to liberate us into life. Love arrives and in its train come ecstasies old memories of pleasure ancient histories of pain. Yet if we are bold, love strikes away the chains of fear from our souls. We are weaned from our timidity In the flush of love’s light we dare be brave And suddenly we see that love costs all we are and will ever be. Yet it is only love which sets us free.

While at college, Amy Biehl became passionately concerned about the apartheid system in South Africa. She won a Fulbright Scholarship to study at the University of the Western Cape, in Cape Town. That’s where Amy was on August 25, 1993 when she offered to drive a friend home to Gugulethu, one of the notorious “townships” where black South Africans were forced to live under the apartheid laws. Amy never made it to her friend’s home. Gangs of angry black youths were wandering the streets that day, causing mayhem. They were throwing stones at delivery vehicles and at cars driven by white people. They toppled one delivery truck over and set it on fire. The mob surrounded Amy’s car and pulled her out of it. There, on the streets of Gugulethu, they stabbed and stoned her to death. Yes: stoned her to death. Sounds positively biblical, doesn’t it? Amy was 26 years old.

In a few weeks it will be Thanksgiving. Extended families will come together, across the miles, and sit down together at the dinner table. Many are dreading the encounter. One such person is a woman named Deena Winter. Deena’s a journalist. I read about her in a column she wrote online. Not long ago, Deena unfriended her own uncle on Facebook. She’d posted some things she’d written that reflected her own political viewpoint, and what he said about her in response was so harsh, she felt she just had to get out of there. What Deena said at the conclusion of her column was the real kicker: “I don’t want to go home for Thanksgiving this year — for the first time in my life. We are not a family that dreads Thanksgiving. We are not a family who fights. We’re a family who loves each other truly, madly, deeply. But I know my father won’t be able to restrain himself from talking politics, no matter who wins the election, and a battle will ensue.

I did a little research into the English word, “kindness,” and I learned something very interesting. It comes from the Germanic root, cyne, which is also related to our modern English word, “kin.” Our kinfolk, of course, are the people we’re closest to: our families, or maybe the sort of close friends we consider family — those people our parents taught us to address as “aunt” or “uncle,” even though we aren’t related. It’s true — isn’t it? —that we interact differently with our kinfolk than we do anyone else. If any of our kin are sick, or in need, we consider it our obligation to help out. And they would do the same for us. We know that. No questions asked.

On Election Day, 1948, President Truman returned to Independence, Missouri, to cast his vote in his hometown. He was the President, after all, so a team of newspaper reporters was assigned to tail him everywhere he went. As it so happened, the reporters were in a separate plane that landed at the Kansas City Airport just behind Air Force One. By the time they’d disembarked, they learned the President was already on the road. The reporters were in a panic. They just had to catch up! They convinced some police officers to give them an escort. They set off down the highway, with the police sirens scattering traffic out of the way.

There’s a scene in C.S. Lewis’ novel, Voyage of the Dawn Treader — one of the Chronicles of Narnia books — that has something very powerful to teach about envy. In the novel, Lucy — the youngest sister — doesn’t have a positive self-image. She thinks she’s plain and unattractive. She’s in awe of her older sister, Susan, who’s got good looks, self-assurance — everything Lucy longs to be. One day, in Narnia, Lucy comes across a Book of Incantations. She uses the book to cast a magical spell, to “Make me she whom I’d agree holds more beauty over me.” As soon as she speaks the words of that spell, Lucy feels a powerful change come over her. She looks at her reflection, and realizes she now looks just like Susan. But she also realizes, to her horror, that she herself is gone — replaced by the image of the one she wanted to become.

In 1954, a community of monks was constructing a new monastery building to house the focal point of their worship: a large plaster statue of the Buddha, more than ten feet tall. When the time came to move the statue, they found that task to be harder than they’d imagined. When a group of them tried to lift the statue, they could not. Thinking at first that it was anchored to the floor, they examined the base and found that it was not cemented down. It was just too heavy. They brought in a crane, but even the crane had a hard time moving it. The ropes holding the statue broke, and it fell hard to the ground. Not knowing what else to do, they stopped work for the day. Besides, it had started to rain. The abbot of monastery threw a tarp over the Buddha statue, to protect it.

It happened in an airport: in the waiting area by one of the gates. It was one of those terrible days when there’d been bad weather, and a great many flights had been canceled. Well, those of you who travel know what happens when flights are canceled: there’s a mad rush to re-book on other flights. At this particular gate, the flight was already full. But there were several passengers, bumped from other flights, who were crowding the desk. “Please be patient,” said the gate agent. “We’ve got you all on standby. We’ll let you know as soon as something opens up.” So, the standby passengers all sat down: except for one man, a business executive. “You know,” he growled, “I was booked in first class on the other flight, the one that was canceled.” “Yes, I know, sir. Please sit down. Make yourself comfortable. We’ll call you.”

Forty-seven days is a long time. Especially if you’re spending that time floating on an inflatable life-raft in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. The person who went through that ordeal, during the Second World War, was an American airman by the name of Louis Zamperini. He was the bombardier on a B-24 bomber. Louie and his fellow crewmen were out on a rescue mission, searching for another flight crew that had gone down at sea. When the same fate happened to them, other planes took off, looking for them. But nobody saw them.

This morning, we’ll look at the first of those phrases: “Love bears all things.” The Greek word, stego, is related to the word for “roof” or “covering.” That whole roof assembly is perhaps the heaviest parts of the whole structure, but it’s absolutely essential. Where would a building be without its roof? And where would the roof be without its bearing walls? You’d better make sure those walls are stoutly constructed, or disaster will not be far behind! So, when Paul says, “Love bears all things,” it’s as though he’s saying love is the bearing wall of the relationship. It’s what holds everything up.

There’s a famous scene in T.S. Eliot’s play, Murder in the Cathedral. The play is about the death of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury in the year 1170. Becket was murdered in the cathedral on his way to prayers, by four knights of King Henry II. It’s a true story. It was a political assassination, done because the Archbishop had refused to go along with some things the King wanted him to do. Ever since his martyr’s death, Thomas Becket has been considered a saint of the church. Anyway, in this scene, Becket sees the knights approaching, swords in hand, and realizes what’s about to happen to him: if he doesn’t give in and carry out the King’s wishes. He entertains the possibility that he may have more selfish motivations for giving up his life: such as enjoying the thought that he’ll be remembered, forever after, as a holy martyr.

Claire and I saw the new Star Trek movie the other day. It was great fun. At the beginning of the movie an alien creature was beamed aboard the Enterprise. Her speech was unintelligible at first — until, on the screen, we saw a computer overlay appear that said “Universal Translator.” Once that device had been engaged, she spoke perfect English. The Universal Translator is a common plot device in the world of Star Trek. Some would say it’s indispensable. Think about it. The crew of the Enterprise takes off at warp speed to travel beyond the fringes of the known universe. Their task? “To explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no one has gone before.”

Mother Teresa said, "It is not what we do that is important, but how much love we put into what we do: we should do small things with great love," but prophets call us as a people or as humankind to great things-huge changes in our collective lives: the eradication of poverty, the end of war, preservation of life on our planet, the end of racism." and several other quotes

Shadowlands is the touching and heart-warming story of a shy middle aged British professor nick-named "Jack" Lewis and an outspoken American divorcee, Joy Gresham. I gather that it is only loosely based on the real-life story of the relationship between well-known author C.S. Lewis and his wife Joy. In the movie the two become friends and then they marry so that she can stay in England. She is stricken with cancer and through the ensuing events Lewis realizes that he really loves her. A word renowned writer of religious and spiritual books he realizes how great a distance there was between writing and talking about something and actually and truly experiencing it. Through the course of his wife's illness and eventual death she teaches this well respected and well educated man a great deal about true love and he comes to realize that pain and happiness are bound together in this kind of love. The quote I remember best from the movie goes like this: "The happiness then is part of the pain now."...

("In Beta Chi Guy, an episode of the wacky sitcom, Family Matters, student Eddie Winslow wants to join a fraternity. He applies and meets all of the requirements and then they issue an ultimatum. Winslow is ordered to dump his nerdy friend Steve Urkel in order to be admitted to the exclusive society...")

("In June of 2005 I went to a seminar in Truro and one of the presenters was Sally McFague, theologian in residence at Vancouver School of Theology. At that seminar and in her books she argues that the Church must be involved with the three “e”s: ecology, ecumenism and economics...")

("It was a long time ago that I first heard this little hymn, this little song, this musical refrain. I believe that originally, it was a composition by Herb Brokering for Vacation Bible School years ago. It goes like this: 'It’s about love, love, love, It’s about love, love, love...")

("Rufus Jones tells the story about the great Hellgate Bridge that was being built over the East River in New York. Just when one of the central piers of the bridge was to go down to its bedrock foundation, the engineers came upon an old derelict ship, lying imbedded in the river mud that was in the way. No tugboat could be found that was able to remove the derelict ship from its ancient bed..." and another illustration)

("Garrison Keillor, on his Writer's Almanac on National Public Radio reminds us that Father's Day goes back "to a Sunday morning in May of 1909, when a woman named Sonora Smart Dodd was sitting in church in Spokane, Washington, listening to a Mother's Day sermon...")

One of the most amazing and moving stories that I have ever heard is this true love story. It’s a story of Thomas Moore, the 19th Century Irish poet. Shortly after his marriage, he was called away on business. It was some time before he returned home, and when he did, he found waiting for him at the front door of the house, not his beautiful bride, but the family doctor. “Your wife is upstairs,” said the doctor, “but she has asked that you not come up.” Then Thomas Moore learned the terrible truth: his wife had contracted smallpox. The disease had left her once flawless skin pocked and scarred. She had taken one look at her reflection in the mirror and had commanded that the shutters be drawn and that her husband never see her again. Moore would not listen. He ran upstairs and threw open the door of his wife’s room. It was pitch black inside. Not a sound came from the darkness. Groping along the wall, Moore felt for the gas jets. A startled cry came from a black corner of the room. “No! Don’t light the lamps!” Moore hesitated, swayed by the pleading in the voice. “Go!” she begged. “Please go! I set you free. This is the greatest gift I can give you now.” Moore did go, but, only as far as his study where he sat up most of the night, prayerfully writing; not a poem this time, but a song...

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