In the
13th chapter of I Corinthians, Paul takes us to
Christianity at its source;
and there we see, "the greatest of these is love."
It is not an oversight. Paul was speaking of faith just a moment
before. He says, "If I have all faith, so that I can remove
mountains, and have not love, I am nothing." So far from forgetting,
he deliberately contrasts them, "Now abideth Faith, Hope, Love,"
and without a moment's hesitation the decision falls, "The greatest
of these is Love."
And it is not prejudice. A man is apt to recommend to others his
own strong point. Love was not Paul's strong point. The observing
student can detect a beautiful tenderness growing and ripening all
through his character as Paul gets old; but the hand that wrote
"The greatest of these is love," when we meet it first, is stained
with blood.
Nor is this letter to the Corinthians peculiar in singling out
love as the "summum bonum." The masterpieces of Christianity are
agreed about it. Peter says, "Above all things have fervent love
among yourselves." ABOVE ALL THINGS. And John goes farther, "God
is love."
You remember the profound remark which Paul makes elsewhere, "Love
is the fulfilling of the law." Did you ever think what he meant
by that? In those days men were working the passage to Heaven
by keeping the Ten Commandments, and the hundred and ten other
commandments which they had manufactured out of them.
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