Common Sense Commentary: 1 Cor.13:1-13 "Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not agape love, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not agape love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not agape love, it profiteth me nothing. Agape love suffereth long, and is kind; agape love envieth not; agape love vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Agape love never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away. When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known. And now abideth faith, hope, agape love, these three; but the greatest of these is agape love."
These verses of God's word tell us plainly that Agape Love (Godly Love) never fails.
Prophecy will fail, tongues will cease and (revelatory) knowledge shall vanish away because these things are all "in part". But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away with... stop! Obviously "that which is perfect" nullifies the need for "that which is in part (imperfect)". So, exactly what is "that which is perfect" which had not yet arrived at that point? Whatever "perfect" means, in this verse, it is the fulfillment and replacement of "that which is in part". Since it refers to the perfect thing as "that", I assume it is not Jesus or the Holy Spirit since each is a person and not an inanimate object, "that". Therefore, I must conclude that the "perfect" thing refers either to the "New Covenant (New Testament) which had not been canonized or put together at that moment, or to the subject of all these verses, agape love. Of course God has always had it but people, even His people, had had none to very little of it in the Old Testament dispensation.
It was the absence, at that moment, of the canonized New Testament, which had moved God to give the special, but temporary, gift of tongues, languages unknown to those disciples but spoken by them, to preach Jesus to all those hundreds or thousands of foreign Jews who had arrived in Jerusalem for the Passover. Except for this miracle, the disciples of Christ, at that moment, had no New Testament and could not witness to those foreigners and carry out the Great Commission which Jesus had just given them, to "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature." Mk.16:15.
So is "that which is perfect" simply agape love or is it the completion and union of the canonized Old and New Testaments into one book, the Holy Bible. It is said that the Old Testament is the New Testament concealed and the New Testament is the Old Testament revealed. You could not well understand either of them without both of them. RB
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment