The Love Chapter, Part I

PEARLS OF PAUL
THE LOVE CHAPTER, PART I
DR. JIM DIXON
1 CORINTHIANS 12:31-13:13
AUGUST 8, 1999

Seventy years ago, in Brackenthwaite, England, there lived a man whose name was William Dixon. As far as I know, he was not related to my family. The name Dixon was and is extremely common in England. William Dixon was a widower. His wife had died in a long hard illness just a few years earlier. Their only child had died one year earlier in a tragic accident, and yet William Dixon was not bitter. He maintained his faith in Christ and resolved that he would serve Christ as long as he was on this earth.

Now, next door to William Dixon in the little village of Brackenthwaite there was an elderly man. This elderly man who lived in the house next door was in ill health. With him, there was his grandchild, a little boy whose parents had passed away in an epidemic that had swept through the village. William Dixon really was fond of this elderly man and his little grandson, and he tried to do all he could to help them. One night, late at night, there was a panicked knocking at the door of William Dixon’s house. He ran to the door, and it was the elderly man. He saw his house was on fire and the little boy, his grandson, was trapped inside. And so, William Dixon came out of the house and other people in the neighborhood also came. The fire was just raging, and they could hear the little boy upstairs crying out. Everybody was afraid to go into the house because the flames were just engulfing that structure, but William Dixon desperately cared about that little boy.

There was a drainage pipe that came down the side of the house, a metal pipe. William Dixon began to climb that pipe to get to the second floor. The pipe was so hot because of the intensity of the flames that were nearby that it literally just seared the flesh from his hands as he was climbing it. And yet he made his way to the second floor and somehow got in through the window and he rescued that little boy. He put him in his arms and then slid back down that hot pipe.

It was only three weeks later that the elderly man, the little boy’s grandfather, died, and this little boy was all alone. There was a meeting of the community to decide who would adopt this little boy. There were a number of people who stood up and said they would love this child and they would care for him. But then William Dixon stood up, and he didn’t say anything. He didn’t say anything. He just held out his hands. He just showed them his scarred flesh. Everyone knew how much he loved that little boy, and the decision was unanimous to entrust that little boy to William Dixon’s care. He took that child and reared him as his own son.

I first heard that true story five years ago. When I heard that story, I was reminded of Christ. I was reminded of Christ the night he appeared to the disciples in the Upper Room after He was resurrected and alive. He appeared to them, and He showed them His hands. He showed them His nail-pierced hands, and His hands were testimony to the fact that He loved them. Those nail-pierced hands said, “I love you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” Jesus said, “You are My friends.” He laid down His life for them, and not only for them but for you and for me. His nail-pierced hands are testimony to the fact that He loves you and He loves me. He loves us as much as He loved Peter, James, and John. He died for us as much as He died for Peter, James and John. It’s on the cross that we see the incomprehensible magnitude of God’s love.

In St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, England, there is a statue which portrays the crucified Christ, and you see His nail-pierced hands, and you see His nail-pierced feet, and you see the agony on His face. There’s an inscription, and the inscription beneath that statue at St. Paul’s Cathedral simply reads, “This is how God loves you.” That’s what the inscription reads. Perhaps it is true that we see the love of God supremely on the cross and through the atoning death of His Son, Jesus Christ.

In our passage of scripture for today and for the next two weeks, the Apostle Paul, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, seeks to define and describe love, divine love. There are many different Greek words for love. We have one English word for love, but there were many different Greek words for love. There was, of course, the word eros. The Greek god of love and the Greek Pantheon was named Eros. He was portrayed as a winged child. He was the exact equivalent of Cupid in the Roman Pantheon.

Eros was romantic love. Eros was the Greek word for sexual love and the attraction between the sexes. We get the English word “erotic” from the Greek word eros. The Greeks also had the word philia. Philia was the word for friendship love, the love between friends, the love that is reciprocated between friends. It was reciprocal love, friendship love—philia. Then, in the Greek, there was the word “storge.” Storge was the Greek word for family love, the love that parents have for their children and children for their parents, and that siblings have for one another. The Greeks said that it was unnatural for a human being to be “astorge,” for a human being to be “without family love.” So, there’s eros and philia and storge, these three Greek nouns representing various Greek concepts of love.

The early Christian community adopted a new noun, “agape,” to describe the love of God. The verb form, “agapao,” was used in the Roman world, but the noun “agape” was virtually unknown. You don’t find it in any parabiblical literature. It just wasn’t there. But the Christian community adopted this noun, agape, “for the love of God,” to describe divine love. Agape love, divine love, is viewed as unique because it is selfless. Eros love is not selfless. Even philia and storge love are not selfless loves, but agape love, divine love, is truly selfless.

In the world we see a lot of selfish love, and there’s a lot of eros out there. Hollywood is just enamored with eros love. This is a world where there’s a lot of philia love and there’s a lot of storge love. There’s very little divine love in this world. There is some divine love in each of us, some agape love, because we were all created with the imago Dei. We were all created in the image of God. Because we were all created in the image of God, we all have a capacity for selfless love.

We all have a capacity for agape love, but our capacity is diminished because we are fallen and we are sinful. Agape love is residual in us. The image of God is residual in us. But when we become Christians, when we embrace Jesus Christ as our Savior and as our Lord, we are meant to be transformed. God begins to change us, and His entire goal is to give us agape love, divine love, the love of God, that we, as Christians, might be characterized by selfless love. That’s His goal in my life and your life, that we might bear the image of His Son, that we might be like Jesus Christ, that we might have selfless love.

Everything God is trying to do in your life as a Christian and in my life as a Christian is designed to transform us so that we might be characterized by agape love, divine love. The trials, the tests you’re going through—God’s purpose in them and through them is to transform you, that you might be more loving as He is loving. This is His singular great purpose in your life and mine. So, this morning we begin to see this love chapter, that we might understand the goal Christ has for us, this transforming goal, agape love.

Now, in the first three verses of 1 Corinthians 13, Paul seeks to exalt love by means of comparables. In these first three verses, Paul exalts love through three comparisons, and these three comparisons will provide our three teachings this morning.

First of all, in verse one, Paul makes this comparison. He said, “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.” So, the first comparable compares love, agape love, with “glossolalia.” Glossolalia is the gift of speaking in tongues. From “glossa,” the Greek word for “tongue,” and “lalia,” the word “to speak.” Glossolalia, “speaking in tongues.” Now, Paul tells us that if we have this great gift but we do not have love we’re just a clanging cymbal or a noisy gong.

In 1906, a man named W.S. Seymour traveled to California to the Los Angeles area. He was an African American. He was a black man. He had one eye. He was descended from slaves. He was a minister, a Christian. On April 9, 1906, he rented a beat-up old building at 312 Azusa Street in Los Angeles, and he began to conduct meetings. It was on that day, April 9, 1906, that a few people were gathered with him in that beat up old house on Azusa Street. An amazing thing happened. They felt the Holy Spirit descend upon their little room with power. All of them in that room on Azusa Street began to speak in tongues. They began to experience the gift of tongues, sometimes called glossolalia, sometimes called prayer language. They began to speak in unknown languages, whether earthly or heavenly they did not know, but they began to speak in languages that were not indigenous to them, that were not their own, that they had not learned, supernaturally. They were exhilarated with incomprehensible joy as they felt the presence of the Holy Spirit just speaking through them. It lifted them so greatly, and they were so excited.

The word began to spread. “At 312 Azusa Street, there are services, and people are speaking in tongues.” Well, crowds began to come. W.S. Seymour continued to preach, and he continued to pray. Some evenings as they would meet in that little house, he would keep his head in a box the whole night, just stick his head in a box and pray—never bringing his head out, not wanting to be distracted by anything. The crowds came, and they filled the house. More and more people began to speak in tongues.

The media began to be interested in this, and so reporters from the Los Angeles Times came to 312 Azusa Street. They didn’t like what they saw. They described it as irreverent. They described it as bizarre. They said the services were out of control, and indeed they were wild. I mean, there was singing and there was dancing, and there was shouting, and there were tongues.

The crowds continued to come, and the services continued to be held. The noise was so great and the rocking was so great that the roof fell in at 312 Azusa Street. Literally the roof fell in, and the walls fell down. They had to get a new building. The revival, as they called it, continued for three years. Out of that Azusa Street Revival that began in 1906 came the Pentecostal denominations. Virtually every Pentecostal denomination in the world today can be traced to the Azusa Street Revival. This is true of the International Church of the Four-Square Gospel. It is even true of the Assemblies of God Churches. They can be traced to Azusa Street although their technical beginning was in 1912.

The gift of tongues is emphasized in all of the Pentecostal churches. They are called Pentecostal churches because of what happened at Pentecost as recorded in the Book of Acts in the Bible, as the Holy Spirit came down upon the 120 believers in the city of Jerusalem and they began to speak in unknown languages. They began to speak in tongues and experience glossolalia.

The gift of tongues was very prominent in first century Christianity. It continued with some popularity into the second century, but then it began to fade away. For centuries in the life of the Christian church, very few people spoke in tongues until the dawn of the 20th century in the Azusa Street Revival when this gift became prominent again.

I am not here this morning to give a teaching on the gift of tongues. I do believe the gift is valid, and I do believe the gift is wonderful. I think the gift obviously can be counterfeited. There are some people who were under so much pressure to speak in tongues in order to find acceptance in their respective Christian community that they’ve developed polysyllabic gibberish. That can happen. And, of course, the gift of tongues can be abused. There is no question of that, and if oftentimes is abused in the Christian world today. There are people who can use the gift pridefully, viewing themselves as somehow more spiritual than those brothers and sisters in Christ who do not have the gift. And, of course, that is unfortunate. It is a beautiful and wonderful gift. When used corporately, it is to be interpreted so that it might be edifying to all who are present, but the gift of tongues can be used privately without interpretation, simply for the exhilaration of the Holy Spirit’s speaking through the believer.

My mother is visiting us this week. She’ll be here at the second service. She received the gift of tongues decades and decades ago. I oftentimes, growing up, would hear my mother speaking in tongues around the house. It’s a precious gift to her and rightly so. But, of course, what God really used in my mother’s life to disciple me and to disciple my brothers was not the gift of tongues, but love. It was the love of Christ, and that’s really the point that the Apostle Paul is seeking to make here. “Even if you speak in the tongues of men and of angels, if you speak in unknown earthly languages or heavenly languages unknown to you but you do not have love, then you’re just a noisy gong and you’re just a clanging cymbal,” because love is supreme, agape love. It’s more important than anything in the life of the Christian.

In the secular worship of Paul’s time, in the Greek and Roman temples, they used gongs and cymbals to introduce worship. This was true in all the temple worship of the Roman and Greek deities. They used gongs and cymbals. Paul is really saying, “Even if you speak in tongues, if you do not have love, your worship is no better than pagan worship.” Of course, the gift of tongues was the gift most valued by the Corinthians to whom Paul was writing.

Paul makes a second comparison. There’s a second comparable here. Paul says, “If I have prophetic powers, and I understand all knowledge and all mysteries and I have all faith so as to remove mountains but have not love, I am nothing.” Now, here Paul compares love with the apostolic gifts. These were the gifts that characterized the apostles. These were the exalted gifts that were so valued by Paul and all the apostles. Prophecy. By prophecy, Paul did not mean the ability to predict the future. Prophecy was rarely predictive. When Paul spoke of prophecy, the Greek word is “prophetes.” It means “to speak for God,” and it means “to speak forth.” Literally it means “to speak forth the word of God.” The gift of speaking forth the word of God was a precious apostolic gift. Knowledge was a critical apostolic gift. Faith to work miracles was a critical apostolic gift. So, Paul is describing the apostolic gifts and then comparing these great exalted gifts with love.

The apostolic gifts have been sought by pastors throughout the Christian centuries. Congregations have sought pastors who have the apostolic gifts. They want pastors who can speak forth the word of God and understand all knowledge and all mysteries. And yes, they want pastors who have faith to work miracles. There’s been this emphasis in congregations throughout the Christian centuries, seeking pastors who have these great gifts. In a sense, it’s kind of unfortunate and oftentimes it causes problems.

I want to tell you a little story about Faith Presbyterian Church in Aurora. I worked at Faith Presbyterian Church in Aurora for 8-1/2 years, and they were good years. I love that church even as I love our own. It was my first ministry there. Faith Presbyterian Church is a great church with, in some ways, a great history, but it also has something of a tragic history.

What I’m about to tell you is not confidential. I would not tell it to you were it confidential. What I’m about to tell you is documented by the EPC and the PCUSA. These are, at least for people who know Faith Presbyterian Church, well known events.

Faith Presbyterian Church was founded by Pete Brewer. He was the founding pastor. Of course, Christ really founded the church in Aurora, Faith Presbyterian Church on Alameda in Aurora. Christ really founded that church, but He used Pete Brewer. He was the founding pastor. Pete Brewer was the father of Mark Brewer. Mark is the pastor at Colorado Community Church, which is a wonderful church. Mark is a wonderful guy, one of my best friends, and, as a matter of fact, my next-door neighbor. Of course, Colorado Community Church purchased our old church building up on Colorado Boulevard.

Mark’s father, Pete, founded Faith Presbyterian Church on Alameda in Aurora, and he had the apostolic gifts. His gifts were great. Could he ever preach! He could speak forth the word of God, and his knowledge was vast. He was learned and he was intelligent, and he was gifted of God. He was a man of great faith. But he did not have a good marriage, and he wound up committing adultery with the church secretary at Faith Presbyterian Church. That relationship continued for a number of years before it was discovered. The church was just devastated. Of course, Pete Brewer left.

Then, in the interim, Mark Moore pastored Faith Presbyterian Church until they could find a new senior pastor. Ultimately, they found Dean Wolf. They brought Dean Wolf to be the pastor at Faith Presbyterian Church. Dean was my boss when I worked at Faith Presbyterian Church, and more than a boss. He was a spiritual father to me and very much a friend. Dean was great in the apostolic gifts. He had an amazing up-front presence, and he was a great preacher of God’s word. He had a vast storehouse of knowledge, and he had great faith. I saw him pray, and I saw many healings take place. He was great in the apostolic gifts. He had memorized much of the Bible. It was Dean that God used to give me a hunger to memorize the word of God. But Dean, also, did not have a good marriage. Ultimately, Dean divorced his wife, Jan. There were rumors that he had an affair. I cannot speak to those rumors. I do not know whether they are true or false. I do know that he divorced Jan and left her. That devastated Faith Presbyterian Church once again.

That church had been built, tremendously built, through the giftedness, the great gifts, that God had given Dean. Near the end of Dean’s tenure at Faith Presbyterian Church, a man was hired named James Garner, Dr. James Garner. In truth, I hired him, but I hired him because Dean wanted me to. James Garner had been a chaplain in the United States military, and was he ever gifted. He was brilliant, and he was gifted. His up-front gifts of proclamation were just awesome. He became the head of adult education over there after I left. He became the heir apparent, and it was expected by many that he would become the new senior pastor when Dean left. But James Garner didn’t have a good marriage either. He had a roving eye, and he committed adultery. He did it on numerous occasions. He left his wife, and the church was absolutely stunned.

He wound up marrying a young lady who had been in one of his Bible study classes. Their marriage didn’t work, and he wound up trying to kill her and then ultimately committed suicide, taking his own life. The folks at Faith Presbyterian Church were just devastated.

Then they hired Jim Morrison to be their Senior Pastor at Faith Presbyterian Church. Jim was deep in the apostolic gifts. I mean, he was gifted. He had a great knowledge and he became the Moderator of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church. He was a great preacher. Everyone I talked to at Faith Presbyterian Church just loved Jim’s preaching. But he didn’t have a good marriage. He, too, had a roving eye, and he committed adultery. He had to step down, and once again, the church was devastated.

I tell you, you can search this country from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and you won’t find many churches with a history of Faith Presbyterian Church in Aurora and thank God for that. But I’ll tell you this, the gifts of the Holy Spirit, even the greatest gifts, are just not enough. They’re just not enough. They’re not enough for pastors, and they’re not enough for parishioners. You see, the gifts of the Holy Spirit are important, and they are needed, but they’re not most important, not in your life or in mine. What is most important is not the gifts of the Holy Spirit but the fruit of the Holy Spirit. That’s what Paul is saying in this little passage, in this little comparable.

The gifts of the Holy Spirit are listed in 1 Corinthians 12, Romans 12, Ephesians 4 and 1 Peter, chapter 4. And they are great, but they are not nearly as important as the fruit of the Holy Spirit listed in Galatians, chapter 5. The fruit of the Holy Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. God wants us to understand that the fruit of the Holy Spirit is summed up in love. In fact, if you study Galatians chapter 5 and the passage on the fruit of the Spirit, the word fruit is singular. There’s one fruit of the Holy Spirit, and its preeminent expression is love. That is why the Apostle Paul writes, “the fruit of the Holy Spirit is love,” and then he goes on to list the other virtues of that singular fruit.

Almost all Bible scholars agree that what Paul is saying is that all the other virtues are expressions of love. Love is expressed in joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Character is far more important than talent. It is far more important than talent, and our nation doesn’t understand this. The churches of Christ do not understand this. Character is far more important than talent. We get into trouble politically as a nation because we think talent is more important than character. Congregations get in trouble because they think talent is more important than character. But what does Paul say? “If I have prophetic powers and I understand all knowledge and all mysteries and I have all faith so as to remove mountains, but I have not love (the summation of the fruit of the Spirit, the very character of God), I am nothing.” Let’s look to the Lord with a word of prayer.