What is left of faith, knowledge and the greatest spiritual gifts if love is missing from them? This sermon returns to the thirteenth chapter of First Corinthians and tries to lift from it the label of a text read only at weddings (1 Corinthians 13). The speaker shows how God’s love changes our thinking, our speech, our conduct and even our piety, making it less self-satisfied and far more open to people. At the end he takes us to Palm Sunday and asks whether our love would survive the test of a single week.
Discussion questions
For your small group or for personal reflection after the sermon.
- Paul writes that without love, speaking in tongues, prophecy, knowledge, faith that moves mountains, and even giving away all one owns amount to nothing. According to 1 Corinthians 13, why do such wonderful gifts lose their value without love?
- Chapter 13 is often associated with weddings, yet Paul wrote it to the church in Corinth right after discussing spiritual gifts. How does reading it as a word to the whole church change your understanding of it?
- The sermon pointed out that Scripture describes God with a noun: God is love, and He cannot fail to love. How does this truth shape the way you think about God and about yourself?
- The speaker stressed that God's love changes the way we speak, even about people we don't know personally, such as politicians. In which conversations do you find it hardest to speak from a place of love, and why?
- The sermon mentioned the Pharisee praying in the temple and Paul's words that where sin increases, grace abounds all the more. What helps you move from self-righteous religion to a faith that is grateful and open to others?
- On Palm Sunday the crowd shouted Hosanna, and a few days later Crucify Him, yet Jesus loved them just the same. Who can you show that kind of persistent love to this week, perhaps by offering a new chance after yet another failure?
