1 Corinthians 13:4

(1) "Love has long patience." The flesh is ever impatient, but love can suffer long and wait God's time. Fleshly endurance is soon exhausted; love does not wear out.

First comes a very positive feature. It suffers long (or, has long patience) and is kind. Could anything surpass the long patience and kindness of God's dealings with rebellious man? No. Well, God is love. And in the measure in which we manifest the divine nature, we shall manifest long patience and kindness towards men generally, as well as towards our brethren.

Patience in the midst of trial is the first-mentioned attribute of love, which even shows positive kindness instead of harbouring a vindictive thought.

It is worthy of note that the qualities of divine love are almost entirely of a passive character. The first eight qualities pointed out by the Spirit are the expression of this renunciation of self.

(2) Love "is kind". The flesh, even if it waits, will often do so in a fretful and resentful spirit; but love, while waiting, can retain a kindly spirit of consideration for others.

"Love does not envy," though jealousy is in its very nature. God, who is the source and final object of His own desires, working as He wills, can envy none. Nor can that love which has its origin and hope in Him. Love covets earnestly, but not for its own sake. It is jealous over those who are its care. But because it knows God, it can neither crave addition to His gift unspeakable which it already has in Christ, nor can it look angrily on any who in position may seem higher than itself; for in God's light only it sees light. As love is of God, so envy is distinctively of Satan. It was a prime element in the original transgression, and was the spring of Cain's deadly hatred to his brother. And when the appointed hour came for darkness to sit in judgment upon light, it was through envy that the enemy prevailed.

(3) "Love is not emulous of others." The flesh ever seeks a place above others, and is jealous of favour or position bestowed on others rather than self. Love can delight without a thought of envy in honours bestowed upon another.

Again, as it does not indulge in envy or jealousy of another, so there is no self-display (or, as some think, forwardness), nor the arrogance whence it springs.

Love "vaunts not itself." True love is not an idler's ornament, but a debtor's obligation, and a learner's art. Love never seeks renown, but rather shuns it; though if real, it proves itself by deeds which cannot always remain hid. ... Self-love seeks self-display; false love is known by the profusion of its words; but the fruit of the Spirit is a working love. And no true workman boasts of an unfinished work. This love was surely sleeping in the saints at Corinth when, while Paul was labouring, they reigned as kings.

(4) "Love is not insolent and rash." The flesh is aggressive, rashly pushing itself into prominence. Love is not self-assertive, but rather retiring and reticent.

Love is marked by the total absence of certain hideous deformities of character and behaviour, which are perfectly natural to us as men in the flesh. Paul strings them together. Here they are: (1) Envy of others: (2) Vaunting oneself, or vainglory, or as it has been translated, being "insolent and rash:" (3) Being puffed up or inflated with one's own importance ...

"Is not puffed up." Self-importance is the internal counterpart of self-display, and is equally alien to a self-forgetting love. It most abounds where self-knowledge is most rare; and for this reason there was much of it at Corinth. Other knowledge might be found there in abundance; but in a just remembrance both of God and of themselves they were deplorably deficient. Hence it is to them only, of all the churches addressed immediately by the Spirit, that this very reproachful term is applied. Love is not thus, but flows most freely from a heart first broken and then healed by the effectual power of truth. We love God, because He first loved us. We love the brethren, because they bear His image, and are His. While beholding the manner of His love, we are self-abased in wonder at His grace. In His presence pride is hidden from our eyes. It is when the Lord is out of our remembrance that this most unlovely form of "flesh" appears. Its best corrective is to turn again and view Him in the place His love has chosen for our sakes.

(5) Love "is not puffed up". The flesh is often vain and filled with its self-importance. Love takes the lowly place in service to others.

The string that runs right through these eight things is, love of self. Alas! alas! how often are these features discernible in ourselves, and yet we are saints of God. It is all too easy for us to be like ships stranded on the dirty mud flats of self-love. What can lift us off? Nothing but a mighty inflow of the tide of Divine love. When saints forget themselves in the uplift of that tide most wonderful transformations are effected.

Love is its own motive. In us participation in the divine nature is its only source. Communion with God Himself alone sustains it through all the difficulties it has to surmount in its path. This love is the opposite of selfishness and of self-seeking, and shuts it out, seeking the good of others, even (as to its principle) as God has sought us in grace.