How is speaking in tongues of men and of angels without love like a noisy gong (1 Corinthians 13:1)?

The Apostle Paul gives great emphasis to all this, because he puts the truth before us in the first person. He begins, “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity [love] I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.” Evidently the subject matter of this speech is beyond reproach. He is not referring to unkind gossip or the like, but to speech of excellent matter, seeing he brings in the allusion to the tongues of angels. But if it lacks this divine love, it is empty and valueless, without edification.

The first three verses contemplate gifts which may be possessed and exercised without love. If they are, the sum total of all that they effect and produce is, Nothing. Speaking with tongues is mentioned first, as that was the particular gift that was becoming rather a snare to the Corinthians. But that is followed by prophecy, which later is eulogised by the Apostle as first in importance; and that by knowledge and faith, and by the practical benevolence that nowadays goes by the name of "charity"; and that again by self-sacrifice of a very remarkable kind. What tremendous assertions are these which Paul makes!

A brother rises in the assembly and speaks words of peculiar sweetness and thrill, though quite unintelligible to us. We discover that he has actually made a Divine communication in a language of heaven, which angels use. How marvellous! How we should gaze at him! Yes. But if he has done this without love he might as well have brought an old brass pan into the meeting and hit it with a poker, for the good he has done, as regards the Lord's interests in the assembly.

And here comes another who has astonishing knowledge and understanding. He not only penetrates to the heart of Divine things, but he can communicate to others what he knows by reason of his prophetic gift. Also he has faith of an almost miraculous power. Yet he has not love! We are not told that he is like a clanging piece of brass, for it is possible that we may gain some help and understanding from what he says, and some inspiration from his remarkable faith. What we are told is, that he himself is nothing. If unspiritual ourselves we might imagine him to be a giant. Really he is less than a pigmy. He is nothing.

To excel therefore in love should be the first and foremost aim of every believer. The way of love is the more excellent way, to which the apostle directs the saints in Corinth who were too much enamoured of those gifts which appealed to their senses rather than to their souls. He says to them, “And a still more excellent way show I to you. If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And if I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing” (1 Cor. 12:31 — 13:2, R.V.).

Whatever the estimate of the value of tongues in modern days, the apostle rates them, whether of men or of angels, to be, in the absence of love, no more than “a mere instrument of sound without sense, dead, mechanical, devoid of moral worth.” There is much clangour and clatter, but no true ministry of the Spirit bearing witness to the spirits of the saints. No edification results, for it is love that builds up, while tongues like knowledge puff up.

Now as the apostle mentions tongues, prophecy, and knowledge, at the beginning of the chapter, as just quoted, so he refers to all three in the latter part of the chapter, by way of depreciation as compared with love. They are but temporary while love is unending in its character and activities. We must put love first. Prophecy, knowledge and tongues are proper only to the circumstances of an immature state, but love will never be superseded. Love is the atmosphere of glory, even as it is the life-breath of the assembly on earth,

To prove the supreme value of love the Apostle speaks of three things in which the Corinthian believers were boasting: their eloquent speech; their spiritual possessions; and their activities. He shows that, though they may seek to exalt themselves by these things, they are of no account in God's sight if they have not love as their motive.

(V. 1). The Corinthian believers were making much of the gift of tongues and natural eloquence. The Apostle warns us that it is possible “to speak with the tongues of men and of angels” and have no love. Where this is so, in spite of eloquence and seraphic words, the speaker will become as “sounding brass or a clanging cymbal”.

It is well, however, to remark its connection here with the assembly of God, and the working of the Holy Spirit in it. Everywhere precious, never out of season, above all it is the lifebreath of the church. Where love is not the regulating power in the Spirit, the very nearness of the saints to each other, and the action of the gifts, prove the greatest dangers; where love governs, all else works smoothly to the edification of the saints and to the Lord's glory. If the Corinthian saints, in their ministering of the gifts, had forgotten the supreme excellence of love, the apostle puts it forward with all prominence between his treatment of the Spirit's presence and action in the assembly, and the order laid down for the due exercise of gift there.

Love, he shows, has intrinsic and divine excellency, surpassing all gifts, even the gifts that edify. For such gifts may be where there is no love. "If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, yet have not love, I am become sounding brass and a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophecy, and know all the mysteries, and all the knowledge, and if I have all the faith so as to remove mountains, yet have not love, I am nothing. And if I should dole out in food all my substance, and if I should deliver my body that I might be burned, and have not love, I am nothing profited." (Vers. 1-3.) The apostle begins with the superiority of love to the gift of tongues in any conceivable degree. It is as evident from this verse as from Acts 2 how baseless is the effort of Meyer and others to deny that they were articulate and intelligible languages. "Of angels" completes the cycle for the apostle, who here, as elsewhere, personates the supposed case. (Cf. 1 Cor. 9:26-27; Rom. 7:7-26, according to the principle stated in 1 Cor. 4:6.) To speak all possible tongues without love were to become sounding brass or a clattering cymbal, not even vox but sonitus and praeterea nihil. But he goes farther. The possession of the prophetic gift, with an inward consciousness, and not merely acquired knowledge, of all the mysteries and all the knowledge that is revealed, nay, the possession of all the faith so as to remove mountains, if without love, leaves one nothing. It is plain that he is not treating of divinely given faith in Christ's person, which is inseparable from eternal life and love too. It is the gift, or χάρισμα, of faith. Power is not grace. (See Heb. 6; Matt. 7) If one should bestow all one's property in charitable doles, and give over one's body to the flames of martyrdom, without love, he is nothing profited, whatever others might reap.

And in the first section, verse I deals with what I speak; verse 2 with what I have; and verse 3 with what I do. Though spoken in most sublime language, "tongues of men or of angels," my words are merely as a brass sounding instrument or a clanging cymbal, if love is not present. The warmth and reality of a proper personal element is lacking: this cannot rightly represent God. Or if one possesses the excellent gift of prophecy, and is exceptionally well taught; and though faith is such as to remove mountainous obstacles, yet if love is not the power in which this is exercised, "I am nothing." In such cases the motive for using the gift is selfish: it is not that of genuine concern for others, and for the glory of God. Thus, in my every effort to be something, "I am nothing."

1 Corinthians 13 tells us how much we may do, and yet be wanting the true spring of Christian activity, how we may appear to be as active as ever, and yet be altogether missing the mark. You may speak beautifully—have “the tongues of men and of angels”—your theology may be sound, your language convincing and clear, and yet no result. Nothing but empty noise—“sounding brass”—“tinkling cymbal”—if love is not the spring.

We may have wonderful knowledge, our Bibles may be worn to rags, our notes and comments numerous, correct and illuminating; we may be able to prophecy, to look with unerring eye into the future and unfold its mysteries; we may be able to remove mountains, to surmount the impossible, and yet if love is lacking be nothing. “God is love.” If love were lacking in Him He would cease to be God. So if love is lacking in us, whatever our knowledge and power may be, we are nothing.

Look at that man. Thousands flock to hear him. His words thrill and stir his hearers to the last degree. He is a great orator, and speaks with the tongues of men and angels. Yet God says he is no better than sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. Why? Because love is lacking. Nothing makes up for love.

This chapter is a most blessed exaltation of love. The word "charity" is an unfortunate mistranslation. The Greek word for love used in the New Testament was never used by the Greek heathen classical writers. In its meaning it was unknown among the Gentiles. God is love. As His people, members of His body, we know the love of God manifested in the gift of God's well beloved Son. And this love is shed abroad in the hearts of the children of God. "Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God and knoweth God." "Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another ... if we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and His love is perfected in us" (1 John 4:7, 11-12.). The divine nature bestowed by the Spirit of God is a holy nature and a nature which possesseth in it the love of God. Love is therefore the divine nature in its manifestation. And this wonderful love, the divine love, is to be manifested in the body of Christ. It is the true motive for all ministry. The Corinthians in their worldly, self-seeking, ambitious spirit, in their use of the gifts, had not followed this more excellent way. The divisions among them and their self-exaltation and self-confidence were the result of not being governed by love. If love had been supreme in the Corinthian church, neither sectarianism, nor careless walk, nor indifference to sin of others and toleration of evil, nor going before a heathen judge, nor high-minded pretensions, nor the desecration of the Lord's supper, nor a false practice of Christian liberty, could have prospered. Love surpasses everything. It is a far better thing than any gift. Very significantly the Apostle begins with the gift, as already pointed out, of the smallest value. Speaking with the tongues of men and of angels without love is like sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.

(1) Now he first of all insists upon the unique value of love. If this one element be removed, we have really nothing. It is not exactly the whole spirit of a Christian, but it is that which is above all necessary to his being that. No tongues thus, he says, have any value apart from this, whether they be the tongues of men or even of angels. It is merely like sounding brass or a cymbal clanging. It is dead, not living. Even the gift of prophecy becomes, apart from this, what it might be in a Balaam, — something that God may put to use, but which has no value to the one who exercises it. So with all knowledge, however universal it might be; so with all faith, if it manifested itself in such work as removing mountains; still without love it was all nothing. If there were that which simulated love still more, the bestowing of all one's goods to feed the poor; if there were that burning zeal in which one could deliver up his body to the flame, and yet love did not really prompt in all this, it would still be nothing. Nothing could possibly be more complete as to the full value of love and its necessity in everything.