What does it mean that love is not proud (1 Corinthians 13:4)?

"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.8 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.9

And supposing a third appears, who resolves, "I shall dole out all my goods in food," (N. Trans.) and is prepared to give his body to be burned! Why, we should feel inclined to exclaim, What a reward he will have in the coming day! But alas, he has not love. Then it will profit him nothing. The absence of love has rendered valueless the whole thing. In the light of these facts, negative though they are in their bearing, of what surpassing value is love!

Now we are to contemplate more closely the features that characterize love. 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.

This one positive feature is followed by negative features. 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: (4) Unseemly behaviour which follows hard on the heels of an inflated mind: (5) Self-seeking: (6) Touchiness, easily taking offence and provoked to anger: (7) Thinking evil, that is, quick to impute evil to others: (8) Rejoicing in iniquity, that is, glad to be able to point out iniquity in others, and to denounce it. The string that runs right through these eight things is, love of self.

First of all, "Love suffereth long." It is in fact a sufferer in a world like this necessarily, as we see in Christ. What a field is this sorrow-stricken scene for its display, but how many calls upon it are there, therefore! Love suffereth long and still is kind. It does not wear out. It is not disappointed, not at least with such a disappointment as would check its outflow. Again, it envieth not. Plainly, it has not self before it, and therefore does not seek a place above others. It does not, therefore, envy others the possession of that which its possessor has not. For the same reason, "love vaunteth not itself." It does not think of itself more highly than it ought to think. It does not parade its deeds or its quality. It is not self-assertive. Still less does it go beyond what is due. It is not puffed up.

Next we come, not to a definition of love, but to its qualities as in this world, specified for our instruction. It is what Christ was here, active as well as suffering in love above evil. "Love is long-suffering, is kind; love is not emulous, is not vainglorious, is not puffed up, doth not behave unseemly, seeks not its own things, is not easily provoked, reckons not the evil, rejoices not over iniquity, but rejoices with the truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things." (Vers. 4-7.) Patience in the midst of trial is the first-mentioned attribute of love, which even shows positive kindness instead of harbouring a vindictive thought. 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. Hence indecorum, or rude behaviour, is incompatible with love, as it is marked by disinterestedness and slowness to anger, and by readiness to forget the wrong that is done.

The opening descriptions are all of a passive character, and show that love demands the renunciation of self. Long-suffering and kindness head the list. These are the attributes of our loving God and Father, and we are to imitate Him as His children and forbear one another in love. Love does not envy. God does not envy. Envy is of Satan; all self-seeking has its origin in pride, which is the crime of the devil (1 Timothy 3:6). Love vaunteth not itself. It never seeks the applause of men. Self-display is self-love. True love is not puffed up. Love doth not behave itself unseemly. Its ornaments are meekness, modesty and unobtrusiveness. It seeketh not its own; it is self-neglect and is expressed in devotion to others. Nor is it easily provoked, for self-consciousness and self-seeking being absent, sensitiveness becomes impossible. Love thinketh no evil. The better translation is, "does not impute evil." It rather hides than exposes. Furthermore, love "rejoiceth not in iniquity but rejoiceth with the truth." The last four characteristics show its positive energy. It beareth all things--it puts up with anything but that which is wrong and sinful; believeth all things; it does not suspect, therefore it hopeth all things and also endureth all things. Finally the permanence of love is stated. Prophecies, tongues and knowledge will fail, cease and pass away. Love never. It is abiding eternal, the greatest of all.

The history of the church at Corinth is alas! the history of the church in responsibility all through the centuries. Schools of opinions, human wisdom, all resulting in a "puffing up" of the flesh. Four times the apostle speaks of the Corinthian believers as being "puffed up." In 1 Cor. 4:6, he speaks of them being "puffed up for one against another;" in verse 18 and 19 of the same chapter he refers to those who were puffed up in their speech, apparently against the apostle himself, and in 1 Cor. 5:2, he has to reproach them for being puffed up when they should have mourned over the conditions prevailing amongst them. Is it not blessed to notice that, as moving in the "more excellent way" of love this feature will be absent? "Love … is not puffed up," (1 Cor. 13:4).

In Christ we see the perfect love that made itself nothing in order to serve others. Love delights to serve; self likes to be served, and thinks itself exalted when others are waiting upon it. Walking in the spirit of Christ, vain glory would be gone, and the lowly grace of Christ would be expressed.

We may talk in a lowly way of ourselves, but self-depreciation is no evidence of the lowly mind, rather the reverse. In self-depreciation we are, after all, talking about ourselves, and this may be the worst form of pride — the pride of humility. The lowly mind does not think of self — good or bad — it thinks of others to serve in love. It is the ignoring of self, not the depreciation of self.

Thus in every step of His path we see the loveliness of the lowly mind that forgets self to serve others in love; as one has said,”Love likes to serve, selfishness likes to be served, and thinks itself exalted when other people are waiting upon it” (J.N.D.). Alas! Our natural tendency is ever to have self before us and seek to make a reputation for self rather than be content to be nothing that Christ may be everything. We forget the Apostle's word, “If a man think himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself” (Gal. 6:3). We may indeed be permitted in our little way to serve, but alas how often we use the very service that the Lord gives us to do for Him, to assert ourselves, exalt ourselves, and work our own wills. We need ever to remember that Christ, not only became a servant, but He also humbled Himself and became obedient. Naturally we like to be lords over God's heritage rather than stoop to serve; naturally we seek to exalt self rather than humble ourselves; and we prefer to do our own wills rather than walk in simple obedience. In the Apostle's day he had to say, “All seek their own,” but in Christ we see One who refused self to seek in love the good of others. Could we live a little more in the presence of the Lord, with Himself before us in all His lowly grace,our selfishness would disappear, and without difficulty we should think of others to serve in love. So acting, strife would disappear and we should find ourselves of one accord. Thus in the first part of the chapter we learn that lowliness is the way of unity.

From verse 4 we learn what love is, and what it is not. It suffers long and is kind; it does not envy, nor is it insolent or rash. Some of the beautiful traits of love have marked the saints throughout the different dispensations; we see the kindness of God in such as Joseph and David, unselfishness and meekness in Moses and Paul, patience and endurance in such as Job and the great cloud of witnesses mentioned at the close of Hebrews 11. But in Jesus every feature of love was found in perfection, and all were perfectly blended together and expressed in all His ways. Longsuffering and kindness mark God's dealings with men from the beginning; they are features of the divine nature to be manifested by all God's children.