Today I took a funeral for which the family had chosen 1 Corinthians 13 as the reading. I haven’t preached on that passage at a funeral before, though I have done so many times at weddings.
It got me thinking about it…
It’s understandable that this passage is commonly used at weddings. After all, it says so much about what love should be. If every married couple lived every moment in this kind of love, the divorce rate would be zero. But St Paul isn’t really talking about marriage here. He is talking more about all relationships. What if we treated everyone with patience, kindness, humility, forgiveness, etc, as described here? What a good world we would then live in!
This passage is really a description of what life is like in God’s Kingdom:
- God’s kingdom is all about love. When we discover Jesus, we discover someone who loved in a 1 Cor 13 way… someone who was patient, kind, never envious, never boastful, never proud, etc. And when we commit ourselves to the way of Jesus, we invite him into our lives to change us from the inside into these sorts of people – the sort of people who love in this way… who are not rude, are not self-seeking, not easily angered, keep no record of wrongs, etc.
2. This life is but a shadow of the life that is to come in God’s Kingdom. All the things of this life will end, sooner or later.
- Prophecies will cease…
- Tongues will be stilled
- Knowledge will pass away
- The imperfect will disappear because perfection will come…
As the child is left behind when we become adults, so will our mortal bodies and lives be left behind when we go to be with the Lord. When you look at a photo of someone, you see only an image of them, as you see only an image of yourself in a mirror. One day all the limitations of this life will be put aside as we go to join the Lord in the life he lives.
St Paul wants us to know that the reality that we see around us is not the ultimate reality. What we experience with our senses today will fade away tomorrow. But God’s Kingdom is the ultimate reality. His love is the true love, of which all our earthly love is but a pale reflection.
No Turning Back 