Let us take that powerful passage from the Apostle Paul about Love and spend the rest of this month considering it, praying about it and letting it work in us for the Glory of God.

Below is a simple interpretation of I Corinthians 13.
It is so profound even the angels of heaven stand in awe of it.

  If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don't love, I'm nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate.If I speak God's Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, "Jump," and it jumps, but I don't love, I'm nothing.

If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don't love, I've gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I'm bankrupt without love.

   Love never gives up. Love cares more for others than for self.  Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.  Love doesn't strut,  Doesn't have a swelled head,  Doesn't force itself on others, Isn't always "me first," Doesn't fly off the handle,   Doesn't keep score of the sins of others, Doesn't revel when others grovel, Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth, Puts up with anything, Trusts God always, Always looks for the best,  Never looks back, But keeps going to the end.

Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end; understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth, and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.

When I was an infant at my mother's breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew up, I left those infant ways for good.

We don't yet see things clearly. We're squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won't be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We'll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!

But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love.

DAY 27—Giving great amounts of money, or suffering for others, all without love, does not accomplish anything for God’s Kingdom.

It is possible to do great charitable work and even to give one’s own life in behalf of others and still be empty of love. Love is closer to being a spirit than it is to being an action that is performed. Too often we are inclined to think of love as something we do. We miss out on what true love actually is. More than a matter of doing or giving, love is a matter of the heart.

Paul made this observation as to how one might do great deeds that would seem to be acts of charity and sacrifice, but still miss out on the kind of Love that God is.

• I Corinthians 13:3—And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity  (agápe), it profiteth me nothing.

How could one do great works for the benefit of others and have no real love? It is quite possible that the works are done for one’s own gratification. They would seem to be works of love, but instead they would be works of religious pride. We can receive some understanding regarding this from Jesus, in the lesson that follows:

• Matthew 6:1-3—Take heed that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of them: otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in heaven. Therefore when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. But when thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth.

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