"And yet show I unto you a more excellent way," the Apostle Paul wrote, a way in which the Spirit of God can be manifested even though we might not possess great gifts. There is a manner in which you and I can be a living witness for Christ to those with whom we are brought into association from day to day. We can be a channel through which the Spirit of God can magnify Christ in His members. When we come to examine it, we find that it is this divine love.
It has often been remarked how inexplicable it seems that the Apostle Paul should interrupt himself here, because the actual subject seems to skip the thirteenth chapter. He passes from the end of the twelfth, where he is considering the gifts, to this subject of love which comes before him. In a way this seems like an interruption. Yet the more we examine it, the more we are brought to the conclusion that not only is the interruption opportune, but it is divine. He shows immediately that if all the most wonderful gifts could be comprised in one gathering, they would be absolutely unprofitable unless they were exercised in this divine way. We can only learn it in communion with Christ. As we walk in communion with the Head of His body, we get His mind concerning His saints, His affections for His people and the thoughts of His heart at the very time when the saints need it. In this way we can be as those who are a witness for Christ, as "an oracle of God," as though God did beseech and utter His word by us.
He begins with that gift which we consider the greatest, that of speaking. We magnify this gift all out of proportion, whether it may be of teaching, preaching or evangelizing. That gift, being one which comes more often before us, we have elevated into a position far too high in the economy of God, to what is needful and what is profitable. 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." 1 Cor. 13:1. I am afraid we have had to find that out. We have to own that a great many, perhaps most of the gifts that God has given to His Church, are scattered at large in this day of weakness and ruin. God has greatly endowed many as preachers and teachers, and yet how often we are conscious of what the Apostle describes here as emptiness and sounding brass. There seems to be a lack of ministry of Christ in such a way as to meet the needs of God's people. It is sad that it should be so, and yet we need to be reminded of it, and also we have to be very careful that the utterances of our mouths would be acceptable in His sight. How often we have to feel and judge ourselves that an utterance to which we have given expression at some meeting or other was mere knowledge. We have not confidently and consciously had contact with the living Head, so that we spoke with assurance as having a word from Him. Let us look to it that what we speak, we get from Christ our Head. He has given us a perfect example of this in John 12:50, "Whatsoever I speak therefore, even as the Father said unto Me, so I speak.”
The Apostle says if he speak but five words in the power of divine love, and it is fur the edification of the saints, he esteems it more than ten thousand words, though they might be the voice of greatest knowledge and eloquence. We have to be on our guard against that also. One of the characteristics of the last days is that men would have "itching cars." 2 Tim. 4:3. We are easily tainted with the same thing, We are unwilling to hear a person who desires to speak out of real love of heart for Christ. We naturally prefer something which pleases us. The Apostle says we must beware lest it be "sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal."
F. Lavington