A Portrait of Love

Read for This Week’s Study

1 Corinthians 13; Matt. 24:12; Gal. 5:22, 23; 1 Tim. 1:14; 1 John 4:8.

Memory Text:

“And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love” (1 Corinthians 13:13, NIV).

Love can conquer all. That’s why Paul had so much to say about it. The word family of agapaō—the most common Greek word in the New Testament to express the concept of love—occurs more than 135 times in his letters. This represents almost half of all occurrences in the New Testament. This should tell us something about the central theme of Paul’s letters to the Corinthian church.

There are many remarkable passages about love in the New Testament—Romans 8:35–39, 1 Corinthians 2:9, 1 Corinthians 8:3, Galatians 2:20, Colossians 1:13, 1 Thessalonians 3:12, and more—but nothing compares to 1 Corinthians 13.

Last week, we saw that without love, all things, even spiritual gifts, are worthless. This week, we will look more deeply into 1 Corinthians 13 and its marvelous portrait of love.

As we will see, love is not so much an emotion as an attitude, an attitude that must be expressed in life, in deeds, and in words; other­wise, it means nothing.

What love really is, and does, has been fully revealed in the life of Jesus.

*Study this week’s lesson to prepare for Sabbath, August 15.

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Additional Reading: Selected Quotes from Ellen G. White

In patriarchal times the sacrificial offerings connected with divine worship constituted a perpetual reminder of the coming of a Saviour, and thus it was with the entire ritual of the sanctuary services throughout Israel’s history. In the ministration of the tabernacle, and of the Temple that afterward took its place, the people were taught each day, by means of types and shadows, the great truths relative to the advent of Christ as Redeemer, Priest, and King; and once each year their minds were carried forward to the closing events of the great controversy between Christ and Satan, the final purification of the universe from sin and sinners.
The sacrifices and offerings of the Mosaic ritual were ever pointing toward a better service, even a heavenly. The earthly sanctuary was “a figure for the time then present,” in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices; its two holy places were “patterns of things in the heavens”; for Christ, our great High Priest, is today “a minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man” (Hebrews 9:9, 23; 8:2).
From the day the Lord declared to the serpent in Eden, “I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed” (Genesis 3:15), Satan has known that he can never hold absolute sway over the inhabitants of this world. When Adam and his sons began to offer the ceremonial sacrifices ordained by God as a type of the coming Redeemer, Satan discerned in these a symbol of communion between earth and heaven. During the long centuries that have followed, it has been his constant effort to intercept this communion. Untiringly has he sought to misrepresent God and to misinterpret the rites pointing to the Saviour. . . .
While God has desired to teach men that from His own love comes the Gift which reconciles them to Himself, the archenemy of mankind has endeavored to represent God as one who delights in their destruction. Thus the sacrifices and ordinances designed of Heaven to reveal divine love have been perverted.
In word and in deed the Messiah, during His earthly ministry, was to reveal to mankind the glory of God the Father. Every act of His life, every word spoken, every miracle wrought, was to make known to fallen humanity the infinite love of God. . . .
Thus, through patriarchs and prophets, as well as through types and symbols, God spoke to the world concerning the coming of a Deliverer from sin.—Lift Him Up, p. 26.