# Contextual Importance - 1 CORINTHIANS 13:4-13; 14:1-5 - 2024-08-21 Today's reading struck me differently than it has in the past. I spent a lot of time today thinking about why *this version* of the text stuck out to me so much. Read it for yourself, and then we'll chat. *Brethren, love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends; as for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is imperfect; but when the perfect comes, the imperfect will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood. So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love. Make love your aim, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy. For one who speaks in a tongue speaks not to men but to God; for no one understands him, but he utters mysteries in the Spirit. On the other hand, he who prophesies speaks to men for their upbuilding and encouragement and consolation. He who speaks in a tongue edifies himself, but he who prophesies edifies the church. Now I want you all to speak in tongues, but even more to prophesy. He who prophesies is greater than he who speaks in tongues, unless some one interprets, so that the church may be edified. - 1 Corinthians 13:4-13; 14:1-5* - 290 These are verses that I could almost quote by heart. I've heard sermon after sermon on top of loads of Bible study lessons about these verses, though never together. We talk about love at times and then we talk about the gifts of the Spirit. This morning my initial thought when reading this text was that the translation was different and had selected *very slightly* different words or ordered the words in a more readable format. I asked a few friends to read it on this Antiochian Orthodox Archdiocese page, and they asked "why does this feel different to you? Seems normal to me." I really questioned myself as to why. What was it this morning that set this whole section into a new light for me? It wasn't until I read the same text in the NASB that it clicked. It wasn't words, though the words are slightly different. I attribute that to the goals of the NASB rather than the translation here (maybe that'll be for another "random topic post"). It wasn't punctuation, which was a top contender in my mind this morning. Rather, it was the lack of break points. The liturgical readings don't include chapters and verses. Our natural inclination is to break thoughts at these points and so we see ourselves learning about love *or* the gifts but very rarely, if ever, do we learn about them together. We can clearly see the context of St. Paul's statement about the gifts being second to love. Love is so much more than the gifts, but we should also be earnestly seeking after the Spirit so that we too may be gifted to serve in spiritual ways. This contextual connection is removed when we choose to only read by chapter and verse. This isn't the only section throughout the Biblical text that we see connections broken by the insertion of verses and chapters, but this one struck me today. I want to challenge you when you're reading a text to intentionally go beyond what you're intending to read and take in the surrounding text as the context for what the author is trying to express, even if it goes beyond the chapter boundary.