If I speak with the tongues of mankind and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. And if I give away all my possessions to charity, and if I surrender my body so that I may glory, but do not have love, it does me no good.

1 Corinthians 13:1-3

I have heard some Christians lamenting their lack of faith in modern days. “We don’t move mountains anymore” they seem to be saying. I’m not worried about moving mountains at the moment; I’m not sure we have achieved the love that Paul was talking to the Corinthian Church about.

Love is patient, love is kind, it is not jealous; love does not brag, it is not arrogant. It does not act disgracefully, it does not seek its own benefit; it is not provoked, does not keep an account of a wrong suffered, it does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; it keeps every confidence, it believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

1 Corinthians 13:4-7

All of the qualities in this passage are not things we are to achieve on our own and then love happens as a result, they are evidence we love in the way God intended.

Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away with; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away with. For we know in part and prophesy in part; but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away with. When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully, just as I also have been fully known.

1 Corinthians 13:8-12

Strong, mountain moving faith may feel deep and important but real maturity, Paul says, is perfected love in God.

Ethan Kirl