Finding Purpose Through Love: The Most Excellent Way!!
READ: 1 Corinthians 12 & 13: 1-3
FOCUS: 1 Corinthians 13: 1-3
“If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.”
Have you ever wondered about God’s plan? Asked yourself where you fit in? How you fit in or even if you fit into God will? This passage of scripture we are looking at today should help you answer that question.
Paul, the most well known apostle today, talks about our spiritual gifts in chapter 12. We are told to use our gifts and that we should not desire those gifts that God has not given us, but to rather commit to those things that God has called us to. God gives us gifts in order to give us a place in His will. It is this place in God’s will that so many Christians are struggling to find.
In looking at our purpose our questions should not be ‘What am I supposed to be doing?’ but rather ‘Who am I doing this for?’. You see these two questions will lead us to very different answers. The first question asks about ‘me’ and focuses on ‘me’, and the second question asks about God and focuses on God. We cannot find our purpose in God unless we let go of ourselves and allow God to do His work in us.
Here’s an example from Chapter 12:
If we search for what we should be doing then we focus on our ability to get something done. We say things like, “That cant be God’s will, I am no good at that!” or we become proud because we are good at the purpose we discovered. This pride becomes a problem in ministry but so does the lack of involvement when we don’t feel equipped. Both of these mindsets can create a problem because they focus on ’self’ rather than God.
So Paul shows us in Chapter 12 that we should not pursue the gifts we would like but rather to focus on the gifts and roles that God calls us to. That way we all end up working together towards a common purpose and we stop trying to out do each other with our own spirituality and abilities.
So how do we find our purpose if we are not meant to look for our gifting? What’s interesting is that as Paul discusses the intricacies of finding God’s will in our lives in chapter 12 he suddenly describes to us THE MOST EXCELLENT WAY. This is the MOST EXCELLENT WAY to find your purpose in God’s will.
Quite simply Paul says in no uncertain terms that Love is the way that we find our purpose. We need to take our focus away from trying to find our gifts and purpose and simply love God. In fact, our primary purpose is to love God.
We often look at this passage (1 Cor 13) in an attempt to understand love. We normally gloss over the comparison section (verses 1-3) and skip straight to the ‘love is patient’ section. The problem with this is that the comparison part of this scripture is the section that shows us HOW to love. More importantly it shows us how to love God. Paul is basically telling us that our gifting is not our purpose. We will never find our purpose in finding our gifts and talents. Our purpose is greater than doing what we are gifted at, our purpose is to love God.
In the next few studies we will look at a few aspects of loving God as we continue to look at 1 Corinthians 13:1-3
