◄ What Does 1 Corinthians 13:8 Mean? ►

How the Corinthian church prided themselves on the multiplicity of gifts with which they were endowed. Indeed, of all the groups of believers recorded in Scripture, it was the Corinthian Christians who were gifted with a greater abundance of spiritual gifts than any other named church. And yet as we discover, this group of saved believers were more carnal and worldly minded than any group of New Testament Christians. They were babes in Christ who had never grown in the faith. They were not maturing spiritually, they were not growing in grace, but they remained carnal, worldly minded believers - eternally saved yet spiritually immature. They were a sad apology for the Body of Christ.

The gifts of the Holy Spirit are truly wonderful, and we should all desire the gifts of the Spirit, but it is the fruit of the Spirit that is to be much more earnestly pursued. The gifts of the Spirit are just for the present, but the fruit of the Spirit will remain throughout all eternity. The gifts of the Spirit will one day be done away with, but the fruit of the Spirit will continue forever. The temporal gifts of the Spirit are for the current age, but the fruit of the everlasting Spirit will abide through the eternal ages to come. The gifts of prophecy, tongues, knowledge, and all the many ministerial gifts with which the Holy Spirit graciously endows each one of His children according to His choosing will one day will vanish away forever. My gifts will one day stop and so will yours.

As high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is the difference between the fruit of the Sprit with His gifts, for the fruit of the Spirit is LOVE; pure, holy, unconditional, everlasting, godly love. The fruit of the Spirit is personified in the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. The fruit of the Spirit is LOVE, which fragments into joy, peace, patient-endurance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control, and these will last forever and ever and into the eternal ages to come, for LOVE NEVER FAILS.

We are told that there are three things that will last forever: faith, hope, and love - but the greatest of these is LOVE. 

How great is Your love for me, Father, and how I long to be more like You. Fill me with Your love, saturate me with Your pure, holy, unconditional, everlasting, godly love, I pray. May I be a transparent channel through which Your love may flow out to others. In Jesus' name, AMEN.