agape

[The Way of Love]


[13:1] If I speak in the tongues 
of men and of angels, 
but 
have not love, 
I am 
a noisy gong or 
a clanging cymbal. 


[2] And if I have 
prophetic powers, and 
understand 
all mysteries and 
all knowledge, and 
if I have 
all faith, 
so as to remove mountains, 
but 
have not love, 
I am nothing. 


[3] If 
I give away all I have, 
and if 
I deliver up my body to be burned, 
but 
have not love, 
I gain nothing.

[4] Love 
is patient and kind; 
love 
does not envy or boast; 
it is not arrogant 
[5] or rude. 
It does not insist on its own way; 
it is not irritable or resentful; 
[6] it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, 
but 
rejoices with the truth. 


[7] Love 
bears all things, 
believes all things, 
hopes all things, 
endures all things.

[8] Love never ends. 
As for prophecies, they will pass away; 
as for tongues, they will cease; 
as for knowledge, it will pass away. 


[9] For we know in part 
and we prophesy in part, 
[10] but 
when the perfect comes, 
the partial will pass away. 


[11] 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. 
[12] For now we see in a mirror dimly, 
but then face to face. 
Now 
I know in part; 
then 
I shall know fully, 
even as 
I have been fully known.

[13] So now 
faith, 
hope, and 
love abide, these three; 
but 
the greatest of these is 
love.

(1 Corinthians 13 ESV)