"Welcome To The Gong Show"
(1 Corinthians 13:1-13)
[1] If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have 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 do not have love, I am nothing. [3] If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
[4] Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant [5] or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; [6] it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. [7] It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
[8] Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. [9] For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; [10] but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. [11] When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. [12] For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. [13] And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.
NRSV
INTRODUCTION:
Do you remember the Gong Show? Remember Chuck Barris; Gene, Gene the dancing machine and the Unknown Comic? The show was funny, tasteless and obnoxious all at the same time. The only thing more obnoxious were the guests. If you remember, the Gong Show was sort of a talent show. If you had a modicum of talent you survived and the panel of judges rated your act. The winning act got some sort of prize like luggage or a a years supply of pacifier wipes. Most of the time, the contestants were either too weird for words or just plain horrible. Their fate of course was the inevitable Gong. One of the judges would signify the end of that person's act by striking a huge gong.
Now what does that have to do with this wonderful passage from Paul about love? According to Paul the one telling attribute of the Christian faith is love. It is the measure of all that we are and all that we do. We can have every talent and ability in the world but if we don't exhibit love then we are like the Gong on the Gong show. And worse yet, we're more like the rotten acts. Some of the folks who came on the show had talent. Some came knowing they had no talent and it was just a fun time. But then there were those folks who came on the show who thought they had talent but the only one they were fooling was themselves.
Sometimes in our walk of faith, we think we're "all that" (as they say) in God's eyes. When in actually we are fooling ourselves. We think we have faith or talent; we think we are doing the work of God but we do it a vengence and a got to get it done to add to my list of accomplishments for God rather than out of love for God. Paul says that attitude is wrong and on the stage of faith it will get us gonged. What is important and central to our faithful walk is love.
I. GOD'S LOVE FOR US:
A. God showed us that love in a very special way. We had banners up just a couple of weeks ago pronouncing how "Love came down at Christmas". Not only did love come down at Christmas, but through Christ love became flesh and blood and walked among us. Love had a name, Jesus. And through Jesus we learned first hand about the love of
B. Alice had been through it many times before. She couldn't remember how often her hopes had been raised only to have them dashed to the floor. The pattern was always the same. First, there was the call to leave the dorm room she shared with others at the orphanage. Then there was the wait outside of the superintendent's office, listening to the muffled voices discussing her behind the closed door. Words like "slow" and "difficult" came through often. Finally, there was the inch-by-inch scrutiny that made her feel more like a specimen under a microscope than the homeless, parentless girl that she was. She hated the women who looked at her the way they did, like a piece of meat hanging in a butcher's shop. They all smelled like lilacs and Alice hated lilacs.
Bad memories came back now as she stood under the searching stares of the young man and woman in front of her. She remembered how one lady would not even look at her after she saw how poorly her dress fit her. Another did not want to have anything to do with her because she stuttered and the servants would only laugh at her. Yet another was afraid that Alice's clubfoot would make her too clumsy to be a good serving girl. Tears welled up when she remembered how she was once slapped when she tripped and her hands brushed against the lilac-smelling woman's soft fur coat. Alice felt very self-conscious in front of this couple. The woman's hair was soft and radiant and Alice's was a tangled mass of knots. The young woman's face was clean and glowing while Alice's was dirty and tear-stained.
In vain, Alice tried to hide her misshapen foot behind the good one. The pretty young lady sat erect in front of Alice. The folds of her long dress reached neatly to the floor. Slowly, the tall, handsome man walked around Alice. At intervals he would stop, glance toward his wife and raise an eyebrow as a thin smile barely traced itself on his lips. He circled Alice a couple of times and then went to the side of his wife. Not a word was spoken as they looked deep into one another's eyes for the longest time.
Finally, he turned to the superintendent who sat behind the mahogany desk and said, "Yes, she's the one. We would like to have her." The superintendent shook his head in disbelief. And Alice was stunned. "Y-y-y-ou m-m-mean y-y-you want me t-t-to b-b-be your s-s-serving g-g-girl?" she asked.
"No, Alice," the pretty lady said. "We want you to be our daughter." Alice couldn't believe what she heard. No one had ever said that to her before. She had dreamed often about what it would be like having a mother and a father and a home. "It can't be true," she said to herself. She wanted them to tell her again. "You really want me to be your daughter. . .to live with you in your house?" Alice was not even aware she didn't stutter a bit.
"Yes," the handsome man said. "We've never had any children. My wife and I have so much love to give, and we want to give that love to you. We want you to be happy."
"But why me?" Alice asked, remembering all the times she had been turned down by the others. The pretty lady stood up and smiled at Alice. Slowly she reached down and lifted her floor- length skirt and revealed her own malformed foot. Softly, lovingly and understandingly, she said to Alice. "Today, we want you to be our child. Please, Alice, let us love you."
That's what God asks through Jesus. "I want you to be my child, Please let me love you."
And when we say "Yes!" all God asks is that we live that love for others to see.
II. LIVING GOD'S LOVE:
A. And that's what this passage is all about, living that love. Paul gives us the most wonderful definition of love that has ever been written. It's easy to get caught up in the wonders of this definition. The hard part is living it. But by living it, by living God's love we are able to witness for Christ. By living God's love, we become disciples and not noisy gongs. And the world knows the difference and our love makes a difference.
B. A couple of Sundays ago, my wife Mary didn't show up for worship. On Saturday she said her throat was kind of scratchy and suer enough when I got home, she was sick. Her doctor has a clinic that is open on Sunday's. So I changed clothes and took her up there. It was packed with people of all ages and the wait was long. There was one young father whose daughter might have been two. She was very sick. She went from being listless to being loud and angry because she felt so bad. This young man was the most patient father I have ever seen. Almost everyone in the waiting room ached for this father and daughter. He held her, loved her and comforted her as much as he could. But she felt rotten and couldn't tell anyone how rotten she felt except by crying loudly and continuously.
I said almost everyone in the waiting room ached for this father and daughter because sitting directly across from me was a mother and her nine or ten year old son. She was one of those gregarious types who talked to everybody whether they were paying attention or not. This woman began to make rude comments about the little girl and her father.
From where I was sitting, I could see a couple of people roll their eyes but nobody said anything. Mary got called back to the doctor. And as she left this woman made some comment about how Mary wouldn't have to listen to the little girl crying any more. I didn't say anything.
I guess this woman took our silence as agreement. Because she began to talk about the father and the noise the little girl was making with her crying. The comment got more and more rude and louder and louder. At one point the father glanced over with an embarrased, pained sort of look on his face. He continued to hold and love his little girl.
The woman spouted off again. I could see everyone in the room cringe. So I said something. I said something to the affect of: "Ma'am, that little girl is sick," hoping for a little compassion. Instead what I got was, "Well, I'm sick of her crying."
So, loud enough for everyone, including the father to hear, I said, "Ma'am, she's no more than two and she doesn't know why she feels that way. We're the adults here, we're supposed to have compassion and understanding for the children not complain when they make noise. Besides, her father is doing everything he can. I've never seen a father with as much patience and love as he has. He deserves a medal not criticism."
After saying that, the woman shut up. The father looked at me and nodded his head in thanks and the people in the waiting room all straightened up a little. I didn't tell her, but I started praying for the woman who had been making the rude comments. And I gave thanks for the father who showed so much patience in a trying time.
In that waiting room I saw the polar opposites of Paul' definition and discription of love. And by speaking out, hopefully in a loving way, I was able to remind others of that love and our responsibility to live that love for others to see.
CONCLUSION:
Through Christ, God calls us to be a part of God's family. Don't let your life be a noisy gong. You see, the only real measuring stick of our faith is our love and how we express that love in the world. If we want to be fit to live with, if we want to serve God to the fullest then we should "Live a life of love" because "love never ends." This morning as you partake of the symbols of God's love for you, be fed and be filled and then go forth to let God's love in you and your love for God show for all to see.
This is the Word of the Lord for this day.
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1. Preaching Magazine, November 88