Week 1 · 1 Corinthians 13:4
Love Is Patient,
Love Is Kind
Both start with the people closest to you.
Read First
I had to go to the county courthouse to renew my car tags. You can do it by mail. I didn’t. So I found a parking place downtown, which is its own miracle, and pulled in behind a pickup truck that had to cost a hundred thousand dollars. Out climbed a guy in work overalls. I decided on the spot that he probably owned every cornfield from here to Ames. That was just an assumption. Not a judgment. Mostly.
We were headed to the same place, so I followed him in. He walked up to the courthouse doors looking like a man who had a secret. The doors are automatic. You walk up, they open. That’s the way it works. But when he got to them, he stopped, looked around, and waved both arms wildly. The doors opened. He walked in.
Now, you wave your arms like that to flag down a bus. To scare away geese. To swat a bee. Not to open a door.
It’s one of those buildings with two sets of doors. He walked up to the second set and did the exact same thing. Stopped. Looked around. Waved both arms wildly. And guess what? The doors opened.
The problem is, they opened for everybody else too. No arm waving required. He didn’t know that. I’m pretty sure one day, a long time ago, a door didn’t open for him. He waved his arms, and it opened. And from that day on, that’s how doors work.
We all do this. At some point you formed a conclusion about how love works, how much patience is reasonable and what people deserve from you. You’ve been waving your arms ever since. Not because it works, but because that’s what you decided the last time you thought about it. This week, consider that the way you’ve been doing it might not be the only way.
This Week’s Greek
Patience with people. Literally “long-tempered.” You have the power to get even, to fire back or give the look, and you choose not to.
Kindness. Goodness that is useful. Compassion in action: lending your strength to someone who needs it.
Your week
Week 1 · Monday
The Chapter Everybody Knows
Read 1 Corinthians 12:31–13:13, then 1:10–12 and 3:1–3
Say
- In 13:1–3, Paul lists impressive things a person could do without love. List them. What does he say each one is worth without love?
- Count the descriptions of love in 13:4–8. How many describe what love does, and how many describe what love doesn’t do?
Mean
- Paul wrote this to a real church. From 1:10–12 and 3:1–3, what was going wrong in Corinth?
- In 12:31, Paul calls love “the most excellent way.” Why do you think he places this chapter in the middle of a discussion about spiritual gifts?
Live
- Which description in 13:4–8 comes easiest for you? Which one would the people closest to you say you struggle with most?
My Notes
Week 1 · Tuesday
Jesus Is Patient With Us
Read 2 Peter 3:8–9, Matthew 26:69–75 and John 21:15–19
Say
- According to 2 Peter 3:9, why is the Lord patient? What does he want?
- In Matthew 26, how many times does Peter deny Jesus? How does each denial get worse?
Mean
- Peter uses the same family of words for “patient” that Paul uses in 1 Corinthians 13:4, and Peter had experienced that patience firsthand. Look up Matthew 14:28–31, Mark 9:33–34, John 13:6–9 and Matthew 26:40. How does Jesus respond each time Peter falls short?
- In John 21, Jesus asks Peter the same question three times. Why three? What does Jesus give Peter instead of a lecture?
Live
- Where has Jesus been patient with you, over and over? Then write the name of one person you’ve run out of patience with.
My wife and I were shopping at one of those places with a long row of registers. Each register has a light, and a voice announces, “Register number five is available.” Everybody knows the unspoken rule: when a register opens, the person at the front of the line goes.
I was in a hurry. I had nowhere to be afterward. I just don’t like lines. The lady in front of me was on her phone, loud enough that everyone could enjoy her conversation. Ding. “Register number five is available.” She didn’t move. My wife and I looked at each other. Finally she put her phone down, turned around to address the rest of the line, kicked her leg out for some reason and said, “Hee hee! I’m multitasking!”
My eyes got big. Multitasking is doing two things at once. She was barely tasking. And I was the one who needed patience.
My Notes
Week 1 · Wednesday
Walk, Keep in Step, Be Led
Read Galatians 5:13–26
Say
- Paul uses three phrases about the Holy Spirit in verses 16, 18 and 25. Write them down.
- Find patience (“forbearance”) and kindness in the fruit of the Spirit in verses 22–23. What other fruit sits beside them?
Mean
- “Walk by the Spirit” (v. 16) means living day by day in the Spirit’s company. “Keep in step” (v. 25) is a military term: you march because you were told to. Being “led by the Spirit” (v. 18) is God changing you from the inside. Which of these is your part, and which is God’s?
- Why do you think Paul calls these things fruit rather than rules?
Live
- Sometimes something blocks the Spirit’s work in us: a habit, an attitude or a sin we’ve let slide. Read 1 John 1:9. Is there anything you need to bring to God today?
My Notes
Week 1 · Thursday
His Yoke Is Kind
Read Matthew 11:28–30, Titus 3:3–5 and Ephesians 4:32
Say
- Who does Jesus invite in Matthew 11:28, and what does he promise them?
- How does Jesus describe himself in verse 29?
Mean
- Weary means worked to exhaustion. Burdened means a load that keeps getting dumped on you. The word for “easy” in verse 30 is chrēstos, from the same root as “kind” in 1 Corinthians 13:4. What does it mean that following Jesus is a kindness to your soul?
- According to Titus 3:4–5, what did the kindness of God do for us? Did we earn it?
Live
- Patience takes almost anything without retaliating. Kindness gives almost anything to help. Who in your inner circle is most weary or burdened right now? What could you carry for them this week?
- One of the heaviest burdens we place on people is our expectations. Is there anyone close to you who feels you’re impossible to please?
Early one morning I was sitting in bed next to my wife, writing devotionals about kindness. I’m a church leader, remember. Meanwhile, my wife was trying to sync her earbuds to her phone. In full disclosure, it was my fault she had to sync them at all. I had taken them to the gym.
She sat there opening the little case and shutting it. Opening it. Shutting it. Every time, the phone popped up a message that said, in so many words, Tap here to connect. What a moment for a church leader to practice what he preaches.
Instead, I got irritated. I said, “Just touch the screen on the phone.” And then I said this: “It’s easy.” And I didn’t say it nice. I said it like, Woman, you are interrupting me while I teach my church about kindness.
It’s not that we don’t understand kindness. It’s that we don’t do it, starting at home.
My Notes
Week 1 · Friday
Love on Purpose
Start with the people closest to you: the person who wakes up next to you, your children, your parents, your roommate, your closest friend, the coworker you see every morning. Write up to six names.
Your Challenge
Patience. Circle the name of the person who tests your patience most. The next time they push your buttons, don’t say what you want to say. Then pray for them by name, not that they would stop irritating you, but that God would bless them.
Kindness. Put a star beside the person who is most worn out. Before group meets, do one specific, useful thing to lighten their load.
What Happened?
Pray
Father, I decided a long time ago how much patience people deserve, and I’ve been waving my arms at the door ever since. Show me a better way. Make me patient with the people closest to me, the way Jesus has been patient with me. Help me notice who is tired, and give me strength to carry some of their weight. I can’t do this on my own. Do it in me. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Go Deeper · optional
- Read Exodus 34:6. God describes himself as “slow to anger.” How does the Old Testament prepare us for makrothumia?
- Read Romans 2:4. Where does God’s kindness lead us?
- Read Luke 10:30–37. Which person shows kindness that is useful?
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