1 Corinthians 13:11

Paul wrote this chapter to a church that had gifts in abundance and was torn by pride. In 1 Corinthians 12 and 1 Corinthians 14 he deals with the variety, purpose and right use of spiritual gifts, and between the two he sets this chapter as “a more excellent way” (1 Corinthians 12:31). The believers in Corinth had split into factions (1 Corinthians 1:10–17), they shamed one another at the Lord’s Supper (1 Corinthians 11:17–34), and their meetings had to be brought back to order (1 Corinthians 14:26–33). Corinth was a busy, wealthy port city whose many cults and schools of philosophy prized fine speech and ecstatic experience, and some in the church treated tongues and prophecy as signs that they stood higher than others. Paul has already said that even the most impressive gifts are worthless without love (1 Corinthians 13:1–3). Now he gives the reason love stands above them all: it lasts, and they pass.

“Charity” is agápē, the love Paul has just described in verses 4 to 7. It reflects God’s own nature, and it is a matter of choice and action as well as feeling, because it seeks the good of others even at a cost to itself. John writes that “love is of God” and that “God is love” (1 John 4:7–8). The verb “faileth”, ekpíptō, means to drop away or fall off, and Paul joins it to the strong word oudépote, “never”. Whatever else falls away, love will remain.

Verse 9 opens with gár, “for”, which gives the reason the gifts will end: they are partial. To know, ginṓskō, is to know, come to know, perceive or understand, and “in part” translates ek merous, from méros, a part, share or portion. Whatever we know now, even what God has shown us, is a portion of the whole. To prophesy, prophēteúō, is to speak under inspiration, and in the New Testament that covers teaching, exhortation, comfort and revelation as well as foretelling what is to come. Paul says that this too comes in part. Prophecy gives true glimpses of God’s mind and will, fitted for the time until we have full and direct fellowship with him.

The apostle includes himself in that “we”, and it humbles us. He had already rebuked the Corinthians for boasting, asking them, “what hast thou that thou didst not receive?” (1 Corinthians 4:6–7). He says of himself, “Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect” (Philippians 3:12). Knowing in part is a reason to hold what we understand with humility and to keep learning all our lives. It also points forward. With all the children of God we hope for what is still unseen, the redemption of the body, and we wait for it with patience (Romans 8:23–25).

“That which is perfect” translates to teleion, from téleios, which means complete, mature, full-grown or finished. Here it means the completeness that ends the partial, and Paul sets it directly against “that which is in part”. His word is neuter, “the perfect thing”, and it names a state of full revelation and completion. When it comes, the partial “shall be done away”, katargéō once more. The gifts are like scaffolding, needed while a building goes up and taken down once it is complete.

The perfect is most often understood as the return of Christ and the eternal state that follows it. Verse 12 points that way with its “then face to face”, and so do the promises that the Lord himself shall descend from heaven and that “so shall we ever be with the Lord” (1 Thessalonians 4:16–17), and that “when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2). Paul also speaks of the church growing up “unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ” (Ephesians 4:13).

To show why the partial must give way, Paul turns to his own life. “Child” is nḗpios, an infant or minor, and figuratively someone simple or immature. The word has traditionally been traced to roots meaning “not speaking”, which fits Paul’s “I spake as a child”. He names three things, speaking, understanding and thinking, so that the whole of a child’s life is in view. All three verbs are in the Greek imperfect tense, the tense of what goes on day after day, and they describe the habits of a child’s ongoing state.

“Became” is gínomai, to become or come into being, and “a man” is anḗr, a grown man, an adult male. “I put away childish things” uses katargéō again, in the perfect tense: Paul has set those ways aside, and they stay set aside. They belong to his past.

The picture explains the verses around it. Our present knowing is like a child’s, real and fitting for its stage, and the coming of the perfect will be like reaching full manhood, when the ways of childhood are left behind. It also speaks to us now. Paul longs for believers to come “unto a perfect man” so that “we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine” (Ephesians 4:13–14). Hebrews says that milk is for babes and strong meat belongs to those of full age, whose senses are trained by use to discern good and evil (Hebrews 5:12–14). Paul himself kept pressing “toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:12–14).

The “glass” is a mirror, ésoptron. Mirrors in Paul’s day were made of polished metal, usually bronze or silver, and gave a dim and often distorted reflection. “Darkly” translates en ainigmati, from aínigma, a riddle or enigma. Our present sight of God and his truth is indirect and puzzling. We see something real, and what we see is veiled.

“Face to face” is the language of direct, close meeting. It was used of an audience with a king, and Scripture uses it of Moses: “the LORD spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend” (Exodus 33:11). In that day we will see God directly: “they shall see his face” (Revelation 22:4), and “we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2).

After all the gifts that pass, Paul names what remains. “Abideth” is ménō, to stay, remain or endure. Faith, pístis, is persuasion and conviction: trust in God’s truthfulness and promises, and reliance on Christ for salvation. Hope, elpís, is expectation, looking forward with confidence to what God has promised, the return of Christ and eternal life. Charity is agápē once more.

These three stand together elsewhere in Paul. In Romans, being justified by faith, we rejoice in hope, and that hope “maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us” (Romans 5:1–5). In Galatians we wait for the hope of righteousness by faith, and what counts is “faith which worketh by love” (Galatians 5:5–6). Paul thanks God for the Colossians’ faith in Christ Jesus and their love to all the saints, “for the hope which is laid up for you in heaven” (Colossians 1:4–5).

“Greatest” is meízōn, the comparative of the word for great, meaning larger or greater. Faith and hope keep their full worth, and love stands above them both.

Everything in this passage leads to Jesus Christ. He is the enduring love of verse 8 in person, shown supremely on the cross: “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). He is “the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever” (Hebrews 13:8). The gifts all pointed to him. The risen Lord, “beginning at Moses and all the prophets”, expounded to his disciples “in all the scriptures the things concerning himself” (Luke 24:27). At Pentecost the disciples “began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance” (Acts 2:4), a sign of the new covenant he had begun. The knowledge we hold in part is complete in him, “in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Colossians 2:3), for in him “dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily” (Colossians 2:9).

God has spoken to us in these last days by his Son (Hebrews 1:1–2). Christ is “the image of the invisible God” (Colossians 1:15), “the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person” (Hebrews 1:3), and the only begotten Son has declared the Father to us (John 1:18). So the face-to-face seeing of verse 12 is the sight of God in Christ, through whom “we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father” (Ephesians 2:18). He is “the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27). In him we are fully known and fully loved, and we are being conformed to his image (Romans 8:29) until the day we see him as he is.

Love outlasts every gift, so it is worth giving our lives to. Our gifts, our knowledge and our service matter, and they are temporary tools that God gives for a purpose, which makes them a reason for gratitude and humility. Jesus told his disciples to love one another as he had loved them, and said that by this all men would know they were his disciples (John 13:34–35). To put away childish things is to let the mind be in us “which was also in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 2:5) and to walk “even as he walked” (1 John 2:6). Every act of love, seeking the good of others, forgiving, enduring and giving ourselves up for them, is building something that will last for ever.

Knowing in part also shapes how we hold what we believe. We can hold our convictions with grace, be patient with brothers and sisters who see some things differently, and stay open to learning more from God’s word. The questions we carry now and the things we see only darkly belong to this present age as well. A day is coming when we shall see face to face and know even as we are known, and the love God has given us will go on in his presence for ever.