This chapter is one we should all read on a regular basis as it is so easy to forget to what we are all called: to love God and others and to allow ourselves to be loved.

"If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonour others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me.  Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

And now [in conclusion] these three [eternal truths] remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love" (1 Cor. 13 NIV).

The verb "remain" in this last statement is in the singular. It seems that in some sense Paul is regarding faith, hope and love as a single unity. As we have already seen in this chapter "love … never loses faith, love is always hopeful" (NLT). We live by faith in the Son of God. Our hope is a living hope. Our love is unique to the Christian faith: the love of selfless sacrifice. "It is not Paul's intention to rank these three in order. In the face of the Corinthians' regard for the spectacular he is saying: 'the really important things are not tongues and the like, but faith hope and love. And there is nothing greater than love'" (Leon Morris).