1 Corinthians 14:1

“Make love your aim, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy.” RSV

Paul talks about three things here. And I believe that he gives a sort of spiritual hierarchy. In other words, the words are ordered in a specific way for a specific reason. One follows the other; the first is most important and the others naturally flow from it.

• Make love your aim
• Earnestly desire the spiritual gifts
• Especially that you may prophesy

I think this is so important. The pentecostal/charismatic church of today is focused on the gifts of the Spirits. We want all the miracles, all the power, all the supernatural that we can have from God. And yet, I think that often it is power without love. And power without love is deadly. It is damaging. Because power, sought for itself, ends up becoming self-centered. We want power for us. We want prosperity for us. We want success for us.

How many prosperity preachers do you hear who teach that we should pray for blessings for our enemies? That we should ask God to give success and finances and health to those who hate us? How many are praying that for the Saddam Husseins and Hugo Chavezes of the world? And yet, this is exactly what the Lord Jesus commanded us to do:
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you salute only your brethren, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?” (Matthew 5:43-47 RSV)

Paul expands on this topic even more:

“No, ‘if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals upon his head’” (Romans 12:20 RSV).

If we make love our aim, then our first impulse will be to want to heap blessings upon, not only those around us, but even our enemies. We will want the best for everyone else, trusting God to take care of us.

This is a struggle because our natural selves tell us to promote us! We want to get the blessings for ourselves and our family. But this isn’t the Christian way. Our way is to make ourselves less so that others might prosper, so that others might be blessed. Our way is to place others ahead of ourselves so that they might be successful, they might receive blessings, they might have good health and much wealth. Being a Christian isn’t about getting as much as I can for myself. It’s about making sure that others have what they need (and want) and trusting God to take care of me. It’s about having the kind of eternal perspective that naturally flows out of loving others.

And it’s only after we do this that we can then desire spiritual gifts. Because spiritual gifts without love are a time bomb waiting to go off, a bomb that will bring not blessings, but destruction everywhere. Spiritual gifts only honor God and bless us when they are operated within love. Outside of that they are simply a way to manipulate and get all we can for ourselves. Not a pretty picture for a Christian.

But Paul is even more defining here. He tells us to seek the spiritual gift of prophesy more than any other gift. More than prosperity. More than healing. More than miracles. Why? Because prophesying is that ability to tell forth God’s word to both the saved and unsaved. Because prophesying brings spiritual healing through the Word.

The Word of God is paramount. Nothing else really matters; nothing else will really last.

And even those denominations and churches which deny women the opportunity to pastor will admit that women in the Bible were fully empowered to prophesy! In other words, this isn’t something we can be denied. We can prophesy . . . and we should.

The Greek word translated here “earnestly desire” is a very strong word. “Zeloo.” It’s the word from which we get the English word “zeal.” It means to burn with desire or zeal; to pursue; to desire earnestly; to strive after; to busy oneself with.

In other words, it is to be our focus. We are running around pursuing (desiring, busying ourselves with) all kinds of activities and goals and pursuits. When actually, we should be focused on these things: loving others, desiring to do God’s work, wanting to prophesy to those around us. Those should be our goals. And nothing—no loss, no disappointment, no sorrow—can take those goals away from us. Those goals are possible in a castle or in a prison cell, at work or during unemployment, in riches or in poverty. Our circumstances melt away when we strive for the things which God has commanded us to do.

Nothing else matters. Nothing else counts.

Isn’t it about time we focused on those things which have eternal value?