How to be a Bride

When Paul wrote the letter to the congregations at Corinth that we call 1 Corinthians, he was not instructing them about how to have nice marriages when he got to what we marked Chapter 13. The last phrase in Chapter 12 and the first phrase in Chapter 14 make it clear that he was instructing them regarding being, together, married to Jesus. How that “together” was possible is what he called “an even better way.”

Please read it as advice on how to work with the rest of the believers who are also trying to get their lives and ministries right:

But desire the greater gifts. And I will show you an even better way.
If I speak the languages of men and of angels, but do not have love,
I am a sounding gong or a clanging cymbal.
If I have the gift of prophecy,
and understand all mysteries and all knowledge,
and if I have all faith, so that I can move mountains,
but do not have love, I am nothing.
And if I donate all my goods to feed the poor,
and if I give my body to be burned,
but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient; love is kind. Love does not envy;
is not boastful; is not conceited;
does not act improperly; is not selfish;
is not provoked; does not keep a record of wrongs;
finds no joy in unrighteousness, but rejoices in the truth;
bears all things, believes all things,
hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends.
But as for prophecies, they will come to an end;
as for languages, they will cease;
as for knowledge, it will come to an end.
For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.
But when the perfect comes, the partial will come to an end.
When I was a child, I spoke like a child,
I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child.
When I became a man, I put aside childish things.
For now we see indistinctly, as in a mirror, but then face to face.
Now I know in part, but then I will know fully, as I am fully known.
Now these three remain: faith, hope, and love.
But the greatest of these is love.
Pursue love and desire spiritual gifts, and above all that you may prophesy.
(1 Corinthians 12:31-14:1 Holman Christian Standard Bible ©®)