<p>13:8 <i>Love never fails- </i>This continues the idea of love enduring all things (see on :7). Love is never 'blown off course'; the end in view is our salvation, intertwined as it is with that of those whom we serve in love. All forms of burnout- a common experience in the Christian life- result from not keeping that end in view.</p><p><i>But whether there be prophecies, they shall be done away. Whether there be speaking in foreign languages, this shall cease. Whether there be the gift of knowledge, it shall be done away- </i>&ldquo;But whether&rdquo; suggests Paul recognizes there may be false claims to the prophetic gift. He is not going to go into this, but rather makes the larger case- that whether or not, they are going to pass away and are not the essential thing. The failing, ceasing, doing away of the miraculous gifts is contrasted to the love which does not fail- because see comment on <i>Love never fails</i> the end view of salvation at the last day is kept ever in view. Prophecy- both in the sense of prediction of the future and the speaking forth of God's word- shall not be needed in the Kingdom. Likewise the gift of knowledge will be obviated by being with the Lord; and there shall be no need to preach in foreign languages once the earth is filled with the knowledge of the Lord's glory as the waters cover the sea, as anticipated in the Old Testament prophecies of that age. This is not to say that this passage does not also anticipate the fading away of the miraculous gifts in the first century. That too is in view, especially in :11, but Paul is asking the Corinthians to adopt a Kingdom perspective, and not seek to display the miraculous gifts which would not play any role eternally. Love does and will play that role eternally. And this then is to be our focus. The focus on the three gifts of prophecy, foreign languages and knowledge is not incidental. These were the very things practiced and claimed in the religious cults of Corinth, and especially at the nearby shrine of Delfi. The Corinthians were basing their Christian life upon those cults, claiming to be able to do these things in the name of having the miraculous Spirit gifts. Paul could have directly confronted them over these issues- but instead he argues more subtly that the Christian life is supremely about love, about building others up so that they will enter God's Kingdom. At best, focus upon the miraculous gifts is therefore misplaced and immature- and that perhaps could be our starting point in dialogue with Pentecostals.</p><p>Paul didn't just start writing his poem about love in 1 Cor. 13. It's wedged firmly in a context, a clearly defined unit of material about the use of the Spirit gifts spanning 1 Cor. 12-14. Having clarified his own authority and personal experience of the miraculous gifts, he proceeds to shew the Corinthians &quot;a more excellent way&quot; (1 Cor. 12:31). He uses a Greek word four times, although most English translations render it inconsistently. It's worth highlighting the words in your Bible, maybe with a note like &quot;s.w.&quot; 'same word' next to them:<br />- &quot;Prophecies shall <i>fail</i>&quot; (1 Cor. 13:8)<br />- The Spirit gift of &quot;knowledge shall <i>vanish away</i>&quot; (1 Cor. 13:8)<br />- &quot;That which is partial shall be <i>done away</i>&quot; (1 Cor. 13:10)<br />- &quot;Now that I am become a man mature, I have <i>put away</i> childish immature things&quot; (1 Cor. 13:11).</p><p>I read this as Paul saying that he used the miraculous gifts of the Holy Spirit in his spiritual immaturity; but in his maturity, he chose not to use them, he &quot;put them away&quot;. Paul also writes of how the miraculous gifts will be &quot;done away&quot; when &quot;that which is perfect complete, mature is come&quot; (1 Cor. 13:10). He seems to be saying that his personal growth from childhood to manhood, from immaturity to maturity, is a reflection of how ultimately the gifts will be no more when the mature state has come; and he wishes to attain that state now in this life, and thus he ceased using the gifts. He asks us likewise in this context to follow his pattern, to be &quot;mature&quot; AV &quot;be men&quot; (1 Cor. 14:20). This connects with how he speaks in Col. 3:14 of &quot;above all&quot; having love, which is the seal, the proof, of the mature state AV &quot;the bond of perfectness&quot;. In his own way, John spoke of the same state when he wrote of &quot;perfect / mature love&quot;, and how he who fears hasn't reached the 'perfected-in-love' stage (1 Jn. 4:18). Instead of flaunting the Spirit gifts, Paul sold his soul for love; he gave himself over to the life characterized by the kind of love about which he writes so powerfully in his poem. Paul laments that the Corinthians weren't mature nor Spirit filled (1 Cor. 3:1,2), and wishes to be able to speak to them as &quot;mature&quot; (1 Cor. 2:6). So often in the decisions we face in life, it doesn't come down to a right or wrong, a yes or no; rather it's a question of what is the mature Christian behaviour, and what isn't.</p><p>The same Greek word translated &ldquo;fail&hellip; be done away&hellip;. vanish away&rdquo; is used in many other places concerning the passing away of the Mosaic Law:<br />-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &ldquo;We are <i>delivered</i> from the law&rdquo; (Rom. 7:6). We are like a woman <i>loosed</i> from her husband, i.e. the Law of Moses (Rom. 7:2). <br />-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The glory of the Law was to be <i>done away</i> (2 Cor. 3:7)<br />-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The Law <i>is being done away</i> at the time Paul was writing (2 Cor. 3:11 Gk.). It was <i>abolished</i>, <i>done away </i>in Christ (:13,14)<br />-&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Christ <i>abolished</i> the law of commandments (Eph. 2:15)<br />Likewise, the prophecy that &ldquo;tongues shall <i>cease</i>&rdquo; (1 Cor. 13:8) uses the same word as in Heb. 10:2, concerning how the sacrifices <i>cease</i> to be offered. The &ldquo;perfect man&rdquo; state of the church, at which the Spirit gifts were to be withdrawn (1 Cor. 13:10; Eph. 4:13) is to be connected with how the Lord Jesus is the &ldquo;greater and more <i>perfect</i> tabernacle&rdquo; compared to the Mosaic one (Heb. 9:11). The conclusion seems to be that the ending of the Spirit gifts was related to the ending of the Mosaic system in AD70.&nbsp;</p><p>Closer reflection upon 1 Cor. 13 suggests that the time of the withdrawal of the gifts was in fact at the time when the Mosaic sacrifices ceased to be offered. There was an interim period between the death of the Lord Jesus and the destruction of the temple in AD70. During this time, various concessions were made to the Jewish believers; they were permitted to obey Mosaic regulations for the time being, even though the Spirit through Paul made it clear that they were unable to give salvation, and were in comparison to Christ &ldquo;the weak and beggarly elements&rdquo;. The early believers were guided through this period by the presence of the miraculous Holy Spirit gifts amongst them, pronouncing, prophesying, enabling preaching in new areas through the gift of languages, organizing the ecclesias etc. But once the ecclesia came to maturity, the written word replaced the gifts. Most if not all the New Testament was completed by AD70, and this was around the time the gifts were withdrawn. Paul uses the same Greek word several times in 1 Cor. 13, even though it is somewhat masked in the translations. The following words in italics all translate the same Greek word: &ldquo;Prophecies&hellip;shall <i>fail</i>&hellip;the gift of knowledge shall <i>vanish away</i>&hellip;that which is in part shall <i>be done away</i>&hellip;when I became a man, I <i>put away</i> childish things&rdquo; (:8,10,11).</p><p>Paul is predicting how the gifts of the Spirit would be withdrawn once the church reached the point of maturity; but he says that he himself has already matured, and he has &ldquo;put away&rdquo; the things of his immaturity- i.e. he no longer exercised the gifts for himself. He presents himself, as he often does, as the pattern for the church to follow. Thus the gifts &ldquo;shall be done away&rdquo; in the future for the church as a whole when they are perfect / mature, but for him, he has already &lsquo;done them away&rsquo; as he has himself reached maturity. In the same language as Ephesians 4, he is no longer a child, tossed to and fro and needing the support of the Spirit gifts. He laments that the believers were still children (1 Cor. 3:1; Heb. 5:13)- yet, using the same Greek word, he says that he is no longer a child, but is mature. In Gal. 4:3, Paul speaks about how he had once been a child in the sense that he was under the Mosaic Law. But now, he has put that behind him. He is mature; and yet here in 1 Cor. 13:10 he associates being mature with putting away the gifts of the Spirit.</p>