No Greater Love.
Love does not delight in evil.
Well this is an easy one. I don’t think many of us would raise our hand if someone were to say, “Who here delights in evil?” Oh, yes, er, dang – every morning I wake up and think here I am delighting in evil again. But 1 Corinthians would not include that love does not delight in evil unless humanity was prone to do this very thing, so…we ponder.
I think at times we forget that we are human and the very bent of humanity is evil. We are not taught to lie as a child when our mother asks if we ate a cookie when we knew we shouldn’t. We are not taught to hold on tighter as a two year old when someone wants to play with the toy we desire. Humanity as a whole is bent towards sin and we must desire to choose something different than our natural bent.
A different translation of “evil” is wrongdoing. Love does not delight in wrongdoing. That feels a little less hostile, but still does not feel like something most of us would see as a temptation.
Let’s look at a scenario:
A friend is playing with fire. Not just a little fire, but a pretty big fire, one that has potential to cause destruction not only to herself, but to those around her. I know its fire, but she keeps telling me that this particular fire won’t burn and has no potential to harm. The fire is the wrongdoing – something that she believes is causing her great joy. Sometimes when we are too close to the flames we get mesmerized by the beauty and forget its power. As the verse states, love would not choose to delight in my friend’s fire dance. Love would pull her away kicking and screaming knowing the outcome will cause her destruction.
Love does not delight in evil may not mean that I do not delight in evil, but I do not take delight in the careless plight of someone else. Love reaches in, in spite of charred pride and risks it all to pull out the one we love.
John 15:13 “Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.”
ARTWORK BY: Lauren Garner of Willow & Stone Designs.
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