“Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up,”
My Notes
What Does 1 Corinthians 13:4 Mean?
Paul defines love with a series of actions, not emotions. Charity (agape) suffereth long — it endures. It is kind — actively good. Then comes a list of what love is not: envious, boastful, puffed up. Each negation removes a counterfeit.
This is the beginning of the famous love chapter, 1 Corinthians 13. Paul wrote it to a church obsessed with spiritual gifts — tongues, prophecy, knowledge — and told them that without love, none of it matters.
The first two attributes — long-suffering and kindness — set the character of love. It bears with people over time, and it actively does good. Everything that follows is a further unpacking of these two qualities.
"Vaunteth not itself" means love does not parade itself or seek attention. "Not puffed up" means love does not inflate its own importance. Love's focus is outward, not inward.
Reflection Questions
- 1.Which attribute of love in this verse comes naturally to you, and which is hardest?
- 2.How does defining love by actions rather than feelings change your understanding?
- 3.Where are you failing to 'suffer long' with someone — where has your patience run out?
- 4.What would your closest relationships look like if you practiced this definition of love daily?
Devotional
Charity suffereth long, and is kind. That is love in two strokes: patience and active goodness. Not one without the other. Patient without kindness is just endurance. Kind without patience runs out when things get hard.
Then Paul tells you what love does not do. It does not envy what others have. It does not boast about what it has. It does not puff itself up, making itself the center of every room.
This is not a description of how love feels. It is a description of how love acts. You can feel nothing particularly warm and still choose to suffer long, to be kind, to not envy.
That is the revolutionary thing about Paul's definition. Love is not a mood. It is a series of decisions made over and over — to endure, to be good, to let go of comparison, to refuse to make yourself the main character.
Which of these descriptions fits your love right now? And which one exposes where your love has a gap?
Commentary
Trusted original commentary from respected historical Bible scholars and theologians.
Charity suffereth long,.... The apostle, in this and some following verses, enumerates the several properties and…
Charity suffereth long - Paul now proceeds to illustrate the “nature” of love, or to show how it is exemplified. His…
(1.)
Charity suffereth long - Μακροθυμει, Has a long mind; to the end of which neither trials, adversities,…
The apostle gives us in these verses some of the properties and effects of charity, both to describe and commend it,…
Charity suffereth long, and is kind The first the passive, the second the active, exercise of love; the one endurance,…
Cross References
Related passages throughout Scripture