Have Prophecies Ceased: Exposition of 1 Cor. 13

I recently promised someone a face-to-face on the subject of cessationism but was unfortunately unable to follow through on that promise. It is my hope that a series of posts in this venue will suffice as an alternative.

Cessationism, the belief that the miraculous gifts of the Spirit have ceased since the times described in the New Testament, is biblically justified almost exclusively with reference to 1 Corinthians 13:

1If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

8Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. 9For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. 11When 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 gave up childish ways. 12For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.

13So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

I quote the full chapter rather than just verses 8-10 because the context is so very critical. The verses on the cessation of spiritual gifts are too frequently treated in isolation, which allows for a radically broad interpretation of what “the perfect” is. Christians, and even non-Christians, are largely familiar both with Paul’s definition of love (i.e. “Love is patient…”) and the triumvirate of Christian virtues (i.e. “So now faith, hope, and love abide…”). In the wake of Pentecostalism, Protestants--particularly those groups with a penchant for controversy--are equally familiar with the promise that speaking in tongues will cease. What seems to be entirely forgotten is that the prediction of cessation is sandwiched neatly in between Paul’s two most memorable statements about love. The verse about tongues-speaking and prophecy are not out of place. It is intimately related to Paul’s argument here, and the true meaning of these verses about cessation are wrapped up in precisely what that argument is.

Paul is writing in 1 Corinthians to a church that is perhaps more troubled than any other represented at length in the New Testament. In Corinth, they prefer human names to the name of Christ (Chapter 1), they prefer wisdom to divine folly (Chapter 2), they prefer libertinism to holiness (Chapter 5), they prefer “justice” to forgiveness (Chapter 6), and in this chapter Paul is dealing with their preference for spiritual gifts over the fruits of the Sprit (if I may subtly propose an intertextual relationship between 1 Cor. 13 and Gal. 5). The purpose in this chapter is neither merely to define love in a list of primary Christian virtues nor to stamp an expiration date on spiritual gifts. Paul’s aim is to show the superiority of love to spiritual gifts.

Paul achieves this aim in three broad strokes that roughly correspond to the paragraph divisions that we see in our modern English translations. First, Paul insists that love is what constitutes the value of the Christian life. Spiritual gifts, knowledge, charity, and even faith (which, incidentally, ought to qualify any valid understanding of sola fide) without love as their primary content and motive are all worthless.

Next, Paul gives an exposition of how love appears when it is manifest. The qualities which are listed are not so subtle jabs at the way the Corinthians have been treating one another. In fact, let’s break it down to see just how Paul’s description of love links back in to Paul’s earlier teachings in the same book:

• Love does not boast.


• Love is not arrogant.


• Love is not self-seeking.


• Love keeps no record of wrongs.


• Love does not delight in evil.

In all this it becomes quite clear that the point Paul is trying to get at is that love is characterized by behaviors and dispositions quite contrary to what the Corinthians are presently practicing. Notably, he once again elevates love even above both faith and hope by saying that love both believes (the verb is “πιστευει”) and hopes all things.

Finally, Paul concludes that--though all things are contingent on love, even faith and hope--love is contingent on nothing, not even time. “Love never ends,” and with this phrase Paul introduces the part of his argument that includes the reference to cessation. The spiritual gifts which the Corinthians are delighting in and allowing to disrupt their services, these things are ultimately transient. There was a time when they began; there will be a time when they end. Love, however, is without end. Ben Witherington has noted that even here love supersedes faith and hope, which both become obsolete eventually. In the final analysis, faith becomes sight and hope is fulfilled. Love only ever increases into eternity.

In the final rendering then, Paul is concerned first and foremost with the perfect nature of love in contrast not only to spiritual gifts, but to the knowledge that the Corinthians professed to have and to the childish behaviors that they have been exhibiting. When Paul speaks of the cessation of miraculous gifts, it is not as a passing statement of fact meant simply to inform the church at Corinth that their prophecies had a "best by" date on them. It was to illustrate that even these great gifts which they had would one day pass away, but love never would. Love, therefore, is the proper object of pursuit, the proper quality for boasting and pride (except that love does not boast and is not proud). There is nothing to glory in except love which is an all-sufficient and eternal glory.

Though I believe this analysis will be fruitful in time, the above does not really immediately solve the problem of precisely when spiritual gifts like prophecy and tongues-speaking will cease. The only thing that seems self-evident to me is that every Christian ought to be in some sense a cessationist. There will be a time when prophecies cease. The only thing left to decide is exactly when that time is.

Gay Marriage: It's the American Way

I have previously voiced my belief that it is patently unamerican that homosexuals are not allowed to marry in this country. I frankly cannot understand why the American government (at the behest of the American people) is involved in sexual ethics at all. It is legal in this country for two men to hold hands, to kiss, to have sexual intercourse, to cohabitate, to adopt children (with a little hoop jumping), to grant each other power of attorney, and to name one another in their wills. If twelve male dwarves wanted to have an orgy in a vat of chocolate pudding, they could do it legally and make the pet parrot watch. We may be disgusted by it (and I may never each chocolate pudding again after concocting that image), but there seems to be a pretty general consensus that our government should not be involved in the sexual behavior of consenting adults. It boggles my mind, in view of all this, that so many Americans would take such a firm stand on whether or not homosexuals can enter into the (unfortunately) public contract of marriage.

And since we are talking about the "rights" of homosexuals anyway, now seems as good a time as any to share a selection from Ron Paul's Liberty Defined on this very issue:

Most Americans do not question the requirement to obtain a license to get married. As in just about everything else, this requirement generates unnecessary problems and heated disagreements. If the government was not involved there would be no discussion or controversy over the definition of marriage. Why should the government give permission to two individuals for them to call themselves married? In a free society, something that we do not truly enjoy, all voluntary and consensual agreements would be recognized. If disputes arose, the courts could be involved as in any other civil dispute…

I’d like to settle the debate by turning it into a First Amendment issue: the right of free speech. Everyone can have his or her own definition of what marriage means, and if an agreement or contract is reached by the participants, it will qualify as a civil contract if desired…

I personally identify with the dictionary definition of marriage: “The social institution under which a man and woman establish their decision to live together as husband and wife by legal commitments or religious ceremony.” If others who choose a different definition do not impose their standards on anyone else, they have a First Amendment right to their own definition and access to the courts to arbitrate any civil disputes.

While I do not recall Paul mentioning it, I think it warrants remembering that marriage licences have been used throughout the past century of American history by the government in order to enforce what it believes are acceptable standards for marriages. In times not so long past, the government protected us from the possible catastrophe of marriages between whites and blacks or, worse still, Japanese! The practice is not as distant as we might like to believe. At some point, it might be nice if the people realized that they did not need the government to protect them from the gay menace. If you don't want to marry, befriend, or even break bread with a homosexual, then you are more than welcome not to. In the meantime, if you do not want the government poking around in your private contracts (or your privates in general) then it is the height of hypocrisy to demand that it interfere with the affairs of everyone else.

"...others will weep."

It's official and apparently has been for some time. The Presbyterian Church USA has officially ratified a measure that opens the door for homosexual ordination in the church, joining a small minority of official Christian bodies to do so. While in the grand scheme of the church universal three million Christians is a drop in the bucket, there is still something disturbing in the way mainline Protestant denominations seem to be succumbing slowly but surely to the rising tide of "progress."

Linda Fleming, an elder and deacon at Knox Presbyterian Church in Ladera Heights, which hosted the Pacific Presbytery meeting, said she was among those who had changed her mind on the issue in recent years.

"I finally decided at the age of 63 that it is inevitable," she said. "I think it's like letting black people come to white churches, or letting women become ministers. It's inevitable."

Still, she couldn't help but express surprise. "For the Presbyterian Church, which is a mainline church, a graying church, it's something."

So reports the LA Times. I sincerely hope that was not the attitude of most of those voting. It is one thing to take a stand on what you believe is correct and another matter entirely to reverse course merely out of fatalistic resignation. I would much rather people take a strong stand on the issue, be convicted of it, rather than support a radical revision of Christian sexual ethics on the basis of ambivalence. Thoughts like these are actually less offensive to me:

"This is an important moment in the Christian communion," said Michael Adee, a Presbyterian elder who heads an organization that fought for gay ordination. "I rejoice that Presbyterians are focusing on what matters most: faith and character, not a person's marital status or sexual orientation."

Of course the separation of a person's sexual behavior from his or her character is entirely artificial. People's genitals are subject to moral agency no less than any other part of their anatomy. If what I do with my hands, where I go with my feet, and what I say with my mouth all speak to and constitute my character then so does into whom I stick my penis, if you can pardon the crudeness (and even if you can't). Christianity Today makes a similar point:

Christianity is a tradition; it is a faith with a particular ethos, set of beliefs and practices handed on from generation to generation. The Christian tradition may be understood as the history of what God's people have believed and how they have lived based upon the Word of God. This tradition is not only a collection of accepted doctrines but also a set of lifestyle expectations for a follower of Christ. One of the primary things handed down in the Christian church over the centuries is a consistent set of lifestyle ethics including specific directives about sexual behavior. The church of every generation from the time of the apostles has condemned sexual sin as unbecoming a disciple of Christ. At no point have any orthodox Christian teachers ever suggested that one's sexual practices may deviate from biblical standards.

Concerning homosexuality there has been absolute unanimity in church history; sexual intimacy between persons of the same gender has never been recognized as legitimate behavior for a Christian. One finds no examples of orthodox teachers who suggested that homosexual activity could be acceptable in God's sight under any circumstances. Revisionist biblical interpretations that purport to support homosexual practice are typically rooted in novel hermeneutical principles applied to Scripture, which produce bizarre interpretations of the Bible held nowhere, never, by no one.

I will now begin taking bets who which denomination will be the next to fall in line.

Breaking News: Liberals Run the Media

In a new revelation that should shock absolutely no one, Ben Shapiro is claiming that liberals run the media. Sure, it's been a stock accusation by conservatives for years now, but Shapiro says he has proof: the liberals themselves admitting it with glee. In a newly released book, Primetime Propaganda: The True Hollywood Story of How the Left Took Over Your TV, Shapiro breaks down the content of dozens of interviews with the minds behind Friends, House, Happy Days, Rosanne, M*A*S*H, and more. They gladly admit not only that they actively pushed a progressive social and political agenda in their TV shows but that they delight in the fact that conservatives are ostracized and discriminated against in Hollywood. Here are some snippets of what Shapiro claims to have gotten out of his interviews:

In one video, "Friends" co-creator Marta Kauffman says that when she cast Candace Gingrich-Jones, half-sister of Republican former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, as the minister of a lesbian wedding, "There was a bit of [a middle finger] in it to the right wing."

Kauffman also acknowledges she "put together a staff of mostly liberal people," which is another major point of Shapiro's book: that conservatives aren't welcome in Hollywood.

Maybe that's because they're "idiots" and have "medieval minds." At least that's what "Soap" and "Golden Girls" creator Susan Harris thinks of TV's conservative critics.

However, the ranks of dumb right-wingers has dwindled, according to Harris, whose video has her saying: "At least, you know, we put Obama in office, and so people, I think, are getting — have gotten — a little bit smarter."

...an additional video has Di Bona, who also created "America's Funniest Home Videos," becoming remarkably blunt about his approval of a lack of political diversity in Hollywood. When Shapiro asks what he thinks of conservative critics who say everyone in Hollywood is liberal, Di Bona responds: "I think it's probably accurate, and I'm happy about it."

Even more interesting than the obvious revelations that shows like Friends or M*A*S*H have an agenda are accusations that shows with a wide viewing audience among conservatives are also secretly trying to push a liberal agenda. The most obvious example of this:

Shapiro released two videos Tuesday, one featuring "COPS" creator John Langley saying he's partial to segments where white people are the criminals...

I know a lot of people who are very restrictive about what their children watch on TV. I have always understood it, but I admit that it always made me sort of uneasy. At the same time, I wonder to what degree the liberality of my own parents TV watching habits has affected my worldview. I suppose at the very least it merits consideration to what degree we want to allow ourselves and our children to be subtly indoctrinated by people who have an admitted agenda in their programming. After all, according to Shapiro, not even Sesame Street is above reproach. It's a good thing I was raised on Mr. Rogers.

Osama bin Laden is dead.

Osama bin Laden is dead. That is clearly old news at this point, but to be quite frank I didn't care much about the fact that he was killed. Tens of thousands of people have died in our crusade to kill this one man. Their deaths collectively seem to merit more attention to me. (For example, more people should really be asking the question: is any man worth it?) We did, however, stay up the night it was announced to see what exactly the president had to say. When Geraldo broke the news to us that the announcement was about bin Laden's death, we went to sleep.

What interests me more than his death is the response that came in the wake of his death. Geraldo was positively giddy, delighted in a way that would have put any school girl to shame. In addition to seeming unprofessional, it struck me as inappropriate that anyone should be so very delighted about the death of another human being no matter how "evil" he may have been. Unfortunately, Geraldo was not alone. The whole country seemed to be elated at the idea that this one man had finally been killed, as if our whole national consciousness had no greater aim in the decade since the September, 11 attacks. It was unnerving. After weeks of believing that I was largely alone in my distaste of this shameless reveling in death, a poll has shown that a majority of American Christians (albeit a slim majority) believe that the response to bin Laden's death was inconsistent with biblical teachings:

Americans are more conflicted over whether Christian values are consistent with the raucous celebrations that broke out after bin Laden was killed. About 60 percent of respondents—ranging from seven in 10 minority Christians to just over half of white mainline Protestants—believe the Bible’s message, “Do not rejoice when your enemies fall,” applies to the death of bin Laden.

I was relieved to find that so many others were uneasy, so many other recognized the blatantly inconsistency between the way Jesus tells us to treat our enemies and the way the American people reacted to bin Laden's death. That relief was, however, immediately met with a new round of disappointment when the same poll revealed that some eighty percent of Evangelicals believe that bin Laden is at this moment burning eternally in hell. Why are we bothering to take a stand on his eternal resting place at all? Are we in the judgement seat? I wonder if perhaps what this poll really reveals is that 80% of evangelicals are too concerned about the eternal disposition of the souls of others and not concerned enough about their own.

In other, even more disturbing, findings:

-- A slim majority (53 percent) of Americans say the U.S. should follow the Golden Rule and not use any methods on our enemies that we would not want used on our own soldiers—down from 2008, when 62 percent agreed.

Support for the Golden Rule principle was strongest among minority Christians, Catholics and religiously unaffiliated Americans (all with majorities above 52 percent), but less so among evangelicals (47 percent) and mainline Protestants (42 percent).

-- Younger Americans between the ages of 18 and 34 (69 percent) are more likely to believe the Bible passage about not celebrating “when your enemies fall” applies to bin Laden than do those age 65 and older (47 percent).

-- Religiously unaffiliated Americans (57 percent) are significantly more likely than Christians to say the use of torture against suspected terrorists can never be justified. Catholics, at 53 percent, are the Christian group most likely to say torture can never be justified.

-- Majorities of white evangelicals (54 percent) and minority Christians (51 percent) believe God had a hand in locating bin Laden, compared to only a third of white mainline Protestants and 42 percent of Catholics.

-- A slim majority (51 percent) of Americans believe God has granted America a special role in human history, led by two-thirds of evangelicals and nearly as many (63 percent) minority Christians, compared to 51 percent of Catholics and white mainline Protestants.

Prothero said he was most surprised by the Golden Rule responses, which indicate that half the country is willing to disregard Christianity’s most commonly expressed teaching—at least, when it comes to wartime.

A Memorial Day Salute to Saluting

I am, unabashedly and vocally, a pacifist in as broad a terms as I can imagine that word being applied. I would like to set that aside for the purposes of this thought, however, and assume for the sake of argument a stance that I believe that it is possible for a war to be justified morally, legally, or even pragmatically. It is Memorial Day, a holiday which in true American fashion was begun to honor the armed services but for all intents and purposes now only honors American decadence in all its wasteful, gluttonous, self-indulgent glory. Nevertheless, a variety of forces still conspire to provide the American public with a nagging reminder that they should be mindful of the military. Beer commercials, talk show hosts, and billboards all remind us to save a moment between our third and fourth helping of potato salad for gratitude for those courageous members of the military who have served and continue to serve protecting our American freedoms.

That is not, I suppose, such an offensive notion in itself. My grandfather served in World War II with distinction, earning a purple heart, and I was raised to feel a certain sense of awe at the thought of that greatest generation. I grasp that in the terms of prevailing moral sentiment that Hitler was a bad man who the world had an ethical imperative to stop. I understand that at Pearl Harbor the sovereign borders of the United States were violated by the army of a foreign state. I can understand the reverence paid to the veterans of World War II.

But I struggle with the idea that the very fact of military service somehow requires deference. There is a popular idea that stretches across the political spectrum that it is somehow beyond debate that men and women who have volunteered for service in the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq deserve praise. Why is that? I am not sure that violence ever deserves praise, but when it is violence which neither protects American liberty nor rights an egregious wrong it seems insufficient to me to appeal to a vague sense of obligation and expect everyone to genuflect before veterans of unjust wars.

I am reading through Ron Paul’s Liberty Defined right now, and he points out that the wars the United States is currently engaged in do not stand up to any reasonable criteria of justification. They are not legal, moral, or pragmatic. He explains:

We have spent a couple trillion dollars, and most importantly, sacrificed a lot more Americans than died on 9/11. Nearly 6,000 have been killed, and hundreds of thousands of physical and mental casualties have been sustained, in addition to hundreds of thousands of Iraqi and Afghani citizens, only to see the Taliban and al Qaeda moving into Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia…Every time there’s a military confrontation, whether in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, or Yemen, even Somalia, “victory” is reported since so many “insurgents” were killed, and when examined closely there is an admission that many civilian casualties resulted as well, referred to as collateral damage. If it was always reported that we killed “freedom fighters” defending their homeland, which is closer to the truth, the American people would be outraged.

Even if I do not share the view, I can understand the mindset which believes that many traits of the soldier are noble. Apparent courage and self-sacrifice are easily lauded, but I would suggest that, regardless of your positions on war in general, there is nothing laudable about having the courage to attack an enemy who has not attacked you or to sacrifice yourself for an unjust cause. Paul writes elsewhere,

The endless praise offered to those who serve in the military--“thank you for your service” in defending the empire--is a required politically correct salutation to our “universal” soldiers. No, they never say thank you for “defending the empire”; it’s much more decent--it’s thank you for defending our freedoms, our Constitution, and for fighting “them” over there so we don’t’ have to fight them here at home. Though the wars we fight are now unconstitutional, the military is endlessly praised for defending our liberties and Constitution.

I am not proposing any kind of antagonism towards America’s armed forces. The idea of more Vietnam era behavior where returning soldiers are reviled, shamed, and abused by the public is really no less distasteful than the kind of intolerant violence that ought to be opposed overseas. I am only hoping that people will be critical of what seems to be a largely uncritical attitude of quasi-religious reverence toward servicemen and women. What is it that deserves praise? What warrants our respect? At the very least, I would hope that it is not the mere willingness to enlist whatever the aim, whatever the orders, whatever the cost (measured in human lives rather than American citizens). There is no virtue in that.

The Church in Egypt (Update)

A story from the Assyrian International News Agency yesterday (to be taken with a grain of salt) reports that three Christians were just sentenced to five years in prison by a military court for carrying weapons:

Defense lawyer Abraham Edward said "This is a very unjust, severe and cruel verdict." He said that as lawyers they are unable to fathom what is going on. "Today's case is very strange, a case where there is not one shred of evidence to indict them. If this case went in front of the International Court of Justice they would all be set free." He criticized the five-year prison sentence handed down to Ayad Emad Ayad for carrying a pocket knife. According to the law this is punishable by a six months suspended sentence.