In the early hours of the morning, before the sun came up, the kids stood in line for the bus and the garbage man came to grab the black and blue containers outside my friends home, I struggled with 1 Corinthians 14. It’s after the love chapter: what could be more difficult than love? Actually, love is not a feeling, love is not a place, love is not a ring. Yes, love hurts, love is not endless, and it fades, and you sometimes have to do more than, tell someone you love them in a song. Love isn’t as easy as some people make it look and it’s much easier than others struggle to express. So the struggle? The struggle is to internalize, process then pass it on.
1 Cor. 14 reduces it down to three things.
“Follow the way of love and eagerly desire gifts of the Spirit, especially prophecy. 2 For anyone who speaks in a tongue does not speak to people but to God. Indeed, no one understands them; they utter mysteries by the Spirit. 3 But the one who prophesies speaks to people for their strengthening, encouraging and comfort.”
We get so scared of the word prophecy. It’s like that word no one wants to utter on the playground. It’s actually being the mouthpiece of God. So technically, we prophesy all day. Sometimes we actually are the mouthpiece of God. Other times we are our own trumpet blaring loudly. Tear the verse apart-
Follow the way of love. Stopping there could take a long detour. Simply spoken, love leads you to do things that honor others and honor God by honoring others. Do that. Do you want the things that the Holy Spirit has for you? Things like, evidence God is working in your life, such as actions of love, joy, peace ? From there, the verse talks about tongues which is another topic people hide under the coffee table so they don’t have to understand it’s meaning. So skip it because it doesn’t really help or hinder the meaning of the verse and jump right into prophecy, or being the mouthpiece of God.
We are mouthpieces. Just bring up a topic, any topic, and you will find people loudly sharing their mouthpiece. We try to convince others, persuade by vocalization loudly proclaiming our opinion and hope someone else quits talking so we can assert another opinion. God doesn’t really speak opinion have you noticed? We do, but God pretty much says, love me, love the one beside you. There isn’t much room for opinion there. There is plenty of room for love. The verse ends by telling us to encourage, strengthen and comfort. Well, that’s more of a piece than a mouthpiece. However, if we take the mouth-piece and live it, it will become something that shows encouragement, lives to strengthen others and demonstrates comfort. That’s a bit harder than just being a mouthpiece. I like to talk, spoiler alert, but there are times when I sit and marvel as I watch God unfold in front of my eyes a living canvas that words cannot describe. Prophecy or the mouthpiece of God? Yes- big time! Can I do it? I can try, and somewhere through my efforts and my struggle to be Jesus, I pray I encourage, strengthen and comfort. At least I am walking along side and making an effort to blow God out so others see, feel or hear his voice and hopefully they hear God louder than they hear me.
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