Back to all lyrics
Artwork for Charity Never Faileth

1 Corinthians 13:1-13

Charity Never Faileth

Lyrics · 1 Corinthians

Charity Never Faileth

1 Corinthians 13:1-13

Lyrics

About this song

About this song

This song belongs to the 1 Corinthians collection. One recording is available to play here, with the complete lyrics below.

Bible book
1 Corinthians
Collection
1 Corinthians
Musical styles
Uncategorized
[Without Charity] Tongues of men and angels may ring, Yet brass without charity is all they can sing. Prophecy, knowledge, mysteries clear, And mountain-moving faith can still disappear. [Verse I] Goods may be scattered, the body may burn, But love cannot be bought by the praise we earn. Charity suffers long and remains kind, It envies no gift and exalts not the mind. [Chorus] Charity never faileth, It bears and believes, it hopes and endures. It rejoices in truth, not another one's fall, And seeks not its own as the center of all. Charity never faileth, When prophecies cease, love remains. [Verse II] It does not behave with dishonor or spite, Is not quickly provoked and keeps no ledger of wrong. Now knowledge is partial and prophecy part, But fullness will answer the childhood of heart. [Bridge] Now we see through a glass, dark and dim, Then face to face where the shadows grow thin. Now only in part, then fully made known, As even already we are fully known. [Final Chorus] Charity never faileth, Faith, hope, and charity abide. But the greatest of these is charity, The gift that survives when the others subside. [Coda] Not a softer ornament, But the measure of every gift.

About the passage

1 Corinthians 13: The gift that cannot replace love

Placed between a chapter about gifts and a chapter about regulating them, love is not a decorative interruption. Paul makes it the test every spiritual ability must survive. Tongues, prophecy, mysteries, knowledge, mountain-moving faith, generosity, and even bodily sacrifice can all become zero in his reckoning when love is absent. He then describes love in verbs and refusals that sound like a direct indictment of Corinth's habits: no envy, boasting, inflation, self-seeking, or delight in wrongdoing. The argument finally reaches time itself. Prophecy, tongues, and present knowledge belong to a partial condition that will not last forever, while love does not fail. Childhood and a dim mirror describe the limitations of the present without making present gifts unreal. Faith, hope, and charity remain, but love is greatest because the church's most prized capacities are temporary while love belongs to the fullness toward which they point.

Study 1 Corinthians 13 in depth