Not Wedding Material
How the Church Turned a Prophetic Confrontation into Romance
The Domestication of a Prophetic Bomb
We have taken Paul’s most devastating critique of spiritual elitism and turned it into wedding décor.
Every year, hundreds of thousands of couples stand before their friends and family while someone reads 1 Corinthians 13 as though Paul wrote romantic advice for newlyweds. The words get printed on throw pillows and coffee mugs. “Love is patient, love is kind” becomes a feel-good greeting card offering vague encouragement to be nice to each other.
This is not just a minor misreading. It represents one of Western church culture’s most complete inversions of Scripture’s actual intent.
Paul wrote these words to a community literally destroying itself through spiritual competition, status hierarchies, and knowledge elitism. He was confronting people who claimed superior spiritual experiences while treating others with contempt. He was dismantling the very idea that impressive religious performances matter if they’re destroying covenant community. These are some of the most confrontational words in the New Testament.
And we read them at weddings.
The modern use of 1 Corinthians 13 perfectly illustrates how Empire church culture neutralizes prophetic challenge into personal sentiment. We have taken a passage that confronted religious elitism and community destruction and made it about individual romantic feelings. We’ve transformed a call to radical covenant solidarity across difference into advice for making your spouse feel appreciated.
This domestication serves Empire purposes perfectly. A passage about “love” that focuses on private romantic relationships poses no threat to church hierarchies, spiritual status games, or competitive individualism. A passage about “love” that actually confronts how communities weaponize spiritual experiences against each other? That would require examining whether our churches function more like the Corinthians than we’d like to admit.
The real 1 Corinthians 13 asks uncomfortable questions: What if your biblical knowledge, your spiritual experiences, your theological correctness, your impressive ministry résumé—what if all of it means absolutely nothing if you’re not maintaining covenant loyalty to a messy community full of people you think are wrong?
That’s not wedding material. That’s a prophetic confrontation of everything we use to justify our religious hierarchies.
Scripture
1 Corinthians 12:27-31 (TLV)
27 Now you are the body of Messiah, and members individually. 28 God has placed these in Messiah’s community: first emissaries, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, leadership, various kinds of tongues. 29 All are not emissaries, are they? All are not prophets, are they? All are not teachers, are they? All do not work miracles, do they? 30 All do not have gifts of healings, do they? All do not speak in tongues, do they? All do not interpret, do they? 31 But eagerly desire the greater gifts. And I show you a far better way.
1 Corinthians 13:1-13 (TLV)
1 If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels but have no love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2If I have the gift of prophecy and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains but have no love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all that I have and if I surrender my body to be burned but have no love, I gain nothing.
4 Love is patient, love is kind, it does not envy, it does not brag, it is not puffed up, 5 it does not behave inappropriately, it does not seek its own way, it is not provoked, it keeps no account of wrong suffered, 6 it does not rejoice over injustice but rejoices in the truth; 7 it bears all things, it believes all things, it hopes all things, it endures all things.
8 Love never fails—but where there are prophecies, they will pass away; where there are tongues, they will cease; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part; 10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. 11 When 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 put aside childish things. 12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. 13 But now these three remain: faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.
1 Corinthians 14:1-5 (TLV)
1 Pursue love, yet keep on desiring spiritual gifts—especially that you may prophesy. 2 For the one who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men but to God—for no one understands, but in the Ruach he speaks mysteries. 3 But the one who prophesies speaks to men for building up, urging, and encouragement. 4 The one who speaks in a tongue builds himself up, but the one who prophesies builds up the community. 5 Now I wish you all spoke in tongues, but even more that you would prophesy. One who prophesies is greater than one who speaks in tongues—unless he interprets, so that the community may be built up.
Context
Paul didn’t write 1 Corinthians as general theological instruction. He wrote it as emergency intervention to a church plant barely a few years old that was already tearing itself apart through spiritual competition, status hierarchies, and religious elitism.
The City and Its Values
Corinth was a Roman colony city embodying Imperial values: honor competition, status advancement, patron-client hierarchies, public displays of wealth and power. The Corinthian believers brought Imperial culture directly into their gatherings—and baptized it with spiritual language.
The Specific Conflicts
Before Paul ever mentions “love,” he spends twelve chapters confronting how the Corinthians were destroying community:
Factionalism (1 Cor 1:10-17): “I follow Paul,” “I follow Apollos”—using apostolic connections as status markers
Lawsuits (1 Cor 6:1-8): Taking fellow believers to Roman courts, preferring public honor victories over community reconciliation
Knowledge Elitism (1 Cor 8:1-13): Those with “knowledge” despising those with “weak” consciences—”Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up”
Humiliation at the Lord’s Supper (1 Cor 11:17-22): Wealthy members eating lavish meals while poor members went hungry—”Do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing?”
Spiritual Gift Hierarchies (1 Cor 12:1-31): Those with “impressive” gifts claiming superiority, treating the body of Messiah as competition
What “Love” Actually Means
The Greek ἀγάπη (agapē) in first-century covenant community didn’t mean romantic feeling or general niceness. In Torah and the Prophets, hesed (covenant loyalty) and ahavah (love) described committed solidarity that held Israel together despite differences, conflicts, and failures—the refusal to abandon covenant bonds even when others were frustrating, wrong, or difficult.
In Roman Corinth’s honor-shame culture, agapē meant choosing community welfare over personal status advancement, refusing to weaponize your advantages against others, maintaining covenant solidarity across social hierarchies.
Paul’s use of agapē directly confronts Imperial values:
Empire: climb the ladder, demonstrate superiority, accumulate honor
Kingdom: use gifts to build up the body, maintain solidarity across difference, refuse to turn spiritual experiences into status markers
The Argument’s Flow
Chapter 12: You’re one body. Stop treating gifts as hierarchy. The “weaker” members are indispensable.
Chapter 13: Even with the most impressive spiritual experiences imaginable—tongues of angels, complete prophetic knowledge, mountain-moving faith, radical self-sacrifice—without covenant loyalty to this messy community, you are nothing. You gain nothing. You’re just making noise.
Chapter 14: Gifts work for building up the body, not showing off. Prophecy builds up everyone. Tongues without interpretation builds up only yourself.
The entire three-chapter unit dismantles spiritual elitism by insisting impressive religious performances mean absolutely nothing if they’re destroying covenant community.
Why “Childish Things” Stings
When Paul says “When I was a child... when I became a man, I put away childish things” (v. 11), he’s calling the Corinthians’ obsession with impressive spiritual experiences spiritually immature. They thought tongues, prophetic knowledge, and dramatic manifestations proved their spiritual advancement. Paul says: You’re acting like children showing off toys. Actual spiritual maturity is maintaining covenant loyalty to people you think are wrong, people who frustrate you, people who don’t have your gifts or knowledge.
The temporary nature of prophecy, tongues, and knowledge (v. 8-10) isn’t about end times—it’s about how these impressive experiences are partial, limited, and ultimately less important than covenant solidarity. What remains eternally: faith, hope, and love.
The Contemporary Mirror
The Corinthians aren’t ancient history. Their conflicts mirror modern Western church culture:
Theological tribalism: Using doctrinal positions as factional identities
Spiritual experience hierarchies: Those with dramatic encounters dismissing those with “ordinary” faith
Knowledge elitism: Seminary degrees, biblical literacy, theological sophistication used as weapons
Gift competitions: Worship leaders, preachers, prophetic voices claiming their gift proves their authority
Pastoral brand loyalty: Megachurch celebrity culture where people identify with their pastor’s brand rather than local covenant community
Paul’s confrontation lands just as hard today: All of it is worthless noise without the covenant loyalty that holds diverse, disagreeing people together in committed solidarity.
The Corinthians baptized Roman honor competition with spiritual language. We’ve baptized American individualism and consumer choice with spiritual language. Same disease, different symptoms.
Covenant
The Scandal Paul Actually Proclaims
Your most impressive spiritual experiences, your deepest theological knowledge, your most dramatic acts of sacrifice—all of it means absolutely nothing if you’re not maintaining covenant loyalty to the messy, frustrating, disagreeing people in your actual community.
Not “less important.” Not “needs some balance.” Nothing.
What This Passage Demands
Covenant loyalty trumps spiritual experience
The Corinthians who spoke in tongues of angels thought their dramatic experiences proved superior connection to God. Paul says: You’re just noise. A noisy gong. A clanging cymbal.
Today: The worship leader whose encounters are profound—but who dismisses different worship styles as “dead.” The intercessor whose prayer life goes deep—but who judges others as shallow. The charismatic whose gifts are genuine—but who creates a two-tier community.
Paul’s verdict: Nothing. You are nothing. Your experiences mean nothing. You’re just noise.
Covenant loyalty trumps theological knowledge
Those with knowledge about mysteries, about right doctrinal answers—they thought superior understanding proved spiritual maturity. Paul says: Without love, you are nothing.
Today: The theologian whose systematic theology is rigorous—but who uses doctrinal precision to dismiss “shallow” theology. The biblical scholar whose exegesis is careful—but who weaponizes knowledge to establish hierarchy. The seminary-trained pastor whose sophistication is genuine—but who makes “less educated” believers feel inferior.
Paul’s verdict: Nothing. All your knowledge means nothing if you’re destroying covenant community.
Covenant loyalty trumps radical sacrifice
Even giving away everything, even surrendering your body to be burned—Paul says these gain you nothing without love.
Today: The missionary who sacrifices comfort—but treats national believers as projects. The church planter who pours out their life—but creates a personality cult. The activist whose commitment to justice is costly—but who treats ideological opponents with contempt.
Paul’s verdict: You gain nothing. Your sacrifice accomplishes nothing eternal if it’s not rooted in covenant loyalty.
The Characteristics Expose Our Failures
When Paul describes covenant love (v. 4-7), every characteristic confronts specific failures:
“Love is patient, love is kind”: How patient are we with believers whose spiritual growth looks different? How kind to those whose theology frustrates us?
“It does not envy, does not boast, is not puffed up”: Do we envy other churches’ success? Boast about our tradition? Get puffed up with our theological sophistication?
“It does not behave inappropriately, does not seek its own way”: Do we use our freedom in ways that harm weaker members? Insist on our way even when it destroys unity?
“It is not provoked, keeps no account of wrong suffered”: How quickly are we provoked when someone challenges our theology? What accounts of wrongs are we keeping against other believers, churches, traditions?
“It does not rejoice over injustice but rejoices in the truth”: Do we secretly rejoice when churches with “bad theology” struggle? Or do we rejoice in truth even when it challenges our positions?
“It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things”: How much will we bear before we leave? What hopes for difficult people have we abandoned? What are we unwilling to endure in covenant community?
The Tension We Must Hold
Paul is NOT saying covenant loyalty means tolerating abuse, enabling sin, or maintaining unity at any cost. The same letter demands church discipline (1 Cor 5). The same apostle confronts Peter publicly for hypocrisy (Gal 2:11-14).
Covenant love is NOT: Pretending disagreements don’t exist, refusing to name sin, accepting any behavior to maintain peace, enabling destruction under the banner of grace
Covenant love IS: Remaining in committed solidarity through disagreement, speaking truth while maintaining covenant bonds, confronting sin without abandoning the person, enduring the discomfort of staying connected to difficult people
The contemporary Western church fails in both directions:
Collapse into cheap unity that refuses to name problems or hold standards—calling this “love” while it enables destruction
Fragment into tribal purity that abandons covenant the moment someone disagrees—calling this “faithfulness” while it destroys the body
Paul’s vision requires holding both simultaneously: fierce commitment to truth AND fierce commitment to covenant solidarity with people who get truth wrong.
The Kingdom vs. Empire Distinction
Empire church culture treats spiritual experiences, theological knowledge, and religious performance as commodities that establish hierarchy—credentials that justify my position in the religious hierarchy, my authority over others, my right to judge whose faith is real.
Kingdom community treats spiritual experiences, theological knowledge, and religious service as gifts for building up the body—worthless unless deployed in covenant loyalty to actual people in actual community, including people who frustrate me, disagree with me, and seem to me to be getting important things wrong.
Empire asks: What does my spirituality prove about my status?
Kingdom asks: How does my spirituality build up the body?
Paul’s answer to the Corinthians—and to us—is devastating: If you’re using your impressive spirituality to establish status rather than build up community, you have completely missed the point. Everything you’re so proud of means nothing. You are nothing. You gain nothing.
The Question That Exposes Us
Ask yourself: What spiritual experiences, theological knowledge, or religious practices do I use to establish that I’m more spiritually mature, more biblically sound, or more genuinely faithful than others?
Whatever that is—even if it’s real, true, and biblical—Paul says it means nothing without covenant loyalty to the people you think are getting it wrong.
That’s not wedding material. That’s the prophetic word that dismantles our entire system of religious hierarchy and spiritual competition.
Practice
How This Changes Our Walk
Understanding 1 Corinthians 13 in its actual context fundamentally reorients how we approach spiritual community. Instead of using our gifts, knowledge, and experiences as credentials that establish hierarchy, we deploy them in covenant loyalty to build up the body—including people who frustrate us, disagree with us, and seem to us to be getting important things wrong.
This shift moves us from Empire patterns (spiritual competition, knowledge elitism, gift hierarchies) to Kingdom patterns (mutual submission, shared edification, covenant solidarity across difference). We stop asking “What does my spirituality prove about my status?” and start asking “How does my spirituality serve this actual community?”
The practical difference shows up in how we respond when someone challenges our theology, practices differently, or seems spiritually immature by our standards. Do we use our superior knowledge to establish hierarchy? Or do we maintain covenant bonds while speaking truth, remaining in committed solidarity even through disagreement?
Three Key Takeaways
Paul wrote 1 Corinthians 13 to confront spiritual elitism, not to offer romantic advice. The Corinthian community was destroying itself through gift hierarchies, knowledge competitions, and status games baptized with spiritual language. Paul’s response: even your most impressive spiritual experiences mean absolutely nothing if they’re not deployed in covenant loyalty to actual community. We’ve domesticated a prophetic confrontation into wedding decoration.
Covenant love means maintaining solidarity across difference, not pretending disagreement doesn’t exist.Paul isn’t calling for cheap unity that refuses to name problems or hold standards. The same letter demands church discipline. But covenant love refuses to abandon relationship with difficult, frustrating, wrong people. We either collapse into enabling “unity” or fragment into tribal “purity”—both failures to hold the tension Paul demands.
Our spiritual credentials—however real—become worthless noise when used to establish hierarchy rather than build up the body. The worship leader’s genuine encounters, the theologian’s rigorous knowledge, the intercessor’s deep prayer life, the activist’s costly sacrifice—all real, all good, all meaningless if deployed to prove “I’m more mature than you” rather than “How can I serve this community?” Empire asks what our spirituality proves about our status. Kingdom asks how our spirituality builds up the body.
Three Discussion Questions
What spiritual experiences, theological knowledge, or religious practices do you use—consciously or unconsciously—to establish that you’re more spiritually mature or biblically sound than others? Be specific. How do these real credentials create categories in your mind of who “gets it” and who doesn’t?
Think about someone in your faith community whose theology frustrates you or whose spiritual practice seems immature by your standards. Can you identify how you maintain distance or establish hierarchy rather than remaining in covenant solidarity with them? What would it look like to deploy your knowledge or experience to serve them rather than to prove your superior position?
Paul says prophecies will pass away, tongues will cease, knowledge will pass away—but faith, hope, and love remain. How does this reframe what you’re investing your spiritual energy into? Are you building up impressive spiritual credentials that Paul says are temporary? Or are you investing in covenant loyalty that Paul says remains eternally?
Seven-Day Practice Rhythm
Day 1: Inventory Your Credentials
Write for 15 minutes: What do I use to establish I’m more spiritually mature than others? Don’t sanitize—write what you actually think.
Prayer: “Lord, show me how I use your gifts as credentials to establish hierarchy.”
Day 2: Notice Your Categories
Throughout the day, notice mental categories about other believers: Who’s “really” mature versus shallow? Who “gets it” versus doesn’t? Which churches/positions do you respect versus judge?
Write down the categories. Don’t justify—just acknowledge they exist.
Prayer: “Lord, reveal the hierarchies I’ve created that fragment your body.”
Day 3: Examine the Connection
Review Days 1 and 2. How do your credentials justify your categories? Write out your actual reasoning.
Prayer: “Lord, help me see how I’ve turned your gifts into weapons.”
Day 4: Identify One Person
Choose one person in your community who falls into your “less mature” category. Write: Why you’ve categorized them, what credentials you’re using, how this affects your interactions.
Prayer: “Lord, show me what I’m missing about how you’re working in [name]’s life.”
Day 5: Practice Covenant Listening
Reach out to the person from Day 4. Ask about their spiritual journey—not to correct, but to genuinely listen. Goal: discover how God is working in their life beyond your categories.
Prayer: “Lord, let me see [name] as you see them.”
Day 6: Shift from Credentials to Contribution
Ask: “How could my gifts serve this community—including those I’ve categorized as less mature?” Write one concrete way to build up someone you’ve been establishing hierarchy over.
Prayer: “Lord, transform my credentials into contributions.”
Day 7: Sit with Paul’s Verdict
Read 1 Corinthians 13:1-3. Personalize with Day 1: “If I have [your credential] but use it to create hierarchy, I am nothing. I gain nothing. I’m just noise.”
Commit to one specific change this week.
Prayer: “Lord, I repent of using your gifts to make noise. Transform me from credential-keeper to covenant-builder.”
Closing Blessing
May you discover that your most impressive spiritual experiences mean nothing apart from covenant loyalty to the difficult people in your actual community.
May you stop using your knowledge, your gifts, and your experiences as credentials that prove your superiority, and instead deploy them as contributions that build up the body.
May you have the courage to remain in committed solidarity with people who frustrate you, disagree with you, and seem to you to be getting important things wrong—speaking truth while refusing to abandon covenant.
May you move from making noise to building up, from being nothing to participating in what remains eternally: faith, hope, and love.
And may the God who composed the body so there would be no division transform you from credential-keeper to covenant-builder, for the sake of His Kingdom and the glory of His name.
Amen.