1 Corinthians 13 – read by David Shelton
If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels , but do not have love , I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal . And if I have prophetic powers , and understand all mysteries and all knowledge , and if I have all faith , so as to remove mountains , but do not have love , I am nothing . If I give away all my possessions , and if I hand over my body so that I may boast , but do not have love , I gain nothing . Love is patient ; love is kind ; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude . It does not insist on its own way ; it is not irritable or resentful ; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing , but rejoices in the truth . It bears all things , believes all things , hopes all things , endures all things . Love never ends . But as for prophecies , they will come to an end ; as for tongues , they will cease ; as for knowledge , it will come to an end . For we know only in part , and we prophesy only in part ; but when the complete comes , the partial will come to an end . When I was a child , I spoke like a child , I thought like a child , I reasoned like a child ; when I became an adult , I put an end to childish ways . For now we see in a mirror , dimly , but then we will see face to face . Now I know only in part ; then I will know fully , even as I have been fully known . And now faith , hope , and love abide , these three ; and the greatest of these is love .
The Sermon – Archdeacon Jill McCoy