Love Matters More Than the Other Gifts

13 If I speak in the tongues^[a] of men and of angels but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. ² If I have the gift of prophecy and know all the mysteries and have all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. ³ If I give away everything I own, and if I give up my body that I may be burned^[b] but do not have love, I gain nothing.

⁴ Love is patient. Love is kind. Love does not envy. It does not brag. It is not arrogant. ⁵ It does not behave indecently. It is not selfish. It is not irritable. It does not keep a record of wrongs. ⁶ It does not rejoice over unrighteousness but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It bears^[c] all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.^[d]

⁸ Love never comes to an end. But if there are prophetic gifts, they will be done away with; if tongues, they will cease; if knowledge, it will be done away with. ⁹ For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part, ¹⁰ but when that which is complete has come, that which is partial will be done away with. 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 away childish things. ¹² Now we see indirectly using a mirror, but then we will see face to face. Now I know in part, but then I will know fully, just as I was fully known.

¹³ So now these three remain: faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.