1If I speak with the languages of men and of angels, but don’t have love, I have become sounding brass 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 don’t have love, I am nothing. 3If I give away all my goods to feed the poor, and if I give my body to be burned, but don’t have love, it profits me nothing.
4Love is patient and is kind. Love doesn’t envy. Love doesn’t brag, is not proud, 5doesn’t behave itself inappropriately, doesn’t seek its own way, is not provoked, takes no account of evil; 6doesn’t rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; 7bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.
8Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will be done away with. Where there are various languages, they will cease. Where there is knowledge, it will be done away with. 9For we know in part and we prophesy in part; 10but when that which is complete has come, then that which is partial will be done away with. 11When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I felt as a child, I thought as a child. Now that I have become a man, I have put away childish things. 12For 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 was also fully known. 13But now faith, hope, and love remain—these three. The greatest of these is love.
Faith (Gk. πίστις, pistis). (2:8; Matt 8:10; 9:2, 21:21, Mark 2:5, 11:22, Luke 7:9, 18:42, Acts 11:24, 24:24; Rom 3:22, 25, 12:3; 1Cor 13:2, 2Cor 5:7, 13:5, Gal 1:23, 5:6, Eph 4:13, Phil 3:9, Col 2:5, 1Thess 1:3, 2Thess 3:2, 1 Tim 3:9, 6:12, 2 Tim 2:18, 4:7, Tit 2:2, Phlm 5, Heb 6:1, 11:6; James 2:14, 1Pet 5:9, 2 Pet 1:5, Jn 5:4, Jude 3, Rev 2:19, 14:12) Strong’s 4102
This word, very common in the NT (243 times), can mean, 1) that which evokes faith, “faithful,” 2) “trust, confidence, faith,” 3) “body of faith, teaching.” It is a noun of action—related to the cognate verb πιστεύω (pisteuo) to “believe. It is hard to overstate the importance of this word to Christian theology, since relationship between humans and God is always dependent on faith. This verse uses the word in the second sense of “trust, confidence, faith.” Here, the reference is to saving faith, which amounts to trust in the person of Jesus (God—John 1:12; Eph 1:15) and the message of the Gospel (Jesus’ death and resurrection—1 Cor 15:1-5). Saving faith depends on knowing certain information, but also necessarily goes beyond believing these things to be true, to placing personal confidence and trust in what and who is known. In this verse, grace is the cause of salvation; faith is the means.