LOVING THE WAY JESUS LOVES

Read what love is and isn’t in 1 Corinthians 13. See if you can substitute your name each time you read the word ‘love’ … We are called to love as Jesus loves, and the more we come to know his amazing love, the more it will flow through us into the lives of those around us.

Most people are familiar with the ‘love chapter’ of the Bible, 1 Corinthians 13, yet Phil Ryken still has something new to say. He draws on the earthly life and ministry of Jesus to illustrate Paul’s several statements about what love is and isn’t. These aspects of love are then illuminated chronologically through the story of Christ’s advent, teaching, miracle working, sufferings, crucifixion, death, resurrection and ascension.

Jesus never does anything without love. His love is everything the love chapter says that love should be. It is patient with sinners and kind to strangers. It does not envy or boast, but offers itself in humble service. It does not insist on its own way, but submits to the Father. It is able to forgive, trust, hope and persevere.

This approach highlights the crucial truth that we are able to love only because Christ first loved us in this particularly profound, very real, and transformative manner.

Commendations

‘As usual, Phil Ryken hides his deep scholarship behind readable prose. But the footnotes reveal that he draws on some of the most penetrating scholarly treatments of St Paul’s text. He combines all that with pastoral experience and insight. The result is a masterful, accessible exposition of this great chapter.’ Tim Keller

‘Jesus said, « By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. » But what does it mean to love others ? By looking at the love of Jesus in the light of I Corinthians 13, Phil Ryken gives us the biblical answer. Loving the Way Jesus Loves is surely one of the most heart searching books I have ever read. This book is must-reading for all who want to grow in Christian love.’ Jerry Bridges

‘There are many expositions of 1 Corinthians 13, the love chapter, but not many where at every point the preacher shows how God’s love in Christ Jesus is the very best exposition and truest embodiment of love. Unpacking the love chapter through this prism, Phil Ryken lends great clarity to Paul’s meditation on love and shows how such love drives us back to renewed adoration of Christ. Reflecting on how Christ, by his life and death, makes 1 Corinthians 13 leap from the page drives home the frequent lovelessness of our own lives, strips bare all notions of love that are little more than sentimental twaddle, and provides a concrete robustness to love that is part and parcel of trusting and following Christ.’ D. A. Carson