The Bible Provocateur
The Bible Provocateur
Love Over Gifts
What if the loudest voice in the room is just noise without love? We open 1 Corinthians 13 and confront a hard truth: tongues, prophecy, knowledge, and even heroic sacrifice collapse into emptiness when the heart seeks applause instead of God. This isn’t an attack on gifts—it’s a reset of priorities. We wrestle with how love shapes motive, how envy wears ambition’s mask, and why public charity often feeds the self more than the hungry. It’s a bracing invitation to trade spectacle for substance.
From there, we test a big claim: love never fails, yet partial things do. We trace how early revelatory gifts served a unique purpose and why the church is now thoroughly equipped through Christ’s finished work, the Spirit’s ongoing ministry, and the completed witness of Scripture. That shift doesn’t diminish God’s power; it clarifies where He promises to meet us today—through His Word forming a people who act with patience, humility, and courage. We talk about resisting provocation, practicing secrecy in generosity, and letting Scripture recalibrate habits that tradition or hype might have set in place.
You’ll hear honest confession about being easily provoked and the daily battle to let love lead. The takeaway is simple but demanding: measure everything by love, root yourself in the Bible, and let quiet faithfulness outlast temporary thrills. If you’re weary of spiritual showmanship and hungry for depth, this conversation offers a path to maturity that is sturdy, clear, and doable. Subscribe, share this with a friend who’s seeking substance over spectacle, and leave a review telling us where you land—are we chasing gifts, or chasing God?
BE PROVOKED AND BE PERSUADED!
So, for those of us who are sitting near a copy of the scriptures, I'm going to be in 1 Corinthians 13. 1 Corinthians 13. And I'd like to try to deal with, and there's a reason why my uh thing is called the Bible provocateur because I intend to provoke and I want to challenge people, Christians, my people, my Christian folks, to look into the word of God and to try to glean things from different perspectives, try to elicit from them perspectives that I may not have had. And uh 1 Corinthians chapter 13. And um, and also to tackle controversial things, you know, the kind of things that when you go to a church, so many pastors will ref will not even attempt to answer those questions. And I think it's a shame that pulpits all over the world, but especially in America, we just gloss over things that are considered difficult to answer, to deal with. So I do this, I do this so I can address and answer the hard questions because I don't care. I I let me let me clear this up. I care what people think because the truth is the truth. The truth is the truth. And but we have pussyfooted around the truth so much that we don't care that it is neglected in the pulpit. Losing people, losing income. Losing income. Now, in First Corinthians chapter thirteen, the apostle Paul speaking to the Corinthian church, he is dealing with this issue of gifts, spiritual gifts, and prioritizing the greatness of these gifts. Now, he starts off. I'm in the new King James for those of you who uh are following along. I usually pick that one because it's middle of the road for most people. Um I prefer the King James uh with all the vows and of these. I prefer that one. Um so for study I use that. For um dealing with things like this, I will use the new King James, and then for uh reading some time or just listening in the car or listening to my earphones, I might do the NIV. This way it gives me a good understanding of how the different versions are being used and which words are being used. So when I'm talking to someone, I can I can relate with whatever translation they have. But I'm a King James person, so I'm a 1611 King James version, so that's me. So 1 Corinthians 13 verse 1. Paul says, though I speak with tongues of men and of angels, and have not love, I've become sounding brass or a clanging symbol. Now what he's saying is, is that if I speak in tongues, or in other words, if I speak with other languages, whether they be of men or of angels, but I do not have love, then I have become sounding brass or clanging cymbals. In other words, I could have the tongues of angels, the tongues of men, but if I don't have love, I might as well speak in something, I might as well be speaking in a foreign language. In other words, it doesn't, is I'm just making noise. Just making noise. And then he says in verse 2, and though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains. But if I have not love, I have nothing. Now, what you gotta follow me so far with everybody is this. Paul's saying, so far, he's setting the tone. He's saying that if I have these gifts and I don't have love, having the gifts do me no good. They do me no good, and they do you no good. It is not enough to have the gift. The gift has to come from someone who has a sincere love in his heart to produce fruit. In order to produce fruit, the one with the gift has to have the right heart. Verse three. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but if I do not have love, it profits me nothing. Now, Christians, listen to this. This is this is heavy. This is heavy. Because he said, if I have tongues and no love, I s I'm I'm like sounding brass or a clanging cymbal, just making noise. Second verse, if I have knowledge and prophecy and I understand all the mysteries and I have all the faith, so that I can remove mountains, if I don't have love, I'm a zero. Then thirdly, he says, and though I give of all my goods, I give of all my money, and I feed the poor, and I give my body for martyrdom. If I give my body to be burned, he's not being hyperbolic, folks. He's saying, if I suffer as a martyr, as a martyr, but I do not have love, that martyrdom will profit me nothing. Nothing. You can be giving all your money to the church. You could be giving your money to lost souls, you could be sending your money to the missionary field, you can go around and claim to be casting out demons and healing the sick and getting spiritual revelations from angels and from God, you could be getting all this stuff. But if you are not operating, as Anna says, with from the posture of a heart of pure love, in so doing, all of it is worthless. This is why Jesus said on judgment to those who said, Lord, didn't I do this in your name? Didn't I do that in your name? Didn't I do this thing in your name? And he says, Depart from me, you workers of iniquity, because I never knew you. I never knew you. So the issue that we have to remember Christians is that Christ looks at the heart. What is the motivation? I could come on TikTok every day and be on here for eight or ten hours expounding verses, answering questions. I could come on here and do all these things. I could read five hours before I get here. I could pray for two hours in the morning when I get up. If I am not doing it out of a sincere and genuine love to see God's people built up and edified, it is worthless. I could do this every day. I could do this every single day, but if my heart is not in it out of love for God and love for you, I will be cast away even though you might have benefited. This is important because do not let your actions shroud a dark heart. Do not think that God is going to bless you for what you've done, even though your heart has not been changed. Even though your heart is not, because he is looking at the heart, not what you do. He's looking at the heart. What you do comes from him. We can't hide from him. He sees what's going on in our hearts. He sees. So you can come off like you're sounding like some kind of a genius. I get it. I get it. The internet made everybody a genius. I did my research, man. I did my critical analysis. Now I know everything. This is what's happening on social media. But Christians, how much time do you spend in the Word of God? How much time do you really truly spend? You can tell me all day long that you this is all you do. But God knows. He knows. He knows that your pages and your Bible are all stuck together. You can lie to me and to your brother and sister in Christ. You can't lie to Christ. We have an obligation to be diligent in our study of the Word of God because it is not just about the pages and the ink on those pages. We are looking and searching into the mind of God, into the mind of Christ. He has exposed himself to us. He's exposed himself to us. He's saying, look at me. I'm your creator. Check me out. Here's what I'm thinking. Get to know me. So all those things that you think you're doing for Christ and for God, if it is not done out of love, you are lying to yourself. You might as well go back to the world and be the child of hell that you were before. And I have to hold that same thing out to myself. I have to check myself every day on this, all day. So back in 1 Corinthians 13, verse 4. Paul says, Love suffers long and is kind. Love does not parade itself. Love is not puffed up. Love suffers long. I got a problem with this. Me personally. Sometimes I am not long suffering. I want to be. Like a lot of you, maybe not. Some of you have very gentle spirits. I don't. The Lord has to manage me. This is a thing that I honestly covet your prayers for with regard to me. To try to be a more gentle spirit. God didn't give me that gift. But it's something I know I need. And therein is the start. Knowing that you have needs. I know how I sound. I know how I come off to some people. I know what I have need of. And if you think that I have a problem, if you think that I am this or that or whatever, do me a favor. Pray for me, please. Just pray for me. Don't come on here and try to slam me and beat me down and try to show me that you you got all this kind of stuff. Just pray for me. Come on here and tell me, brother, I'm gonna pray for you. That's all. But love suffers long and is kind. And it's kind. Love does not envy. Envy, I'm telling you, envy is a disease of one of the worst kinds. And what makes it so bad is that the most envious, the most jealous people, the most envious and the most jealous people will never admit it. They will never say it because no one wants to feel like they are the person that is envious. Because the thing that people who the thing about people who are envious is that they want to be envied. So to admit that they are envious is to face the reality that no one envies them. It's it's people spend so much time trying to build up an image so that people will have a view about them that they want them to have. So be careful with this envy thing, because envy ends up being the prime motivating factor for people to do what they do, not ambition. Ambition and envy are like twin sisters. Very hard to tell the difference between envy and ambition. Make sure that your ambition is not envy. Verse four, love does not parade itself, it is not puffed up. So here's what he's saying. Love does not parade itself. Love doesn't go, love is like, here's what he's saying. Somebody's in need. Somebody's in need. You recognize that need. So you go and address that need. And when you do, you go outside and you want to tell everybody you do it. You're running around telling everybody what you did. It's sort of like these celebrities, whenever they're making a contribution to some charitable event, it has to go in the news and they got to print up these big cardboard checks and let everybody know what they're doing. I gave this to this organization, and I gave so much money and I contributed to this, and I got my name put on the side of that building at the university. That's not love. That's not love. That's selfish ambition. It is selfish ambition. If you're one of these ladies and you get your new purse or you get your new ring that your husband gave you to get you know to get engaged, what do people do? They go around and telling everybody, ah, look what I got, look what I got. I got my new purse, or I got my new shoes, or I got my new car. It's not just ladies, it's men too. Same thing, especially men. You got the new car, you got the new job, you got the promotion, you got to go and tell everybody. It doesn't, it doesn't taste as good unless everyone knows what you have. That's what makes it good. If you had all this wealth and nobody knew about it, it wouldn't, you wouldn't feel good about it. And I'm not talking about you individually. What I'm saying is this is how the world works. Everything has to be a show, a presentation. That's not what love does. That's not what love does. Love is like you do what needs to be done and you disappear. Because the only one you want to see you doing your deeds is God Himself, the Lord Almighty. You know that when he sees it, he is the majority that you want to see it. When God sees it, when he sees what you have done in secret, he will reward you openly. But if you seek to get your reward from mankind, to get man to see it and to clap and to give you accolades, that is your reward. And you will have no reward coming from the Lord. You have to, like one of the uh believers here said, you have to be content with God. Because, see, here's the thing: if you're able to do these things, not to be seen by men, but to be seen by God only, it is a tremendous expression of faithfulness because you know that God does see. Because you, because if God did not see in your mind, if God didn't see it, you need somebody to see because man needs this. Man thrives on accolades and rewards, man needs it. God knows we need it, he knows we need it. He's just asking for us to let him be our audience. There's no bigger audience than the Lord Almighty and the angels in heaven. That's who you want to see your good deeds. Not me. You want me to see it. Not your mother, not your father, not your co-workers and your colleagues, not your girlfriend, not your boyfriend. Okay. Love does not behave rudely. Love does not seek its own. Love is not provoked. Love thinks no evil. Love does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in truth. Now, as I'm reading, I know I'm seeing or feeling a sense of conviction. And I'm not just saying that to pander to you. It stings in the deepest parts of my own soul to read this. Because I know when I'm being rude, and I'm sure there's more times where I'm rude when I don't realize that I'm being rude. And Christians, understand something. We commit so many sins, we do so many bad things that we don't even know we did. Under the Old Testament, you had to make sacrifices for committing sins of ignorance. There were offerings that were made for sins committed in ignorance. Just because you don't know about it doesn't make it any less a sin. So this is why I love all these people like our Islamic friends and our Judaism, our friends in Judaism, who believe in keeping the law. How do you account for the sins that you commit in ignorance because you don't know it? This is why we seek God daily. Love does not behave rudely, it does not seek its own, it's not selfish, is always looking out for the other person. It is not provoked. It is one thing to provoke, it's another thing to be provoked. Don't be so easily drawn in to something that is not going to end up being a good thing. Let me give you an example because I am easily provoked. I'm just being transparent with all of you because I don't want anybody. See, it's one thing to come here and talk about this stuff, it's another thing to live it. And I would be alive if I didn't tell you that I don't struggle daily with living in accord with the word of God. Okay? It's true. I, me, I'm just telling you something. For me, I'm just making a confession to all of you. I am easily provoked. Easily. If it weren't for my brother here, Jason, and other people, you know, who help every now and then with moderating, but Jason is, he's always there. When these people come on here and say some of the mean things they say, I get easily provoked. I want to answer back. And I know it's wrong, and I get caught up. And even when I just make some of the posts and I get comments, I want to lash back. I want to come back at them hard. I have a brutal tongue if I let it go. But God has to restrain me. And I know that. And I know that. So when you see me in a video or you see me in a live, you can see it. I know that because I can't hide it. But I'm just sharing that with you. Okay? We're supposed to confess our faults with one another. That's what I'm doing. Um verse seven. Love bears all things. It believes all things, it hopes all things, endures all things. Now, verse eight. Verse eight. First Corinthians thirteen, verse eight. If any of you guys have a Bible, open it now. First Corinthians chapter thirteen, verse eight. Because here is the I'm gonna make my the biggest point of the day here. Love never fails. Never fails. Now let me say one thing about this. If you love, it is impossible to fail at anything in this life. If you are motivated by the love of God and the love of me and all your other Christian brothers and sisters, your neighbors, you cannot fail in life. It is impossible. Right here, love never fails. You have to take note of a strong word like never. Like never. Like when Jesus says, Depart from me, you workers of iniquity, I never knew you. Never is a serious word in the Bible. Serious word. Cause never is absolute. Never means never. So love never fails. If you love, you cannot fail. And I don't mean that syrupy, sloppy love of the world, which is fleeting, comes and goes. You know, people get married every day and get divorced two days later. Not what we're talking about. I'm not talking about the love you have for your child or your brother or your mother. Not talking about that. We're talking about a love that flows from God through you out. Okay? A love from God that flows through you and comes out. When you have unconditional love, love, the love of God is motivating you in everything you do. Your love for God, knowing that He loves you, is the backdrop of everything you do, everything you say. If that is what is happening, you cannot, will not, ever fail. Why? Because love never fails. Never is a serious word. Whenever you see never in the word of God, stop. It's like a red, big red stop sign. Stop and pay attention to what the word of God is saying never is applying to. Because never is absolute. I love this. Now listen. Verse eight still. Love never fails. Now he gives you the big but. Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail. Okay? Prophecies, they will fail. Whether there are tongues, they will fail. They will fail. Whether or I'm sorry. Whether there are prophecies, they will fail. Whether there are tongues, they will cease. Whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. Knowledge means revelatory knowledge. It means that God speaking directly to a human. Speaking, God audibly speaking to like he did to Moses and David. Okay? And Elijah and Isaiah. He says here, love never fails. Never fails. Never. But he says, prophecies will fail. Tongues will cease. And knowledge will vanish away. Tongues, prophecies, and knowledge, they're going to be done. But love outdoes them all. And love, what? Never fails. All these other things, they do. They do. Now, the question is, when? When do the other ones fail? Because love never fails. I'm gonna show you. Verse nine. For we know in part. We know in part. Meaning that we know partially. We prophesy in part, or we prophesy partially. We don't get the whole picture. Now watch this, verse 10. Here's where this is what you got to get. Verse 10. But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part shall be done away. When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child, but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know also, even as I am known. And now abide faith, hope, love, these three. But the greatest of these is love. Now, the issue here in verse 10 that's that is going to be the controversial part of this whole piece, and I'm going to deal with it. And Jason, I already see what you said. And you're you are right, but I'm going to take it a step further. Love never fails, but prophecies, tongues, knowledge, all of that will cease and be done away. And then it says in verse 9, we know in part and we prophesy in part. So the knowledge that we have when Paul is speaking, because remember, when Paul is is when Paul is writing this, he's writing this, and when the Corinthians are reading this, there's no New Testament yet. There's no New Testament. All Paul had was the Old Testament. Anytime you read a New Testament scriptures, you have to remember it wasn't, it wasn't that we that the writer wasn't aware of what was going to happen in the future. So Paul, all he had was the Old Testament when he's writing this. So he's saying, At that time, we know in part, we prophesy in part. But then he says, When that which is perfect comes, then that which is in part will be done away. So what's in part? Knowledge and prophesying. Because he says, What we know in part, what we know, for we know in part and we prophesy in part. Knowledge and prophecy. We know them in part. But when that which is perfect comes, then that which is partial will be done away. Which means that the partial will go away in place of the fullness. That which is in part will disappear, because now we have the fullness. You don't need to deal with what's in part if you have what's full and complete. Perfect here in verse 10. Follow me now. When he says, when that which is perfect comes, perfect means complete. When that which is complete comes, then that which is in part goes away. You don't need what's partial, what's only giving you part of the picture if you have the complete picture. Complete or perfect means complete or and or mature. How do you know? Well, look what he says. In verse 11, when I was a child, I spoke as a child, and I understood as a child. A child only has a partial understanding of adult things, because they're children. But Paul says, But when I became a man, I put away childish things. So I put away my that faulty understanding because now I have a fuller understanding because now I'm an adult. So when Paul says, when that which is perfect comes, when Paul says when that which is perfect comes, then that which is in part will be done away. He was not talking specifically about something specific. Paul was not specifically talking about something specific. Paul was laying out a general rule, he was rolling out a principle. Don't when you have only a piece of the puzzle, when you get the whole puzzle, get rid of the pieces because now you have the whole thing. Now you can put the whole thing together. So what Paul is saying is that whenever whatever comes that is complete and that is mature, then put away that which was in part. How do I apply this? We had, Jason said, Christ came and he did. But when Christ came, when it comes to our spiritual and biblical understanding, we didn't have everything that we needed until after he left. Until after he left. So it started with Christ because the gospel became much more clear because Christ started explaining the Old Testament. He started explaining things. He gave us a sermon on the mount. But he also said that it was needful for him to go away. Why? So that the Holy Spirit will come and indwell us and teach us. And then the apostles wrote the scriptures. Wrote the scriptures, and then when we got the whole canon of scriptures, then the Holy Spirit was able to take what we read and understand in the word of God so that we can apply it to our own hearts and to our lives and to help and bless other people. So from Christ, his ministry, through the ministry of his apostles, then his ascension, which brought the ministry of the Holy Spirit to come and indwell each one of us believers and the word of God to help us understand the entire word that God has communicated to man and ever intends to communicate to man, now we have everything that we need. So guess what? When I tell people, if you're speaking in tongues, you're wasting your time because God did away with that. If you're telling me to somebody that God's giving you visions, you're not getting visions. You ate too much sugar last night, and that's what's giving you visions. All that stuff, we don't need it anymore because it passes. What we need now is the word of God and love, which never fails. I don't need miracles. The miracle is for me to get up in the morning and pray. The miracle is for me to get up and read the scriptures. The miracle is for me to come on here and share the word with you guys and to be blessed be try to be a and to try and be a blessing to you and to try to be blessed by you. Both here and in my own personal life. We have everything we need. We are told by Paul when he wrote to Timothy that the word of God thoroughly thoroughly furnishes the man of God. Listen, another important word: the word of God thoroughly furnishes the man of God for every good work. Every. When you see every, that's a big red stop sign. Like never. Every. You don't need anything in this life other than the love of God and His Word and His people. Each other. This is all that we need. Stop looking for the miraculous. He saved your soul. Is there anything more miraculous than that? Do you remember what it took to turn you away from your sin? Do you remember the sins that you loved so much more? Christians, think about it. We spend too much time trying to make it difficult. Stop making it so difficult. These guys in these churches trying to hype you up with all this spiritual, spurious, religious excitement, they're wasting everybody's time. Give me the word of God pure, undefiled, and uncut. I don't need a show. If I want entertainment, I will turn on YouTube or these other swipes on here on TikTok or turn on Netflix. I don't want to go to church to get entertained or to see all this display of so-called God's power. I tell these people to their face, you're not casting out demons, you're not speaking in tongues, and if you were, it ain't the terms of the Bible, and you're not healing anybody. None of it. You're not getting visions, you're not a prophet, you're not an apostle. I will tell any one of these guys to their face. The word of God is all you need and love. That never fails. It never fails. It never fails. The gifts are not a lie. The gifts were here. The gifts in the scriptures were here. But like I said, when you read in the Bible, when you read these gifts, you have to understand we didn't have the word of God then. We didn't have it. Those gifts were real. Every gifts that we saw, the apostles, we read about the apostles that they did. We read up, Paul got bit by a snake and didn't die. You want to go stick your hand in the snake's mouth and see if you die or not? You see what I mean? I'm not trying to be rude. I'm just trying to get you to understand. Everything we read in the scripture, we have to understand its contextual format. We didn't have, when we read it in the scriptures, we didn't have the scriptures when it was written and when it was read. Now we have the bit the ability to look back and see all these things, and we can see how much of a blessing it is for us to have God's completed word, the old and new covenant together. We have what no none of the apostles have. We have now what they never had. Paul didn't have what we have now. They were here. They were legit. They happened. But now those things have become the weak and beggarly elements. We don't need them anymore. This is the same problem that Israel had. They couldn't break away from the law, from the ceremonial laws. They couldn't get their mind away from it. So now you have a New Testament church that can't get their mind away from the miraculous. Here's where I gotta calm down. You see what I'm saying? This is what I do. But I'm okay if you're struggling with some of this. I get it. I get it. People have been raised in certain churches. People have been have been taught certain things that they cannot abandon. Traditions. Traditions. If you've been brought up in a church where they tell you to go to the altar call, you believe altar calls is gospel. You don't see it in the Bible at all. I tell somebody, I tell somebody about predestination, and they can't wrap their heads around that. But they can tell you all day long about a seven-year tribulation where the Bible says no such thing. Tay, oh my gosh. Tay hello. You guys had to stop and say hello to this little beautiful girl. She's all grown up now. But anyway, Christians, listen, we all have, we all have our our things, you know, and we all have to deal with our own demons, so to speak. We all do. You're entitled to yours for you to work them through. All I'm asking you to do is hear me out and see if these things are true. Read the scriptures again and see, because it's easy. But what ends up happening sometimes is that we get clouded by our own traditions. No different than the Israelites did. They did the same thing. They did the same thing. John the Baptist, they, you know, they they cut his head off. They didn't want to hear that message anymore. And he wasn't even here that long. Jesus, they said they said was crazy. Casting out demons by the power of Satan. They told Paul he was mad. Paul got so upset, he called the, he called, I forgot who he was, but he called the guy a whitewashed gravestone and then got slapped for it. People are, if you're gonna tell the truth, even out of love, if you're gonna tell the truth, even out of love, people are not gonna like what you have to say. They're not gonna be happy with it. They are not going to be happy with it. George Davis, Jesus came to fulfill the scripture. Jesus has done it all. He's done it all. We don't need anything else. He made it easy. He said, clear your plate. Clear your plate. You have the word, and you have my spirit, and you have me, and you have my father and your father. You don't need all of these crazy excitement things and things to prod you on. That's those are lollipops. They're pacifiers. Paul said that when I was a child, I spoke as a child. I understood as a child. I acted like a child. I understood like a child. But now I'm a grown man. He's trying to relate the physical world the way we as a child when we grow up to our spiritual persons. Who are we as spiritual beings? Are you still a spiritual child chasing after pacifiers? Tongues were not a sign, were not for believers. They were a sign for the unbelievers. The miracles, they were all signs for unbelieving Jews to authenticate the message and the messenger as coming from God. We don't need that anymore. All you need is the word of God. And if God is going to send me to hell for telling people that all you need is Christ and His Word, then I'm on my way. Because I'm going to keep telling you that is all you need. Love of God, love of brethren, and a love for his word. That is all that you need. That is it. That is it. May God bless you all. You are my people, and I love doing this. I love being with you guys. And um and if you struggle with any part of what I'm saying, just check it out and challenge me. If you disagree with something, write to me and tell me what it is and give me a chance to answer back. But for now, may God bless all of you. Brothers and sisters, God bless you all. Until next time.