Boastful Love
Doesn't exist.
We are walking down the descriptors of love found in 1 Corithians 13, aka The Love Chapter, and so far in earlier posts we have reflected about love being both patient and kind and not envying others. But there is another little word thrown in there with envy that describes something else love is not.
It is not boastful.
It does not boast.
So let’s think about this. Why, first of all, is boasting connected with envying?
One possibility is that those who envy others, feel they are actually inferior, so they compensate by bragging and boasting. It is a way to posture and fake out others as to our real significance. In other words, even if some of the brag is true, it is still in many ways untrue or a distortion of reality.
How do I know this?
Because our life is borrowed. This includes our health, wealth, intellect and everything else that describes who we really are. Understanding this appropriately removes the puffed up ego. And as the ego happily deflates what should remain is a healthy dependence on God and others. And the best exchange currency between people is always Love — to love one another well.
Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring.
Let another praise you, and not your own mouth; a stranger, and not your own lips.
A stone is heavy, and sand is weighty, but a fool’s provocation is heavier than both.
Wrath is cruel, anger is overwhelming, but who can stand before jealousy?
Better is open rebuke than hidden love.
Faithful are the wounds of a friend; profuse are the kisses of an enemy.
Proverbs 27:1-6 (ESV)
“Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.”
1 Peter 4:8 ESV