A More Excellent Way

1 Corinthians 12:31

But covet earnestly the best gifts: and yet shew I unto you a more excellent way.

Charity is often wrongly defined as love. Charity is more than love; it is invested love. You can love someone, or you can invest your love in them. For instance, God loved the world, but charity was God sending His Son into the world to die for their sins. God invested His love in the world by giving His Son, and it was that invested love, which is charity, that made a difference in the lives of millions of people who got saved. Jesus loves the world, but He invested His love by giving His life as the sacrificial payment for our sin. The Holy Spirit loves the world, but He invests His love in the lost by convicting them day in and day out as they reject Him. Though God loves us, it is His charity that became a more excellent way for the world to see His love.

The same is true with the believer. We can love people, but the more excellent way is to have charity for others so they can see that love. The Scriptures say in 1 Corinthians 13:1, Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. You will notice that we can speak angelic words, but those words mean nothing if we don't have charity. Notice the phrase, I am become as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. This verse is teaching that speaking in several languages or with angelic words may impress people for a short time, but those words become as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal if you don't invest your love in those to whom you are speaking. Certainly, you have love for people if you are willing to speak the truths of God’s Word to them, but that is not enough to make a difference in their lives. Investing your love in people is the more excellent way; it is the way that causes them to listen to you week in and week out for charity allows them to see your love.

Whether you are a pastor, Sunday school teacher, Christian school teacher, bus worker, or any type of ministry worker, the fact that you are in ministry shows that you have love for people. However, you will never make a difference in people if you don't have charity, which is investing your love in people by investing your life in them. It is more than just getting behind a pulpit or podium and teaching that makes a difference, but it is visiting them during the week, weeping with them in their heartaches, rejoicing with them at their weddings, visiting them when they are in the hospital, or praying and being there for them after they have lost a loved one. You can have love for people, and that is certainly good, but the more excellent way to make a difference so that your words and actions don't become as a sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal is to have charity, which is investing your love in people by investing your time and life in them.

Charity is most certainly not easy. Having charity means you will be inconvenienced and often disappointed, but you never give up on them. My pastor taught that the harder you preach, the more you must love those you preach to. He said that they will put up with your hard preaching if they know you love them. Let me put it this way; people will put up with you preaching hard to them if you have charity for them, or have invested your love and life in them. You can either use people to build your work, or have charity and use your work to build people. Charity is always the way to change lives for it is the more excellent way that makes a difference in those you invest your time and life into.