02/16/2010

Tell Me About Love - Part XI - Love is Comely

1 Corinthians 13:5 begins by telling us that love is not rude. The Greek word here is aschemoneo, which means unbecoming or to be uncomely. This leaves quite a bit of interpretation to it, because the natural question is “behaving uncomely in comparison to what?”

To grasp this normally we have gone to places where a word was used before to understand the context of how it was applied in other circumstances, but we are unable to do this because this is the only place in the Bible where this Greek word is used. So we must try another option to find its application.

Aschemoneo is from the root word aschemon, which means to be uncomely or inelegant. This word is only used in 1 Corinthians 12:23 where it reads:

²² On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, ²³ and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, ²⁴ while our presentable parts need no special treatment. But God has combined the members of the body and has given greater honor to the parts that lacked it…

The NIV translators have translated aschemon as “unpresentable” in this case. The KJV uses the word uncomely, so maybe it would be a good idea if we got a definition of uncomely.

The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines the word comely as:

1. pleasurably conforming to notions of good appearance, suitability, or proportion
2. having a pleasing appearance : not homely or plain

With these definitions we can deduce that uncomely would be bad in appearance, unpleasing, homely or plain. Seeing this definition it seems a bit odd that the NIV translators chose to translate this as rude.

We did also see however that another meaning for this word was to be “unbecoming.” If we look at the definition for this it reads: not according with the standards appropriate to one's position or condition of life. What this means is that the actions or appearance of someone do not match up with who they are.

An example might be this. One day you are watching the news and you see the President at a news conference dressed in swim fins, a hat made out of newspaper, a Scottish kilt, and a flamingo shirt. This would be a very odd thing for a president to be wearing and so we would say that his attire was unbecoming of a president.

There is a great joke about a woman who stops at a light and the car ahead of her is going really slow. She is in a hurry and so she starts honking her horn excessively, yelling obscenities, and cursing profusely. A police officer notices this and pulls her over. He leaps out of his car and draws his weapon and yells at her to get out of the car immediately. Terrified the woman does as she is commanded. The officer pushes her against the car, handcuffs her and then asks her for her identification. She is scared beyond belief and cannot understand why this is happening. The officer checks her identification and then uncuffs her and apologizes for placing her under arrest. She asks him why he did this to her, and the officer explains, “Well I saw you driving down the road, blasting your horn, screaming and yelling fowl language. Then I noticed that Jesus symbol on your car, and I thought for sure you had to have stolen the vehicle. No Christian would act like that!”

The woman was demonstrated unbecoming behavior. This is not how a Christian should act, and even a humorous example like this demonstrates the need to present a picture of ourselves that does not appear to be uncomely.

While I do agree with the NIV translators that to be uncomely is to be rude, there is clearly a great deal more to being unbecoming than just this. We can be unbecoming by being prejudiced, selective, hostile, angry, depressing, greedy, overly needy, and many other ways.

The real heart of the matter stems from a very catchy cliché that many like to use – What Would Jesus Do? There are WWJD wrist bands, bumper stickers and ads everywhere. The problem with all this apparel is that no one is really asking themselves What Would Jesus Do. To be honest, anything other than what He would do would be uncomely. The only way that we can be “becoming” is to emulate what He was like.

I mentioned a list of things above and I want to elaborate on a few of these to demonstrate how Jesus set the example. Jesus welcomed everyone who came to Him. He did not refuse to speak to Gentiles, Roman soldiers, women, the sick, the infirm, or persons of other races. He liked everyone. To be prejudiced or biased is to be uncomely. It presents God in the wrong way, and this is something we cannot do.

Jesus showed no favoritism toward anyone. While He had twelve disciples, we are told on a few other occasions that there were many disciples other than the twelve. He sent out seventy-two at one point to minister, and when the Disciples were waiting for the Holy Spirit to come to them on the day of Pentecost there were many others there as well. Thus Jesus was not choosy. All were welcome to come to Him, and He did not hold anyone in higher esteem than others. You can think that Peter was clearly more liked by Jesus than the others, but He also was very harshly criticized by Jesus. It all evened out.

A person who puts some in a more prominent place than others is acting uncomely. They are not truly representing the beauty of Christ.

Any extreme form of emotion is also uncomely. Whether it is fits of rage, or constantly being sorrowful about everything, this does not present Jesus well at all. No one likes to be in the company of someone who is always angry and bitter, especially when it is a constant thing. Life is always terrible, they are always being cheated and they always think everyone is against them. How does this represent Christ?

The same is true on the opposite extreme. There are those who are always sad about everything. I am not talking about those who are facing some real issues with depression, but I am instead talking about those who just think that everything is always bad; the ones who see a dark cloud in everything.

There is clearly no real joy in either of these groups, and therefore they are uncomely. They do not shine Jesus in any way, and therefore they distort the face of God.

When you examine the life of Jesus you see that at times He was angry (when He overturned the tables in the temple is an example), and at times he was quite sad (when Lazarus died is an example), but He was never stuck in either of these emotions. We are in fact told on several occasions that Jesus was joyful. I think many of us can't see Him this way because movies often present Him as stoic. That was not Jesus at all. He was joyful and loving to all.

If we understand that He was joyful then it should inspire us to emulate His emotions as well. We should seek to put those emotions into good actions as our loving God does.

Paul says that love is not unbecoming, unbecoming of Jesus and who He was that is. This is such an open-ended statement, yet it is so simple to understand if you really look at it for a minute. It doesn't take a lot of in depth examination or Bible study. You don't need to go to your minister or priest. You just need to ask yourself one simple question

– What Would Jesus Do? If you have read any of the life of Jesus, the answer should become real clear to you then.