The biblical picture of love can differ wildly from how the world defines it. Be set aright and encouraged by these verses and commentary adapted from the ESV Study Bible.
Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away.
The terms believes and hopes are sandwiched between bears and endures and, like them, probably refer to relationships between people rather than to faith and hope in God. Love believes the best of others and hopes the best for them.
Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. Interpreters differ over the time when Paul expects prophecies to pass away and tongues to cease (along with other gifts represented by these examples). The “cessationist” view is that miraculous gifts such as prophecy, healing, tongues, interpretation, and miracles were given to authenticate the apostles and their writings in the early years of the church, but those gifts “ceased” once the entire New Testament was written and the apostles died (c. A.D. 100). Others hold that Paul expected these gifts to continue until Christ returns, which will be the time when “the perfect” (1 Cor. 13:10) ways of speaking and knowing in the age to come replace the “in part” (1 Cor. 13:9) gifts of this age. Support for the second position is found in 1 Corinthians 13:12, which indicates that “then” (the time when these gifts will cease) is the time of Christ’s return.