To apply this passage to my life I must pull my head out of the details in a suspension of wit to realize its most profound essence. God, in his wondrous affection towards you and me, raises us into spiritual adulthood that is far greater and more delightful than our practical understanding of what it means to be spiritually adult. This “adultness” is not academic or a function of acquired wisdom…no not according to this passage. Instead, to put away childishness in return for spiritual maturity is to live surrendered to the catalysts of faith, hope, and love as they abide in us and through us as administered by the Spirit of God. No, not in the pomp of our experience and knowledge but in the resting of our souls being transformed into the likeness of Jesus whose love—true, real, selfless love—is the very power of God by which the Spirit empowers. Yes, love abides in us as the first among the divine impartations by which God makes us alive. May it be true of us in Jesus’ name!2
“When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love.”
1 Corinthians 13:11-13