Remembering without ceasing your work of faith, and labor of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ, in the sight of God and our Father…
1 Thessalonians 1:3
In Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians, he mentions those three great abstracts from 1 Corinthians, “Faith, Hope and Love” and praises the church for displaying them to the watching world around them, which is pretty amazing considering this early church had a rough start with some persecution that flared up early in its formation.
We all think we know what those words mean, but it becomes apparent if you were to ask 10 different people you get 10 completely different definitions of love. I love that Paul adds an active qualifier to each of these works so we have some idea of what having faith, hope and love entail. He says WORK of faith, LABOR of love and PATIENCE of hope. This implies there is an expression of these virtues that we have an active hand in and that we must be involved in doing to express them.
We express faith through works, love requires labor, and true hope must involve patiently waiting to see that which we cannot yet see. Lord, help us to embody these abstract qualities through our actions!