Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Corinthians 5-8.

There are a lot of things I thought about writing on from today’s passage, but  I felt like the thing I should write about is what Paul wrote in chapter six verse fourteen: “Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common?”  Often I have heard this quoted in order to support the idea that a believer should not marry someone who has not given themselves to the Lord.  While that is a true sentiment, it is really only a small subset of what Paul is talking about.  A little further on in this passage, Paul quotes from the Old Testament where a prophet wrote that God’s people should come out from among unbelievers and separate themselves from them.  When Paul quotes that he is not saying that we should try to stay away from unbelievers. if we do that, how could we preach the Gospel to them?  The point here is that we should not enter into alliances with unbelievers in our efforts to do God’s will in this world.  If you are starting a business, do not enter into a partnership with unbelievers to do so.   I struggle with explaining this, because every time I think I have the words to say what I understand Paul to mean here, I come up with an example where the words exclude something which Christians are called to do.  The best I can do is offer some examples.  Some years back, some young women who were very committed to serving the Lord became active in an organization seeking to combat pornography, both because of the way in which it victimized its subjects and because of the way it destroyed those who viewed it.  The organization worked against pornography to bring glory to God.  At one point, they were approached by a secular feminist organization which wanted to partner with their organization to fight pornography.  The young women brought this partnership up to a Bible Study group which I was part of as well as praise for the hand of God working.  Having just read this passage a few days earlier I was struck by this being them yoking their organization with unbelievers and warned them to be careful about such a partnership.  They dismissed my concerns because the partnership was focused exclusively on fighting pornography.  A few years later, the once Christian women’s organization which had been formed to combat pornography was promoting abortion (the young women I had known were strenuously pro-life).  This is not an example of my wisdom, or anything of the sort.  It merely shows that the Spirit had provided a warning against what the Enemy would try to do.  When I started writing that I intended to follow it up with a second example, but it has slipped my mind, and this entry has gotten long enough.  The important point to remember is that, even when a secular group shares our concerns on a particular issue, they have a different agenda than that of those who follow Christ and may choose to morph the goals of our mutual organization into things which are contrary to the Gospel of Christ.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Corinthians 1-4.

In today’s passage, Paul writes about how the glory of God in the old covenant was such that Moses needed to place a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from being overwhelmed by the glory which shown out from his face.  He makes this point after writing that the glory of the Gospel is much greater than that of the old covenant.  Yet, he also tells us that when we turn to Jesus, the veil which hides God’s glory from us is taken away.  Therefore since we can look directly into the glory of God, we should not use deception or distortion in our effort to bring people to God.  Instead, we should set forth what we believe, and know to be true, plainly and clearly so that others can see the glory of God and be transformed by it, even as we are being transformed by it.  If we remain faithful and true to the message which God has given us, His light will shine through us so that even those who choose to veil themselves from His glory will see it shining out from us.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  1 Corinthians 15-16.

As Paul comes to the conclusion of this letter to the Corinthian believers he reminds them of what he had preached to them as the gospel, the good news which had brought them salvation.  Paul had preached to them that the Scriptures had predicted that Christ, the Messiah of God, would die for our sins, and Jesus did indeed do that.  But, He did not just die, He was raised from the dead after three days, which had also been predicted by Scriptures.  Paul lists here some of those who had witnessed that Jesus had risen from the dead, which he had told them about when he first preached in Corinth.  After reminding them of what he had preached when he first came to Corinth, and that they had believed him when he first preached it, Paul emphasizes that if Christ had been raised from the dead, then there must be a resurrection which we also will experience.  Paul continues by pointing out that all of the rest of what he preached relied upon the resurrection and was of no value if the resurrection was not true, both that of Jesus and the one yet to come for us.  Paul goes on to address some of the objections which had been raised to the idea of the resurrection in similar fashion to the way in which Jesus addressed the Sadducees, by showing that those who raised those objections both failed to understand what Scripture taught about resurrection and failed to believe in God’s supreme power.  The Gospel which Paul, and all of the other Apostles, preached was the death and resurrection of Jesus.  All of the rest of their teachings derived from those things.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  1 Corinthians 12-14.

A lot of times the way in which my Bible Reading schedule splits up the passages causes me to miss the context of certain passages.  Today’s passage is one where that is not true, by putting chapters twelve, thirteen, and fourteen together we get a much clearer understanding of the point Paul is making in chapter thirteen.  And probably a better understanding of twelve and fourteen as well.  In chapter twelve Paul tells us that we cannot point to a spiritual gift and say that “If you don’t have this gift, you don’t have the Spirit.”  He also tells us that we cannot say that we are better than someone else because we have a particular special gift or another, nor should we allow ourselves to think ourselves less than others because we do not have some particular spiritual gift or another.  Actually, he even addresses those who think that because they don’t have some gift which they think is more valuable that they are not saved.  Even when he lists certain gifts in order, he is referring to the order in which they appear in the Church, not their importance.

I wasn’t going to go there, but now that I have written the above I feel that I should.  I mean think about it.  If God did not send apostles, there would be no Church in a particular area.  Next, the local Church is going to need some prophets to understand what its mission is.  Once it knows what its mission is, it is going to need teachers to teach God’s word to the people to whom it has been called to minister.  Once people begin to be taught God sends those through whom He performs miracles to draw them to Him.  But none of these are more important than another.  We even see an example of this in Paul’s life.  Paul was an apostle, but he did not begin his ministry until a prophet revealed that God desired to send Barnabas and Paul (at that point known as Saul) on a missionary journey.  I am not going to go into much depth on the rest of the passage, but I want to point out that Paul tells us that NONE of these gifts have any value if we do not use them in love.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 1 Corinthians 9-11.

Paul begins today’s passage by discussing the freedom he had as an apostle that he did not use.  Instead of taking advantage of the rights and freedoms he had, he made himself a slave to the desires and thoughts of others so as to bring as many as possible to the Lord.  In telling us this, Paul is offering himself up as an example of our need to discipline ourselves to do God’s will.  I think understanding what Paul is saying hear can be made more clear by remembering what he wrote in chapter three, where he told us that no foundation could be laid aside from Jesus, but that what we build on that foundation would be judged.  If we built with good materials, what we had built would survive that judgement, but even if what we built on that foundation was burned up in the fire of judgement we would still be saved as one “escaping through flames.”  Later in today’s passage he writes that while we are indeed free to do anything we like, we should bear in mind that not everything is beneficial.  So, when we choose how we act, let us choose those things which will provide us materials to build on our foundation that which will survive the fires of judgement.  And Paul gives us guidance to understand what types of things will allow us to build something which will last.  He tells us that we should avoid actions which might cause another to stumble.  He gives further instruction on knowing how to recognize that which will last; if instead of seeking our own good we seek the good of others, so that they may also come to know the Lord, then we are building a structure on the foundation which is Jesus which will shrine bright after passing through the fires of judgement.  Seek to do that which will lead others to a closer relationship with God.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  1 Corinthians 5-8.

In yesterday’s passage Paul began his letter to the Corinthian Church by rebuking them for allowing disagreements to divide them.  Today’s passage begins with Paul rebuking the Corinthian Church for boasting about having a member who was sleeping with his stepmother.  He reminds them of a previous letter where he had told them not to associate with sexually immoral people.  Here he clarifies by saying that he meant those who claim to be believers.  Then he expands on that by saying that we should not associate with those who claim to be believers who are sexually immoral, greedy, an idolater, slanderer, drunkard, or swindler.  We should expel such people from among us.  He uses this incident to teach that while we should not pass judgement on those outside the church, we should judge between believers.  Specifically, if we have a disagreement with a fellow believer we should take that disagreement to the church for resolution rather than take it to the secular court system.  In fact, Paul tells us that rather than allow the secular court system to decide the resolution to a disagreement we have with a fellow believer we should allow ourselves to be cheated or otherwise wronged.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  1 Corinthians 1-4.

There are many non-denominational  congregations which base their decision to not affiliate with a denomination on today’s passage.  They have a point, but they usually miss the fact that Paul calls out the faction which separates itself by claiming “I follow Christ”.  Paul’s point is not that we should not follow the teachings of specific teachers, rather we should not allow ourselves to be divided.  I find it interesting that Paul segues from writing against dividing ourselves according to the leader we learned from to writing about how the Gospel seems foolish to the worldly.  I had never considered the link between our desire to be viewed as wise leads to division in the Church.  Or, perhaps I should more accurately say that I never realized that Paul was making that connection here in the beginning of 1 Corinthians.  Paul writes here that God made the wisdom of this world foolish through the Gospel.  I believe that he is referring here to the idea he wrote about in chapter one of his letter to the Romans (although he had not yet written that when he wrote this letter).  In Romans he wrote about how people rejected the knowledge of God which was revealed by Creation in order to pursue their own ideas about how thing should be.  So, if you think that you are wise, then you are actually a fool.  By God’s standards we are all fools.  Our only hope to act wisely is to allow God’s Spirit to direct us.  I always struggle to find a way to fully express what Paul says here about God using he weak and foolish, as this world judges things, to accomplish His acts of power and wisdom.  That struggle has two sources.  First, I struggle with my desire to appear wise to people, rather than embracing the foolishness of God.  Second, one can only come to understand what Paul is getting at by surrendering to God’s power.  No amount of eloquent or persuasive words will truly convey the message which God has for us.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.