One In Jesus

(1Co 13:4-7 ESV) Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Now, let’s take a step back. This is not a chapter on weddings. Paul is not address marriage. He is discussing congregational life. This is how a Christian congregation is supposed to behave. This is what the world is supposed to see when they see a church.

If the church were to live 1 Cor 13, there’d be far less criticism of the institutional church and far less insistence on mission somehow separate from the church. For the church to be the church, the church must live agapē. It’s not complicated; it’s just not easy.

PS — The commentaries are often quite good on this passage, and I have little to add but to point to the words of others.
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(1Co 12:29-30 ESV) 29 Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? 30 Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?

These rhetorical questions all anticipate an answer of “no.” This is especially significant for tongues, as Paul plainly contradicts any notion that we should expect all Christians to one day speak in tongues. The gift of tongues is not a particularly honorable or expected gift — just one of several that a Christian might receive.

(1Co 12:31 ESV) But earnestly desire the higher gifts. And I will show you a still more excellent way. 

Paul thus introduces the magnificent chapter 13, making clear that faith, hope, and love are all gifts of a higher order than the the more flamboyant gifts previously under discussion. Continue reading →

(1Co 12:27-28 ESV) Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. 28 And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healing, helping, administrating, and various kinds of tongues.

Notice that, in v. 27, “member” translates melos, meaning a body part. Paul is not discussing who’s on roll. Rather, by “member” he means a part of a single organism — just as my arm is a “member” of my body. To sever my arm from my body would be to “dismember” me. Continue reading →

Paul next offers a powerful metaphor — a comparison of a congregation to a human body, indeed, the body of Christ —

(1Co 12:14-17 ESV) For the body does not consist of one member but of many. 15 If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. 16 And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. 17 If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell?

It’s a familiar lesson to anyone who’s spent much time in church, and as a result, we often don’t hear the fullness of what is saying. N. T. Wright offers some insights that carry us beyond most commentaries. Continue reading →

(1Co 12:13 ESV)  13 For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body — Jews or Greeks, slaves or free — and all were made to drink of one Spirit.

I interrupted the series on 1 Corinthians because I thought much of the material in Scot McKnight’s latest book Kingdom Conspiracy: Returning to the Radical Mission of the Local Church would give us a deeper grasp of chapters 12 and 13. They are speaking about the same things.

We in the Churches of Christ see 1 Cor 12:13 as a proof text on the necessity of water baptism. And while the verse unquestionably is important in understanding baptism, we really need to be able to read it in context for the point Paul was intending make. Continue reading →