1 Corinthians 14:26-28 - That the church may be built up

14:26

We now get positive teaching on worship. “Each one of you has a hymn, a word of instruction, a revelation, a tongue or an interpretation”. It appears that all would come with something to contribute, in a moment Paul will give further instructions on doing things in an orderly manner, but let’s look at the matter of contributing first. Clearly, for practical reasons this could only be put into practice in a literal sense of “everyone” in relatively small gatherings, in a large church it would just not be practical. However, what is relevant in all cases is that there is no scope for passivity in worship. We should attend intending to contribute, ie to worship with our hearts and minds, to actively listen to the preaching, to actively pray. It is worth noting, given all that Paul has said about tongues, that he includes tongues in the list. Later he will insist that interpretation should go together with tongues. The underlying ethos is that everything is done in order to build up the church.

14:27,28

Having given the general principle, Paul now gives some caveats and sensible constraints. Spirit led worship and common sense are not contradictory! So, there were to be at most two or three who would speak in tongues, and they should speak in order, not all babbling at once. Moreover, there must be someone to interpret. Note the implication that there is a gift of interpretation, and that the one with this gift can more or less guarantee to be able to interpret the tongue. If there was no one around with the gift of interpretation, there was to be no public tongue speaking, for it would be a waste of time. This also implies that the gift of interpretation is a reliable steady gift. Ie it is not a case of someone being able to interpret occasionally, rather the person(s) with this gift can use it regularly.

1 Corinthians 14:23-25 - God is really among you

14:23

So Paul makes a very obvious point. If the whole church is speaking in tongues, then using the Corinthian’s logic that would be a mega sign of God’s presence. Paul points out that if an outsider drops in on the meeting the only reaction he will have, and very reasonably so, is that everyone is out of their mind. The outsider would in no way be attracted to the gospel. Paul’s teaching could be summed up as “use a bit of common sense!”

14:24,25

While everyone speaking in tongues would just convince an unbeliever that everyone is mad, if everyone prophecies then he would be convicted by God. Now, Paul is not suggesting that everyone should prophesy at once (see later instructions!), he is just using rhetorical language, but he is making an important point about the difference between prophecy and tongues. Prophecy will have an effect on unbelievers. A prophecy is given in the common language, is intelligible to all, and will convict people for it will be declaring God’s truth. The words will convict the man and lead him to worship the Lord. Again, Paul is not saying that every time anyone prophecies every single unbeliever will be convicted, he is just making a general point and using rhetoric to emphasise the point. And the point is that instead of seeing who can pray the most in tongues in a meeting, the Corinthians should be seeking God for the gift of prophecy, for the exercise of that gift in public meetings will be beneficial to all. It will build up the church, and it will convict the unbeliever. And that has not changed, today we should ask God all the more for the gift of prophecy.

1 Corinthians 14:18-22 - A sign for unbelievers

14:18,19

Just to make sure people don’t get the wrong idea Paul stresses that he speaks in tongues “more than all of you”. He believes tongues is a good gift, one to be used, but in the right context. So in a church meeting speaking in tongues is generally not a good idea! A few words in English (or Greek, in Paul’s case) is far more beneficial for all concerned.

14:20

Paul then calls on them to show an ounce of common sense. In being so beholden to speaking tongues they were acting like children, being childish rather than childlike. They had a sort of “I’ve got a new toy” attitude. Now they, and we, were to be “infants in evil”. Ie we do not need to be experts on sordid and evil practices. Given the debauched state of Corinth it would be very easy to become experts in evil, they, and we, should shun all this. But with regard to the gospel we are to be mature in our thinking. From time to time there are parts of the church that denigrate thinking, such an approach finds no support from the Bible.

14:21,22

Paul has gone quite a time without quoting from the Old Testament, he now puts that to rights. Now we might wonder what on earth is Paul saying here, what does he mean? And if tongues is a sign to unbelievers why does he advocate praying in tongues? Well, the Corinthians seemed to be unduly obsessed with the gift of tongues, thinking that it was a sign from God, therefore they should use it in public meetings as it indicated God’s presence. Paul is saying that in a public meeting tongues is a sign to unbelievers. The quote from Isaiah 28:11,12 talks of God speaking in an unintelligible language (to the hearers) is a sign of judgement, is a sign of how far from God they are. It is not a sign that God’s people are under a blessing. Prophecy, on the other hand, is a sign for believers. What he means is that tongues in itself is useful for believers, as it edifies the individual, but if someone speaks in a tongue in a public meeting that is not a sign of God’s blessing or presence in the meeting. Whereas, if there is a prophecy in the meeting that does indicate God’s presence and blessing. Paul will expand on this in the next few verses.

1 Corinthians 14:15-17 - Pray with my spirit, pray with understanding

14:15

We see again the wonderful balance of the Bible. So often we want to turn things into an either/or debate. Paul, on the other hand, has taken a much more sensible approach. He has pointed out the limitations of tongues, things it cannot, and is not meant to do. So we recognise those limitations, and use the gift properly. We pray with our mind, and we pray with our spirit. We praise with our mind, and praise with our spirit. It is good to pray and praise in the spirit, but that is not all we should do. We were given minds, so we should use them too.

14:16,17

Paul then continues to give reasons for tongues not having a great part in church services and meetings. They are all related to the inability of anyone to have a clue what is being said. If we pray in a church meeting the purpose is so that we can pray together, so that others can give agreement to our prayers. Praying in tongues in a public meeting is a waste of time, we can do that at home, doing it in a public meeting adds no value.

Verse 17 gives some insight into what is actually happening when we pray in tongues, or at least one the things that will often be happening. We will be giving thanks to God. So why not do this in English, someone might ask? Because there is more than we can understand, and God has seen fit to give the gift of tongues to many, so we should trust Him that He has made a good decision! However, when I pray in tongues no one else but me is edified, and if you pray in tongues no one else but you is edified.

1 Corinthians 14:13,14 - My mind is unfruitful

14:13

The one who speaks in a tongue should pray that he may interpret. I have already said that interpretation seems to be a gift much in absence. There are a number of things that can be learnt from this. One is that the tongue which is a genuine gift of the Spirit is an actual language of some sort, otherwise it could not be interpreted. Secondly, we can ask God for the gift of interpretation.

14:14

We now learn more about the gift of tongues, and what we learn here is very important. When we pray in tongues our minds are unfruitful. Tongues is nonsense, not because it actually is no sense, but because our minds are not involved. This does not mean that we are not in control, ie we can choose whether or not to pray in tongues, but we should not expect our minds to make any sense of it. Just as a bit of empirical evidence on this. If I pray in tongues I actually have to say the words, even if very quietly, I cannot pray in tongues in my head. Whereas, I can say English words in my head without vocalising them at all. This is also a very useful aspect of praying in tongues. There are times when we are overwhelmed by events, when our minds are all over the place. In those times we can still pray in tongues, we pray in the Spirit. Now the fact that as far as we are concerned tongues is gibberish worries some people, it should not. We are to use our minds, as much of Scripture exhorts us to, indeed the next verse will do so, but we must not make an idol out of the mind. But what if someone, or even ourselves, actually are speaking gibberish, and it isn’t actually the Holy Spirit? Well sometimes that might be the case, so what? Many prayers in English, and not a few sermons, are complete gibberish! But we do not advocate not praying in English and not having sermons. We need a down to earth, practical approach to praying in tongues, as Paul has here in this chapter. It is a gift of the Spirit, it is a common one, it is useful in edifying the individual, but it is not magic and we should not make more of it than the Bible warrants. If you pray in tongues that is good, if you do not you can ask God for the gift, but do not get worked up about it if you do not have, or even never get the this particular gift.

1 Corinthians 14:6-12 - A clear call

14:6-8

Paul now expands upon the point he has just made. If Paul came to the church and all he did was speak in tongues, what would the point of that be? No one would understand what he was saying, and so no one would benefit. For something to be understood or intelligible in some way, there needs to be a clear distinction in what is said. Note the practicality of Paul’s approach to things, and that this practicality is linked with using spiritual gifts. We have a habit of either thinking being practical means the supernatural goes out of the window, or “let’s be supernatural or spiritual, so anything goes”. Verse 8 brings in a note of urgency. We are not playing games, but fighting a battle, so we need clear instructions and teaching.

14:9-12

So when speaking to the church one should speak in English (or whatever the local language is). There is no point whatsoever in speaking in another language, not even in tongues. Someone might say, well it is a spiritual language so it is bound to be useful. That is just super-spiritual nonsense. This is an area where charismatic churches today sometimes fall down (though probably less so than used to be the case), encouraging people to speak in tongues in the middle of a service. What is the point? And this is what the Holy Spirit says, for it is here in the Bible. We should seek to excel in gifts that build up the church.

1 Corinthians 14:4,5 - Edifying yourself

14:4

We now get more information on the purpose of the gifts. If we speak in tongues we edify ourselves.Some who say tongues is no longer relevant sometimes mock charismatic churches, saying that the tongues are not languages. Now, are what are called “tongues” sometimes made up? I would be surprised if this was not the case, but that does not mean all tongues are “made up”. Likewise, churches sometimes make far too much of tongues, giving it a place and purpose that the Bible does not give to it. Here we see that the primary purpose of tongues is to edify the individual. It is good to pray in tongues because it builds you up. We will say more about this when Paul says more about the gift. Prophecy, on the other hand, builds up the church. If someone speaks in a tongue no one else will have a clue what he or she is saying, indeed the speaker themself will generally will not have a clue. However, if someone prophecies the words will be intelligible to all, so the church can be built up.

14:5

So now we need a balanced and sensible approach. Tongues is good, but prophecy is even better. So Paul desires that all speak in tongues. This is not to say that all will, as he said earlier in 12:30, but it is good for anyone to speak in tongues. Speaking in tongues is not “magic”, you do not need to be special to speak in tongues, and speaking in tongues does not make you special. Prophecy is better because it builds up the whole church. So we should desire prophecy even more. Paul then mentions an exception, when tongues are interpreted. Interpretation is a gift that is not much evident in churches these days. The text implies that for the most part tongues will not be interpreted, it is a gift for the individual, but sometimes it will be. We should have the right spirit and attitude, the ones that Paul has been encouraging from chapter 12 onwards, and we should seek to have more of the gifts that God gives.

1 Corinthians 14:2,3 - The one who prophesies

14:2

This chapter essentially contrasts tongues and prophecy, while also giving general instructions on worship. If we look in Acts we see that tongues and prophecy were the most common gifts, often manifested by believers when they first came to faith (eg Acts 19:6; 10:46). The Corinthians seemed fascinated by the gift of tongues, probably because people spoke in another language which they had not heard before. The reason the Corinthians liked tongues is the very reason Paul gives for considering prophecy to be of more importance. For when someone speaks in tongues no one else, indeed not even the speaker, has a clue what they are saying. We will look more at this as the chapter progresses. When someone speaks in tongues they “utter mysteries in the Spirit”. We should note that there seem to be two versions of tongues. At Pentecost the disciples spoke in other languages, languages of the various people’s who were visiting Jerusalem. Ie they spoke in human languages, and this does sometimes still happen. However, most times speaking on tongues was speaking in a non-human language, or at least one that no one around knew of.

14:3

Prophecy, on the other hand, is spoken in the common language, so people can clearly understand what is being said. As mentioned earlier, we actually have very little idea of the precise nature and content of prophecy, but here we do get three ingredients. It is for upbuilding, encouragement and consolation. Acts 10:46 speaks of “extolling God”. So part of prophecy will be praising God. Indeed, if we look at the OT prophecies, a significant aspect of it is declaring the greatness of our God. The circumstances were such and such, but God is infinitely greater than the circumstances, and realising the greatness of our God is a key element in strengthening us for the battles we face, and extolling His love and care is a key element in consoling us when we go through tough times.

1 Corinthians 14:1 - Prophecy and Cessationism

14:1

So Paul has been teaching on the primary importance of love, but this is not to denigrate the gifts at all. The gifts are to be desired, and are to be used in the context of love. We are to “pursue love and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts”. On the cessationist view, one has to say that this chapter would be one of the most irrelevant chapters in the New Testament.

Paul then singles out one gift as being of special importance, prophecy. Now this is an area where a lot of nonsense is spoken. If you look at Charisma News there are frequent articles that make me groan. At the time of writing there is this one entitled “Blood Moon Pastor Gives Prophetic Insight Into Coming Solar Eclispe”. This sort of things just makes me groan. By now (this was written some five months ago), of course, I could have been proved to be a hopeless sceptic and all he said came true! However, there are things that give prophecy a bad name. But the cessationist camp sometimes talk an equal load of nonsense. One tactic is to set up a straw man by effectively saying that every “prophetic word” has to be equally true or authoritative as Scripture. No sensible charismatic believes this, all prophecy has to be judged against the written word of God. Nor is the cessationists' view of prophecy consistent with Scripture. There are the major and minor written prophets (Isaiah, Micah etc). Then there were bands of prophets, about whom we know very little of what they actually said. Then think about Elijah and Elisha. These are two great prophets of the Bible, but their words of prophecy are not of the same value as the words of Isaiah. What do I mean by this? Ask yourself this, when did you last hear a sermon based on the words of Elisha and drawing lessons from the words themselves? We have no doubt heard many messages on Elisha and Elijah, but their actual words are very much tied into the context of the time. Their actions and trust in God provide valuable lessons for us, but their words do not really contribute to our theology. We have also heard many sermons on Isaiah, and in this case the emphasis is on the words Isaiah spoke, and his words are foundational to much of our theology. Then there is David’s prophet Nathan, not all the words he spoke were correct! Eg in 2 Sam 7:3 Nathan tells David to go ahead and build a temple “for the Lord is with you”. Then in the next verse we read that the Lord spoke to Nathan and gave him a very different word. So straw man arguments against prophecy should be abandoned. On a more positive note, from Genesis to Revelation God has on numerous occasions spoken to individuals and to groups of people about their particular situations. So has He now stopped doing that! Our God is a God who communicates with His people on a personal level. In his book on Covenantal Apologetics, Oliphant says (p200) “God the Holy Spirit does not speak audibly to people , even to his people, apart from the word of Christ in the Bible”. On what grounds can we say that?  In Acts 18:9,10 God spoke to Paul encouraging him to stay in Corinth. Does God never speak to a Christian today urging them to stay or leave a particular situation?

Anyway, time to end what has become close to a rant! Suffice to say that I believe that prophecy is still relevant for the Christian today, but everything is subject to the written word of God. Actually, we have very little idea about the detailed nature of prophecy in the New Testament. But this chapter is highly relevant to us today, so let’s see what we can learn from it.

1 Corinthians 13:11-13 - Faith, hope and love

13:11,12

We need to realise what we were, what we are and what we will become. A child has a very different perspective on life than an adult has. Now, there are many things we eulogise about being childlike, but we are not meant to be childish, and we are meant to grow up. So it is spiritually. The thinking of the Corinthians was childish, rather than childlike. Man in his sin is very childish, we can see this sometimes in ourselves, and certainly in others and the world in general. When we come to Christ we start to become what we are meant to be, so we should give up childish ways. But at the present we only see in part, we see dimly, but we should know where we are going, and in that future the gifts will no longer play a part, but love will.

13:13

So these three remain: faith, hope and love. Now why do faith and hope remain? Will we need faith and hope when we see Christ face to face? Will we any longer need hope? Perhaps it is because we do not appreciate what faith and hope really are. Faith is the language of communication with God. If we want to communicate with Him, if we want to hear from Him, we need faith. Then we will have complete trust and security in God. We will be 100% confident in every word He says. Hope in this life is often a very uncertain thing, but hope in God is a sure thing. Then we will know that every plan and purpose of God will work out. “But the greatest of these is love”. Faith and hope on their own could conceivably be evil, if there was an “evil God” (this is a philosophical idea, don’t worry, I have not gone off the rails). The Nazis had hopes, but they were utterly evil hopes. But there isn’t an evil God, God is love, so faith and hope are faith and hope in a God of love.

1 Corinthians 13:8-10 - Love never ends

13:8

Love is now compared to the gifts, and again we should remind ourselves we are not talking about sentimental soppiness here! The gifts are temporal. Prophecies will last only for a time, tongues will cease and knowledge will pass away. Why are these things temporal? When Christ returns and we are raised to new life or transformed will be immortal, we will be in eternity. We will see and know all things. So prophecies and knowledge (as we think of it now) will be gone. By the way, this hints that prophecy is a glimpse from eternity, it is a revelation from God. We will see Christ face to face, we will see Him as He really is, we will stare into the face of God. So tongues will be a total irrelevancy. But love never ends. God is love, love is eternal, it is a foundational quality.

13:9,10

The knowledge we receive now is only partial knowledge, no matter how spirit inspired it might be. When we prophesy we prophesy in part. We do not foretell or reveal all things, for all things are not revealed to us. Indeed, how could we possibly foretell all things? “When the perfect comes, the partial will pass away”. This verse is used by some as a support for cessationism, ie the gifts ceasing at the end of the apostolic era. This is a perfect example of eisegesis, something most cessations would recoil in horror at. Paul is quite clearly looking forward to the end of the present age, the return of Christ. There is no reference to any apostolic age. Some talk about the canon of Scripture being the “perfect”, but that is equal nonsense. The text is quite clearly talking about the return of Christ when the gifts will cease to by.

1 Corinthians 13:4-7 Love is patient

13:4

We now get various characteristics of what love is. In reading this we need to remember the context, and the context is not a wedding ceremony! There is nothing wrong with using this chapter as part of a wedding service, and there are many general lessons to be learnt about love from this passage, but that was not the original context and it is helpful to view it in its original context. That context is a church that was obsessed with individual leaders, with competing against one another in various ways, and with exalting one's own ego. The virtues mentioned in verse 4 all run directly counter to these aspects of the church. Love is not in the least concerned with exalting oneself. When dealing with others it is patient and kind, these two virtues are directly relevant to the earlier questions addressed in the letter regarding the eating of food offered to idols. The attitude of some was to prove who was right, the right attitude is to be patient and kind.

13:5-7

We then get a further list of negatives, ie things that love is not. It never tires to pull others down so that it can be built up. The companion of being patient is that it is not easily angered. When we are concerned with exalting ourselves we can delight in others faults, for they show how much better we are! If we are self-seeking then may well delight in evil, we delight when others fall, for that makes us look better! (Or so we think.) We then get more positive aspects of love. It rejoices in the truth. This is very relevant for today, for the world delights in moral relativism, “do not judge”. This is not true love, for true love looks for the truth. But it does not look for the truth in order to do someone down, instead it seeks to protect. Someone may well be guilty of sin, and we should not hide from this, but we should always hope that the person will get on the right road. And we do this with perseverance. And let me remind us again, that these instructions, this teaching, is primarily for church life.

1 Corinthians 13:1-3 - if I have not love

13:1

The Corinthians seemed to value speech. They liked the sound of their own voice, and rhetoric was important in Greek culture. They also were much taken by the gift of tongues. So Paul starts out by saying that if we do not have love, then no matter how gifted, whether naturally or supernaturally, our speech may be, it is like a clanging cymbal. What we say, and the heart that is behind what we say are of equal importance.  

13:2,3

Paul then goes on to give more similar examples. Next is prophecy. The prophecy may reveal the deepest of truths, of be full of insight. Or a person may have faith that can move mountains, but if we do not have love we are nothing. Notice all the “I” statements here. A person can think they are something because they have a particular gift or ability, but the truth is we are something only if we have love. And how “great” we are is measured only by the love that we have. Love is the measure that God uses. Now we need to bear in mind that the love spoken of is not the sentimental mush that we so often think of, it is not a love that shrinks from teaching hard truths when necessary, but it is a love that truly has the best interests of others as its goal. We can give all we have to the poor, but without love this is of no value. we can suffer for our faith, but if we do not have love it is of no value. God is love, and we need to be moved by that same love.

1 Corinthians 12:29-31 Eagerly desire the greater gifts

12:29,30

Paul has just listed various gifts and now asks, rhetorically, if all have these gifts, expecting the answer no. Few would argue with this answer, the only one that some might argue with is “do all speak in tongues”. There are some who say this is an essential sign of being filled with the Holy Spirit, or baptised in the Spirit, though I think this view is far less prevalent than it used to be. There is no Biblical  warrant for saying that speaking in tongues is a necessary sign of being filled with the Spirit. However, the point that Paul is making is that no one has all the gifts nor fulfills all the ministries, nor are we meant to! God has created the church as a body, with many parts, fulfilling different functions, but all are part of the same body, and all need each other.

12:31

We are now about to enter perhaps the most popular chapter in the New Testament, certainly the most popular in 1 Corinthians, the chapter on love, but we need to note that this is all part of the same argument from Paul. Paul’s teaching has not been so much on what the gifts do, though he will focus more on this in chapter 14, but on appreciating the God who is the giver of the gifts, and the attitude we are to have towards them. Chapter 13 is all part of that argument.

However, first note v31, “eagerly desire the greater gifts”. I really don’t see how cessationists get round verses like this. We are commanded to desire the gifts, the greater gifts. But this is not a desiring the gift in order to enhance our egos! He will now talk about the nature of love, and this is to be the underpinning characteristic of all that we do.

1 Corinthians 12:25-28 - The Body of Christ

12:25,26

So, we are to look at ourselves as part of the body, and we all belong to each other, and we function together as a single unit. We are to be concerned for each other, for the body to work well, all parts matter. If one part of your body suffers, so the whole body suffers. We know this to be physically true, it is also true of the church. Conversely, we are to rejoice in the honouring of any part of the body.

We need a body mentality.

12:27

Paul now gives more fundamental information on the church and our part in it. We (plural) are the body of Christ. The church, you and me, is the primary means of God working in the world. Sometimes teaches belittle the church, or stress that God works through other ways. Is the church the only way in which God works in the world? Absolutely not, but it is the primary way. And the church is to be Spirit filled and Spirit led. We are all part of the church, the body of Christ. We should have a security in this, for when we consider ourselves of no account, or when we try to big ourselves up, these are both signs of deep insecurity.

12:28

Then we get a list of various roles within the church. To some extent these can be viewed as being listed in order of authority, but that is not Paul’s purpose here. The unity and interdependence of all these roles is the key point. First, we should note that it is God who places these people in the church. You cannot choose to be an apostle, or a prophet. You cannot choose to have a particular gift (though you can desire a gift, and later we will be encouraged to do so), but it is God who gives the gifts. The role of apostles in today’s church can cause much controversy. There are no apostles like Peter, John etc, Ie there is no one who is a physical witness of the resurrection, who spent time with Jesus while He was here on earth. But apostle is used in at least two senses in the New Testament. The one thing it is not is a status symbol, and sadly that is the way it is sometimes used. Apostle means one who is sent. So what would an apostle today look like? God may give someone a special role in reaching a particular community or sector of society, and a role in establishing God’s work in that area. They would not be doing this because of their own abilities, but because God had given them grace to do this. For instance, the Muslim community is humanly speaking very difficult to break into with the gospel, or a ground-breaking work may be done in the LGBT area. The marks of an apostle in such a situation would be that their message was Christ-centered, their life was Christ-centered, they would be unusually effective, breaking through in situations what were seemingly impossible. They would bring people to Christ in repentance and faith, they may do signs and wonders. They would most probably suffer for the sake of Christ. Now, they would not be the only person involved in this work, there would be many helpers (as Paul, himself, had many helpers).

1 Corinthians 12:14-24 - All part of the body

12:14-17

Paul then uses the analogy of the body to demonstrate how ridiculous it is when we think or act as if we are independent entities. The human body consists of many parts, not one. The parts have different functions, but they are meaningless unless they are part of the whole. Sometimes we may think we are not as important as someone else, or that we do not really belong. But such thoughts do not change the truth. We were baptised into Christ, so we are part of Christ. And we all need each other. No one can do everything, no one is equipped to do everything.

12:18-20

God created the human body, He designed it so that it would function in a certain way, with all parts being dependent upon each other. Likewise, He has designed the church, assigning different functions to each one of us. So our value, our worth, stems not from the task that we do, but from the One who assigned it to us. That difference is crucial. It is God who gives us value. So we are many parts, but one body, and we should rejoice in that.

12:21-24

All parts are indispensable, and all need each other. Sometimes we may think we are of little consequence, or that someone else is of little consequence. This is not true. Moreover, some parts of the human body are obvious to all, others are “less honourable”, they are hidden, but these parts are treated with special modesty. So it is with the church. Whether we have a role that is prominent and widely recognised or not is neither here nor there. People may be complimented on have a beautiful face, but no one has been praised for having a great pair of kidneys. Yet consider what happens if your kidneys fail to function properly!

Bitcoins and the reliability of the New Testament!

Just watched a Panorama programme on the Bitcoin currency. The way Bitcoin authenticates transactions and accounts is by having numerous “bookkeepers” (actually computers) that store the data, and it confirms things with all of these. So if one of them was corrupted it would stand out as all the rest would show different information.

It struck me that this is remarkably similar to how we know the New Testament is reliable! There were many streams of transmission, so if someone had tried to fiddle with the text, or if a simple error occurred, it would stand out because of the other streams of transmission. This is part of the way that Bible translation works. Numerous texts are looked at, and so we can be confident that the text that our Bibles are based on is 99% correct.

1 Corinthians 12:12,13 - Baptised by One Spirit

12:12

Having listed the gifts, Paul focuses on how the church is meant to function. Indeed, it is significant that the emphasis is not on the gifts themselves, but who they come from, what they are given for, and how the church is meant to operate. The church is seen as the body of Christ, and it is made up of many parts with different functions, but all the parts are part of the one body.

There are a couple of very significant points to note. One is that, as is often the case, the way nature works is seen as a reflection of the way God works. We will see this again in chapter fifteen in relation to the resurrection, here we see it in relation to the church. God created all things, and so it is to be expected that creation reflects something of the glory of God. The second thing is that Paul does not say in this verse that the church is like the body, but that Christ is like the body. The church is seen as being the body of Christ.

12:13

Paul now gives the justification for saying we are all one body. As is often the case in the New Testament, the Holy Spirit is given pride of place. We were all baptised into one body. This can refer both to water baptism and to Spirit baptism. With water baptism we are baptised in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. And, without wanting to get bogged down in detailed discussion about Spirit baptism, we are all filled with the same Spirit. The Holy Spirit is a person, He is part of the Godhead, and His working is essential to the life of the church and the life of the individual. No Spirit, no life.

All this applied regardless of background. Being Jew or Greek made no difference, being free or a slave made no difference. Cultural or ethnic backgrounds make no difference. We are all baptised into Christ by the same Spirit.

Romantic Love - A sermon

A sermon entitled Romantic Love. It's not what you might think, but a sermon on God's love for us revealed in the book of Romans.

1 Corinthians 12:9-11 - The work of one and the same Spirit

12:9

Faith is mentioned as another gift. This is not “saving faith”, every believer has that! Rather it is the Spirit giving faith to someone in a particular situation about what is going to happen, what God is going to do. Moses had faith that the Red Sea would part. He had no reason to imagine that that would happen, other than that God told him what to do. Then there are gifts of healing. This does not mean medicine is of no value, absolutely not, but the Spirit does give gifts of healing. One of the prominent aspects of Jesus’ ministry was that He healed lots of people. Now this gift is controversial and problematic for various reasons. One is that some people misuse and abuse it. If someone is seriously ill, or a close relative is seriously ill, there is a great desire to see healing, and some people exploit this desire to get money out of people. Then there are times when healings are claimed, but nothing much has actually happened. Sometimes this is just over-claiming (ie there is no ill-intent, people are just claiming more than is justified by the facts), sometimes people are pretending. Then sometime we struggle with faith. However, there are also times when genuine healings do take place. So we should certainly not reject this gift, but we should seek the Lord in humility and faith.

12:10

Much the same as we have said about healings can be said about miracles. Miracles do happen, but by their very nature they will not happen very often. Prophecy is mentioned here, but Paul goes into this, along with tongues, in much more detail in chapter 14. So we will save discussion of prophecy and tongues till that chapter. While tongues is very common in charismatic/pentecostal churches, interpretation seems to be fairly rare. Discernment is the ability to see what is really going on. There are many so-called “discernment ministries”, especially in the US. On the whole these “ministries” do not have the gift of discernment.

12:11

So what are we to draw from all this? One is that we as churches are not very good with the gifts of the Spirit. We need to be more charismatic! We need to seek the Lord more, we need to expect more, and we need to look for reality, not fake.

All the gifts are empowered by the same Spirit. Our focus needs to be on God, and on what He is doing. Too often we put the focus on ourselves. Moreover, the Spirit gives the gifts as He wills, this is not in our hands, it is in His hands. So we should walk humbly with our God, being expectant.

It is implicit from Paul having listed the gifts, without explanation of what they are, that the Corinthians knew what the gifts were. They are meant to be a normal part of church life.

1 Corinthians 12:7,8 - For the common good

12:7

Again the focus of is on the the reason spiritual gifts are given. First, they are a “manifestation of the Spirit”. The gifts are given by God, they are a tangible realisation of the presence of God in the world. When Jesus went back to the Father, He went so that the Holy Spirit could be sent to us. The Holy Spirit is God, and is God’s presence on earth and in us, and one of the ways He demonstrates this is through spiritual gifts. By the way, I can find no Scriptural basis for saying God has stopped manifesting Himself in this way. Secondly, the gifts are given for the “common good”. We need to keep both these things in mind if we are to have a right approach to spiritual gifts. They come from God and are a manifestation of His presence on earth, and they are given for the common good. There is a parallel here with the two greatest commandments, love God and love others.

12:8

Now we get a list of nine of the spiritual gifts. We do not need to treat this as an exclusive list, ie they are not necessarily the only spiritual gifts. Some are obviously “supernatural”, others may appear “normal”. The Spirit may give special wisdom in a situation, ie knowing what to do, the practical application of truth. “a message of knowledge by means of the Spirit”. This message could be for an individual or about a situation. We do, of course, need to beware of “Christian fortune telling”, which is what sometimes happens. So how do we discern (and discernment is one of the gifts!) between what is a spiritual gift, and what is fake? One helpful thing to do is to look at the life of Jesus, for we see many of these demonstrated in His own life here on earth. Many times He was questioned by the Pharisees or teachers of the Law and He would respond with amazing wisdom, wisdom that exposed the truth of the situation and of people’s hearts. Then at others He has knowledge of a person’s situation (eg the Samaritan woman in John 4).

1 Corinthians 12:3-6 - Different kinds

12:3

The pagan worship would sometimes involve “religious” experiences, sometimes quite dramatic. The Holy Spirit has an effect on our lives, sometimes quite dramatic, so we need to be aware of the danger of letting influences from ungodly culture intrude on our lives. Paul gives a very simple test. If someone says “Jesus is accursed” then it is definitely not the Holy Spirit who is inspiring them, but the Holy Spirit will lead people to declare that “Jesus is Lord”. Now we might think demons would not be so stupid as to do such blatantly wrong things that make it so obvious they are not godly, but demons will do stupid things. Worse, people will sometimes fall for it. Consider some of the debates in some churches about LGBT stuff and how often things that are so obviously against God’s word are passed off as being motivated “by the Spirit”. You may think I mention LGBT stuff too often. The reason is that these issues so clearly demonstrate the  modern day reality of the things that Paul is talking about. If we talk about idols then it means little to us today and we then think the word has little relevance. But God’s word is all too relevant today, and the LGBT stuff is the clearest demonstration of that.

12:4

Paul now turns his attention to various spiritual gifts. The first thing they need to know is that there are different kinds of gifts. We should also note that they are gifts. We have done nothing to earn or merit them, they are freely given by God. Our human tendency is to assume that we have done something to merit the gift, and to start comparing our gift or gifts with those of others, either considering ours to be more or less important than another gift.

12:5,6

Paul then says that, likewise, there are different kinds of service and working. It is vital that we associate these words with spiritual gifts. They are not given to us as a plaything, or to enhance our ego. They are given first for service, to enable the work of the kingdom to progress, to serve the Lord and to serve others. Whatever the gift, it is to be used to serve the Lord. Note that Paul says it is the same God at work. When we use a spiritual gift aright, it is God working through us. God works and we work. And you might sometimes consider your gift, or someone else’s gift, to be more or less important, but this sort of thinking is deeply mistaken. God is at work, and there are many facets to the work He does, many things that need doing. So whatever it is the Lord gives us to do, and enables us to do it, we should do it gladly and diligently, not wasting time on considering how important we consider it to be. God wants it done, so it is important.

1 Corinthians 12:1,2 - About spiritual gifts

12:1

Now we come to spiritual gifts. There are some who are “cessationists”, ie they believe the gifts mentioned here were for the apostolic era only. I have to say that I can see no Biblical support for this notion whatsoever. That is not to say that there are not those who misuse or abuse the gifts, or talk a lot of nonsense, but there are no indications in Scripture that the gifts will cease before the return of Christ. So we will look at these next three chapters assuming that all that Paul teaches about is relevant for us today and that we need to pay attention. Indeed, Paul starts this section by declaring that he does not want his readers to be uninformed. It seems that the Corinthian church was perhaps treating the gifts as toys (and some churches today do the same). They are to be used with godly wisdom, and indeed common sense!

12:2

First Paul addresses some things that they needed to unlearn. We are all influenced by the culture we came from, and by the culture we live in. Prior to being Christians the Corinthians had worshipped idols. Now idol worship is one of the worst sins in the Bible, again and again Israel was condemned for this in the Old Testament. Yet the Corinthian converts came from a background of idol worship. The gospel can reach into any culture, no matter how ungodly, and bring people out of the darkness into the light. Now even though the idols were mute, were nothings, they led them astray. How did this happen if idols were mute, were just wood and stone? It was because behind the idols were demons. Note that it says they were “led to” these idols. Today we see society being led astray to the madness of LGBT stuff. The LGBT agenda is nonsensical and so clearly wrong, yet it seems to be having such a hold on society. Why is this? It is because of the things that are behind it. As Paul says in Ephesians 6, our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against principalities and powers.

1 Corinthians 11:31-34 - Eating together

11:31,32

These two verses are very interesting. Paul’s solution to the problem is that we need to be more discerning about ourselves, to be realistic about our need for forgiveness, about our own sinfulness and failings. If we come to the Lord in humility then we receive grace, like the tax collector in the temple whom Jesus said went away right with God because he confessed his sin. If we come in pride then we receive judgement from the Lord. Then Paul gives the reason for the Lord’s judgement upon the Corinthians, it is an act of discipline, seeking to save them from the condemnation that will come upon the world. Note that the world will be judged. God does discipline us and we need to learn from it when it happens.

11:33,34

There is unity before the cross. We are all sinners in need of forgiveness, and through the cross all who believe are justified and receive the same Holy Spirit. Whatever wealth we may or may not have, whatever worldly status we may or may not have, whatever qualifications we may or may not have, none of these make any difference. So the Lord’s Supper was not to be a time for a meal as such, the focus was to be on the Lord and what He has done for us.