Today’s passage: 1 Corinthians 1:1-3
Helpful thoughts:
- Paul wrote this letter to the church at Corinth from Ephesus around A.D. 53-55.
- Corinth was a Roman colony which contained much idolatry, business, and entertainment. The people of the city were highly interested in promoting themselves: their quality of life and social status.
- Paul (Among other believers) had spent 18 months in the city in the early 50s planting and establishing the church there.
- Paul was called to be an apostle. He did not choose this for himself. God chose him (Acts 9:1-9).
- An apostle is a man who saw the resurrected Christ and was chosen by Him to go and establish the church. They were given the authority to speak and to write the Word of God.
- Paul was the final apostle chosen by Christ (1 Corinthians 15:8-9). Therefore, anyone who calls themselves an apostle today should be considered dangerous to the faith and avoided.
- An apostle is a man who saw the resurrected Christ and was chosen by Him to go and establish the church. They were given the authority to speak and to write the Word of God.
- The members of the church at Corinth were also to see themselves as called by God from out of the world. They were one church among many all over the world who are the people of God.
- They had not become Christians because they had a higher level of awareness or intelligence than other people.
- Of all the churches in the world, theirs was not superior compared to the rest.
Questions to consider:
- To whom did the church at Corinth belong (Verse 2)? By whose grace did it come into existence (Verse 3)? By whose will did each individual in the church become a member (Even Paul – Verses 1 & 2)? How should we also see ourselves as individual Christians and as a part of our church (And THE Church)?
- In what ways can we already see Paul working to shape the church’s thinking away from the self-help and personal promotion culture they had been saved out of? How might we describe the self-help and personal promotion mindset with the activities of our own culture? In what ways is the description of the city of Corinth strikingly similar to where we live today?
- In a culture infatuated with “self,” how is peace defined? When is a person described as “at peace” in our culture today? What peace did God bring through the shed blood of Jesus Christ? Why does peace with God require grace from Him as opposed to personal reflective thinking?