I entreat YOU, brothers and sisters, …that there be no divisions among YOU…; ·for…·…each one of YOU is saying: “I am of Paul” or “I am of Apollos” or “I am of Cephas” or “I am of Christ”… ·…—both Jews and Greeks! ·…Not many of YOU when called were wise by fleshly standards; nor were many powerful or of noble birth. ·Instead, God has chosen the foolish…, the weak things of the world…, ·…those of dubious birth…and those who are despised… ·so that nothing of flesh may boast in his presence. (1 Corinthians 1:10-12,24,26-29 PH)

The cross is…to us...the power of God. ·As it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, …bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.” [Is.29:14] ·…I came to YOU…with no superiority of words or wisdom, declaring the mystery of God— ·…determined not to 'know' anything except Jesus: Messiah and Crucified One. ·I came in weakness…, ·my words and my message…a powerful demonstration of the Spirit, ·so that YOUR faith would not stand on human wisdom but on the power of God ·…The wisdom of this age (and) of the principal leaders of this age are coming to nothing. ·But we proclaim the wisdom of God hidden in a mystery —things predestined by God for our glory before this age began— ·which none of the principal leaders of this age knew; for had they known they would not have crucified the Lord of glory... ·But God has revealed them to us by his Spirit… ·…We have received the Spirit...so that we might know the things…freely given to us… ·But… ·YOU are still fleshly-minded… ·when one says “I am of Paul” and another “I am of Apollos”. (1 Cor.1:18-19; 2:1-8,10,12; 3:1,3-4 PH)

I write… to warn YOU as my beloved sons and daughters. ·For though YOU have ten thousand childhood tutors in Christ, YOU do not have many fathers. In Christ Jesus I have begotten YOU through the Gospel! ·Therefore I encourage YOU to become imitators of me... ·It is (also) reported everywhere that among YOU there is sexual promiscuity… ·I wrote YOU in a letter to not keep socializing with the sexually promiscuous… ·(not meaning)…people of this world…, ·(but)…anyone called a brother or sister who is sexually promiscuous, an avaricious materialist, an idolater, an abuser, a drunkard, or an extortionist… ·…Should YOU not judge those within…? ·“Put away the wicked from among yourselves” [Deut.22:22]! (1 Cor.4:14-16; 5:1a,9-13 PH)

We know that “we all have knowledge”. (Yet) knowledge puffs up while love [Gr. agape] builds up. ·If someone thinks he knows something, he still knows nothing yet as he should know. ·But if anyone loves God, this one is known by him… ·So concerning the eating of sacrificed-to-an-idol-food, we know that “an idol … is nothing” and that “there is no other God except (the) One”. ·Even if there are those called ‘gods’, whether in heaven or on earth—as there are many ‘gods’ and many ‘lords’ — ·yet for us (there is) one God, the Father from whom all things came and towards whom we live; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and by whom we live. ·However, not all have this knowledge. Faced with the ongoing group-custom of the idol,  the conscience of some—being weak—is also being defiled when they eat sacrificed-to-an-idol-food.

·Yet food does not place us nearer to God; for we are neither ‘better’ if we eat something nor worse off if we do not eat something ·But YOU must watch out lest this authority of YOURS becomes a stumbling block to those who are weak.

·For if someone sees you[i], who have this knowledge, reclining at table in the idol's temple, might not the conscience of the one who is weak be emboldened to eat sacrificed-to-an-idol-food? ·And so through your knowledge, the weak brother or sister for whom Christ died might perish! ·When YOU sin in this way against those brothers and sisters and wound their weak conscience, YOU sin against Christ. ·Therefore, if (such) food is a snare for one of my siblings, I will not eat any meat… ·Brothers and sisters, I have applied these things to myself…so that no one of YOU may be puffed up with superiority in regard to ‘the other’. (1 Cor.8:1b-13; 4:6 PH)

Paul planted the church in Corinth and spent a year and a half ministering among them [+50-52 AD] (Act.18). About two years after he left [mid 54 AD],[ii] he hears that the church is a mess. Cliques have formed among them and various sinful behaviors are being tolerated in the church. So Paul is careful to not ‘exercise dominion’ over them (2 Cor.1:23), even though he is like a spiritual ‘father’ to them. Instead he ‘warns’, ‘encourages’ and ‘entreats’ them, more as an elder brother—unlike the ‘super-super apostles’ (Med.#34) who behave like their ‘childhood tutors’ in Christ. For in God's family the familiar expressions of social power have no place: because he is now their only Father, and because of the way Jesus has become their only Lord.[iii]

Because of the power of their kosher customs, many Jewish disciples in Corinth refuse to eat the ‘sacrificed-to-an-idol’ meat sold in the market—thinking that this makes them ‘better’ and closer to God. Their clique is no doubt the one that claims Peter (‘Cephas’) as their leader. Then there are some Greeks and Greek-speaking Jews who freely eat meat sold in the market because: “we know that there is no other god except the One”, therefore “an idol...is nothing”. Strongly influenced by a rational Greek education, those in this clique identify with Apollos—the eloquent Alexandrian Jew who taught in Corinth after Paul left (Act. 19:1); and they look down on the over-scrupulous, Judea-oriented Jews. Finally, there are those with a rudimentary understanding of Paul's gospel—of a multi-ethnic church under Jesus as Lord—who have formed two cliques of their own. One claims Paul as its patron, and the other ‘boasting’ that they are the true ones ‘of Christ’.

By creating cliques around the status of a leader—based on ethnic or religious ideas, customs and social status—these believers show that they are still primarily influenced by the ‘fleshly standards’ of human wisdom and social power. So Paul reminds them about ‘the mystery’ that he proclaimed—about what God in his wisdom had prepared for our glory from the beginning. What had been previously been hidden but is now revealed is our ‘placement as sons’, whereby male and female believers of all nations become co-heirs of the Father (Med.#6 & #8). Likewise, Paul must remind them of what he proclaimed about how Christ became the ‘power’ of God and our sole ‘Lord’. Not only did our Father create all things through Jesus in the first place, but the life with the Father we now enjoy, we live through Jesus as our only Lord (Med.#56). So even though there are divinely ordained social powers in heaven and on earth (‘gods’ and ‘lords’) that still have a role to play in the world, the lordship of Jesus now trumps all these previous social power relationships. By his death on the cross, Jesus has triumphed over them; so we are now able to stand up to them (Med.#31), and we are no longer obliged to live by the social divisions and the hostilities that prop up their power (Med.#44).

Jesus' birth, upbringing and life in the power of the Spirit here on earth also demonstrates how God uses the socially ‘weak things of this world to confound’ those with social power (1 Cor.1:27). This is why the ‘principal leaders’ of this age didn't recognize him. Nor did they understand what God was doing through him, or they wouldn't have crucified him. In the same way, Paul came to the Corinthians ‘in weakness’—not using the power of his education when speaking to them, nor expecting the privileges of a Judean apostle of Christ. Instead he worked to support himself and identified with people of all ethnic and social groups (9:19-21). Even when he hears that many of them are continuing in sinful practices, he still refuses to lecture them from a position of social power. In both his first letter (5:9,11) and his second one (1st Corinthians), he expects them to take adult responsibility in the Spirit to deal with these problems. To help them, he will visit once, send Timothy, Titus and two more letters (Med.#72 & #73), allowing another year and a half to go by before they finally deal with the toughest issue. Paul only refers to them once in this letter as his ‘sons and daughters’, addressing them instead 21 times as adult ‘brothers and sisters’! Finally, he gives them some strategies for dealing with their divisions.

With regard to food customs, Paul tells them to take adult responsibility on two levels. As groups they must learn to stand up to social pressure and the idea that their own group customs (‘us’/‘we’) are somehow either superior (or inferior) to ‘the other’. And they must not act like their own freedoms and ‘authority’ as a group (‘YOU’, plural) is more important than the impact of their actions on brothers and sisters who don't yet have the same freedom or level of confidence that they have. Then switching to the singular, Paul emphasizes that each individual believer (‘someone’, ‘you’, ‘I’) must put unconditional love [Gr. agape] above his or her own ‘knowledge’, and above exercising personal freedom. For each believer will be held accountable when such ‘knowledge’ leads to actions that harm a brother or a sister —especially the ones who are ‘weak’. For ‘knowledge’ is always limited and tends towards pride ('puffs up'). And ‘knowlege’ that is not governed by love is essentially worthless knowledge (1 Cor.13:2).

When groups as well as individual believers take such adult responsibilities seriously, social power will have much less influence in the church! It is the power of social groups, to dominate and exclude, that is the problem in the church, not ethnic identities themselves (1 Cor.12:12)! Ethnic identities can actually be part of the solution, as we will see in Paul's response to the same divisive issue in the church in Rome (Rom.14-16, Med.#70).

Father of all, you are over all and through all and in all. (Eph.4:6)

Help me be like Jesus, so that I please my neighbor for his good, towards (him) being built up, and not just please my own (group)—so that together we may glorify you by each person taking responsibility: to not allow evil to be attributed to anything that for ‘us’ (in our own respective groups) is good. (Rom.15:2-3,6; 14:16)

[i] By underlining the word ‘you’ (if it is lower case), I am emphasizing that the Greek pronoun is singular rather than plural which is indicated when ‘YOU’ is in caps.

[ii] Dates are taken from ‘A Chronology of the ‘Middle’ Part of Paul’s Life and Ministry’, which you can access through the detailed version of this meditation if you become a member.

[iii]See also what Paul says about ‘childhood tutors’ in Med.#30. Become a member and read more about ‘The Corinthian Mess – The Back-story’ in a two-part article that you can access through the detailed version of this meditation