10/22 1 Corinthians 1-2

Sisters and Brothers,
After finishing Exodus from Old Testament, we are continuing the first letter from Paul to Corinthians.
Paul established this Christian community in about year 51, on his second missionary journey. While Paul was in Ephesus on his third journey, he received disquieting news about Corinth. The community there was displaying open factionalism, as certain members were identifying themselves exclusively with individual Christian leaders and interpreting Christian teaching as a superior wisdom for the initiated few. Not only that, many other questions regarding the Christian teaching were raised and false teachings were spread with ill practice.
To treat this wide spectrum of questions, Paul wrote this letter from Ephesus about the year 56. The letter illustrates well the mind and character of Paul. Certain passages of the letter are of the greatest importance for the understanding of early Christian teaching on the Eucharist and on the resurrection of the body.
Paul's authorship of 1 Corinthians, apart from a few verses that some regard as later interpolations, has never been seriously questioned. Some scholars have proposed, however, that the letter as we have it contains portions of more than one original Pauline letter. We know that Paul wrote at least two other letters to Corinth in addition to the two that we now have; this theory holds that the additional letters are actually contained within the two canonical ones. Most commentators, however, find 1 Corinthians quite understandable as a single coherent work.
The first problem Paul addresses is that of divisions within the community. Although we are unable to reconstruct the situation in Corinth completely, Paul clearly traces the divisions back to a false self-image on the part of the Corinthians, coupled with a false understanding of the apostles who preached to them and of the Christian message itself. As Paul wrote, “I urge you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree in what you say, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and in the same purpose.” “For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with the wisdom of human eloquence, so that the cross of Christ might not be emptied of its meaning.”
Even nowadays, we are still facing the same issue in our society. We are often unconsciously falling into the trap of boasting. As Paul wrote, “Rather, God chose the foolish of the world to shame the wise, and God chose the weak of the world to shame the strong, and God chose the lowly and despised of the world, those who count for nothing, to reduce to nothing those who are something, so that no human being might boast before God.
In chapter 2, Paul continued to explain that the wisdom is from God but not human being. “When I came to you, brothers, proclaiming the mystery of God, 1 I did not come with sublimity of words or of wisdom.” “I came to you in weakness and fear and much trembling.” And this wisdom cannot be acquired by revealed by God through Holy Spirit. Paul made his argument that none of the rulers knew, otherwise, they would not have crucified the Lord our God.
With this understanding in mind, we human beings can be categorized into two different persons, a natural person or a spiritual person. “The natural person does not accept what pertains to the Spirit of God, for to him it is foolishness, and he cannot understand it, because it is judged spiritually. The spiritual person, however, can judge everything but is not subject to judgment by anyone. For the spiritual persons share God’s own capacity to judge, they will not criticize nor boast.
Doesn’t this sound easy, to obtain God’s wisdom for God is gracious and merciful? But the key is to empty our hard and let the Holy Spirit to lead us. Imagine, can we put anything into a bottle that is full? Let’s us empty ourselves so we can receive God’s wisdom through the Holy Spirit.

In Christ,
Dan