What’s the essence of the Christian faith? Is it honoring God with your life? Living a life of integrity? Not being selfish? Helping others? Can you love God, be sincere and ignore Jesus altogether? The whole heaven and hell thing – is that a misguided or outdated question, as many church-attending people now think and many church leaders, authors and speakers would now contend? In the first part of 1 Corinthians 15, Paul helps us to understand this issue more thoroughly.
Chuck Smith in his book Charisma Versus Charismania begins with a story of the abuse of the gift of tongues that he witnessed as a young man. The church in 1st Century Corinth bore some similarity to the church of Chuck Smith’s 20th Century youth. It seems some of things that made Chuck uneasy made the Apostle Paul uneasy too. Today’s chapter deals with a church’s prioritizing and use of the Holy Spirit’s gifts.
The Corinthian church was obsessed with spiritual gifts. They loved to see God in action, working supernaturally in their lives. Spiritual gifts are good, but the Corinthians were imbalanced. They focused on the outward signs of God’s Spirit but neglected His inward work in their hearts. In 1 Corinthians 12 – 14, Paul gives an extended teaching on the topic of spiritual gifts. Here in the middle of that, in Chapter 13, he tells them what they should make their highest priority.
The Corinthian church needed correction on a number of issues. In this chapter Paul deals with the appearance of women while praying or prophecying and an irreverent appraoch to the Lord’s Supper.
Central Reflections 