1 Corinthians 1:1-3 (KJV)
Paul, called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God, and Sosthenes our brother,
Unto the church of God which is at Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours:
Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
I mentioned in the first lesson that I have taught through 1 and 2 Corinthians before[1]but that in a recent reading of the two books in my own daily visits with God, I saw some things I had not covered in that first series so many years ago.
I wrote in my Daily Visits the following,
“Life is a fabric woven together over time. It is not one event after the other. So too those themes that Paul deals with the Corinthians about find their way again and again in the fabric of his letters to them.
· The subject of spiritual labor
· The subject of authority
· The subject of the church
· The subject of communion
surface once and again as Paul works his way through this book.”
I want to address these themes that weave together to make up the fabric of these two books. I need for you to see them early on in our study so that you will know to look for them as we progress. I won’t always point them out but you do need to know to look for them.
I will depart from my fabric picture and move instead to a steel building concept to illustrate my outline for you.
In a typical steel building there are three main components:
· The columns that are the vertical members upon which everything else hangs
· The purlins that are the horizontal roof members and
· The girts that are the horizontal wall members
There is more but that serves our purpose for this lesson.
I see 1 and second Corinthians built upon several pillars or columns of truth and woven together with other purlins or girts of truth.
· The pillars, I would think, are specific and functional
· The purlins are practical and doctrinal
Realizing that, whenever a picture like this is used, it has to allow for some “license” Let me try to build for you some of the skeleton of 1 and 2 Corinthians.
After a foundation is laid, the columns are next to go up.
I. THE PILLARS OF THE LETTERS TO CORINTH
As I said, the pillars are subjects that tend to repeat themselves throughout these two letters and which I perceive to be instrumental to the letters.
Everything else hangs on them. And all four of these are found within the first chapter, most of them within the first three verses.
The first pillar
A. God Our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ
1 Corinthians 1:3 (KJV)
Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
You might prefer to think of this as your cornerstone or the foundation of the building because obviously everything rests upon God.
No God, no reason for the message at all.
· God’s name is referenced in 88 verses in 1 Corinthians and 62 verses in 2 Corinthians
· Jesus is referenced in 24 verses in 1 Corinthians 16 verses in 2 Corinthians
This doesn’t include those verses that might reference the name Christ alone.
Wait a minute.
Can you say that everything about your life is built upon God so that He is seen in anything and everything you do?
The second pillar
B. Spiritual Authority
1 Corinthians 1:1 (KJV)
Paul, called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God, and Sosthenes our brother,
Paul insisted from the beginning that he was called to be an apostle through the will of God.
And the subject is going to come up again and again.
He will write of the proof of his calling
2 Corinthians 3:1-2 (KJV)
Do we begin again to commend ourselves? or need we, as some others, epistles of commendation to you, or letters of commendation from you?
Ye are our epistle written in our hearts, known and read of all men:
He will write of the power of his calling
1 Corinthians 9:4-6 (KJV)
Have we not power to eat and to drink?
Have we not power to lead about a sister, a wife, as well as other apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas?
Or I only and Barnabas, have not we power to forbear working?
He will write of the problems of his calling
2 Corinthians 11:23 (KJV)
Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I am more; in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft.
The relevance today is that, in our current Christian climate preachers are not respected as authorities.
Paul challenges that in page after page of these letters.
C. Spiritual Labor
1 Corinthians 1:14-18 (KJV)
I thank God that I baptized none of you, but Crispus and Gaius;
Lest any should say that I had baptized in mine own name.
And I baptized also the household of Stephanas: besides, I know not whether I baptized any other.
For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.
For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.
We will see him early on telling us that we are laborers together with God.[2]
If the members of a church won’t do the work they are commissioned to do, the whole building decays.
D. The Local Church
1 Corinthians 1:2 (KJV)
Unto the church of God which is at Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours:
I wanted to use the word local in this heading because 1 Corinthians is especially used, by those who believe in the invisible, universal church, to prove their point.
The problem is that, in order to do it, they have to forget 1 Corinthians 1:2.
The letter is written to a specific church in a specific place.
It is fair to apply it to other specific churches in other specific places but it is dishonest to try to apply it to an invisible church with
· no place to meet,
· no preacher to lead it,
· no water to baptize in,
· no treasury to give to and
· no purpose to exist
II. THE PURLINS OF THE LETTERS TO CORINTH
Remember that I said in my concept:
· The pillars are specific and functional
· The purlins are practical and doctrinal
Some of these “purlins” surface more often than others but each is found more than once. Some of them are underlay several chapters of at a time.
The purlins I see are:
A. Division and Carnality
1 Corinthians 1:10 (KJV)
Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment.
Frankly, this is the reason these two letters were written.
Everything that is addressed in both letters stems from the carnality of these Christians.
Notice I did say they were Christians.
1 Corinthians 3 speaks of the natural man, the spiritual man and the carnal man.
· The natural man is unsaved.
· The spiritual man is a Christian surrendered to Christ
· The carnal man is the Christian who lives in the power of his carnal nature
Problems happen in churches whenever Christians behave according to their nature and not according to the Holy Spirit.
B. The Lord’s Supper
1 Corinthians 11:23 (KJV)
For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, That the Lord Jesus the same night in which he was betrayed took bread:
The issue of the Lord’s Supper occupies at least 7 of the 16 chapters of 1 Corinthians.
C. Spiritual Gifts
1 Corinthians 1:7 (KJV)
So that ye come behind in no gift; waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ:
We know that 1 Corinthians 12-14 address the spiritual gifts. Here we see it in the very first chapter of the letter.
Isn’t it interesting to realize that a person can be spiritually gifted and carnal at the same time?
I know some preachers who are powerful in the pulpit but their lives are a blot on the name of Jesus Christ.
And finally there is
D. The Resurrection
1 Corinthians 15:12 (KJV)
Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?
I almost called this a pillar in my building.
If you wanted to do that, it would be fine with me. J
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