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Thursday, 21 August 2008

1 Corinthians 4-1 Corinthians 5

**We are going to continue getting the notes up here, one or two chapters at a time. Sorry for the delay....
The discussion notes are in italics
1 Corinthians 4 (New International Version)
Apostles of Christ
1So then, men ought to regard us as servants of Christ and as those entrusted with the secret things of God. 2Now it is required that those who have been given a trust must prove faithful. 3I care very little if I am judged by you or by any human court; indeed, I do not even judge myself. 4My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent. It is the Lord who judges me. 5Therefore judge nothing before the appointed time; wait till the Lord comes. He will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and will expose the motives of men's hearts. At that time each will receive his praise from God.

Paul talks about not caring who he is judged by, because God is the one who judges. It shouldn't matter what others say or think about us, but what God thinks. And although we feel comfortable knowing we are under His grace we need to remember that it is Gods Grace and not what we think about ourselves that makes us innocent.

6Now, brothers, I have applied these things to myself and Apollos for your benefit, so that you may learn from us the meaning of the saying, "Do not go beyond what is written." Then you will not take pride in one man over against another. 7For who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you did not?
We talked about how important it is to remember that all of life is a gift. We have nothing that was not given to us because God provides for our every need.

8Already you have all you want! Already you have become rich! You have become kings—and that without us! How I wish that you really had become kings so that we might be kings with you! 9For it seems to me that God has put us apostles on display at the end of the procession, like men condemned to die in the arena. We have been made a spectacle to the whole universe, to angels as well as to men. 10We are fools for Christ, but you are so wise in Christ! We are weak, but you are strong! You are honored, we are dishonored! 11To this very hour we go hungry and thirsty, we are in rags, we are brutally treated, we are homeless. 12We work hard with our own hands. When we are cursed, we bless; when we are persecuted, we endure it; 13when we are slandered, we answer kindly. Up to this moment we have become the scum of the earth, the refuse of the world.
14I am not writing this to shame you, but to warn you, as my dear children. 15Even though you have ten thousand guardians in Christ, you do not have many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. 16Therefore I urge you to imitate me. 17For this reason I am sending to you Timothy, my son whom I love, who is faithful in the Lord. He will remind you of my way of life in Christ Jesus, which agrees with what I teach everywhere in every church.
18Some of you have become arrogant, as if I were not coming to you. 19But I will come to you very soon, if the Lord is willing, and then I will find out not only how these arrogant people are talking, but what power they have. 20For the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but of power. 21What do you prefer? Shall I come to you with a whip, or in love and with a gentle spirit?

1 Corinthians 5
Expel the Immoral Brother!
1It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that does not occur even among pagans: A man has his father's wife. 2And you are proud! Shouldn't you rather have been filled with grief and have put out of your fellowship the man who did this? 3Even though I am not physically present, I am with you in spirit. And I have already passed judgment on the one who did this, just as if I were present. 4When you are assembled in the name of our Lord Jesus and I am with you in spirit, and the power of our Lord Jesus is present, 5hand this man over to Satan, so that the sinful nature^[a] may be destroyed and his spirit saved on the day of the Lord.

6Your boasting is not good. Don't you know that a little yeast works through the whole batch of dough? 7Get rid of the old yeast that you may be a new batch without yeast—as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. 8Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old yeast, the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with bread without yeast, the bread of sincerity and truth.
We talked about how serious the situation of sin in the body of Christ is to the rest of the body. It is important to note that it is obvious that this person and the person's involved are not repentant of their sin; they are boasting and that can't be tolerated in the church because a little yeast... and the whole bread is infected. So we expel the immoral brother in order that his soul will be redeemed.

9I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— 10not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. 11But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat.
12What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? 13God will judge those outside. "Expel the wicked man from among you."^[b]
We mentioned the fact that paul just got done saying "do not judge". But now he is saying don't judge the people of the world but judge Christians. What we came up with was that judge might mean holding our brothers and sisters accountable for their actions. if we see someone in sin in the church it does no good to gossip about them or judge them without love. but if we judge their actions and hold them to the standard that Christ calls us to always for their sake; so that they may turn from sin and be saved, not so we can feel good about what good little Christians we are.

~Glen

Thursday, 07 August 2008

Tuesday 8/5/08 1 Corinthians 2:1-3:23

Christ Crucified
1 And I, brethren, when I came to you, did not come with excellence of speech or of wisdom declaring to you the testimony^[a] of God. 2 For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. 3 I was with you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling. 4 And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human^[b] wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, 5 that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.

There was some discussion regarding the wisdom of man and the Power of God. It is amazing how powerfully God created the universe and how complex it is and how foolish the wisdom of man is that says there is no God because of the evidence of things like evolution and the big bang theory. But studying the universe and the world open to God you can really see the amazing power that He has.

Spiritual Wisdom

6 However, we speak wisdom among those who are mature, yet not the wisdom of this age, nor of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. 7 But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory, 8 which none of the rulers of this age knew; for had they known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
9 But as it is written:

      “ Eye has not seen, nor ear heard,
      Nor have entered into the heart of man
      The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”^[a]
10 But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. 11 For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. 12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.
13 These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy^[b] Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. 14 But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. 15 But he who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is rightly judged by no one. 16 For “who has known the mind of the LORD that he may instruct Him?”^[c] But we have the mind of Christ.
We talked about judging all things and how elsewhere in the Bible we are told not to judge or we will be judged ourselves. This passage is probably not referring to judging each other or people but judging the fruit and judging satan and satans work. we are rightly judged by no one because we are covered under the blood of Jesus.
Sectarianism Is Carnal
1 And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual people but as to carnal, as to babes in Christ. 2 I fed you with milk and not with solid food; for until now you were not able to receive it, and even now you are still not able; 3 for you are still carnal. For where there are envy, strife, and divisions among you, are you not carnal and behaving like mere men? 4 For when one says, “I am of Paul,” and another, “I am of Apollos,” are you not carnal?
Watering, Working, Warning

5 Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers through whom you believed, as the Lord gave to each one? 6 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. 7 So then neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the increase. 8 Now he who plants and he who waters are one, and each one will receive his own reward according to his own labor.
9 For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, you are God’s building. 10 According to the grace of God which was given to me, as a wise master builder I have laid the foundation, and another builds on it. But let each one take heed how he builds on it. 11 For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. 12 Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, 13 each one’s work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is. 14 If anyone’s work which he has built on it endures, he will receive a reward. 15 If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.
16 Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? 17 If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are.
It is important to remember who does the growth in our spiritual work and who is ultimately important. God is the one who brings about fruit from our labor in the Lord. And our work will be tested and will be revealed through the fire of that testing. Not everyone is called to do one thing like evangelism, and leading X number of people through the sinners prayer a year is not an accurate gage of whether or not you are walking out your Christian life fully or not. some people are planting seeds, others are watering, some people are reaping the harvest. what is important is that you are doing what God is leading you to do. What season has God called you into?
18 Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you seems to be wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise. 19 For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, “He catches the wise in their own craftiness”;^[a] 20 and again, “The LORD knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are futile.”^[b] 21 Therefore let no one boast in men. For all things are yours: 22 whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas, or the world or life or death, or things present or things to come—all are yours. 23 And you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.
Following God is foolishness to the world. Many times God will call us to do things that the World would deem unwise. But God is our everything. everything in life that we have we owe to God. And God is faithful and trustworthy to rely on. this applies to things like tithing and sacrificing time, money, relationships, whatever we need to.

If there is somthing anyone would like to add and I am sure I missed alot in my discussion notes.

~Glen

Tuesday, 05 August 2008

Monday 8/4/08 1 Corinthians 1:1-2:5

1:10 "I appeal to you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another so that there may be no divisions among you and that you may be perfectly united in mind and thought."

We talked about all the different denominations, and that this is not how God intended the church to be. However, God does bring fruit through the people who are seeking him in lots of different denominations. Now our goal should not necessarily be to eliminate all the different names, but to be of one mind and purpose. We also talked about the fact that there have been many revivals that different denominations have come out of, where people chose the preachers or topics they liked, and followed those to the extent of creating a new denomination. This ties in with the next couple of verses where Paul says not to follow a specific person, but to follow Christ, who is not divided.

1:17 "For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel - not with words of human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power"

We talked about sermons or teachings we have heard where the preacher uses catchy, somewhat sales-like pitches, jokes, or bullet-points to make their message attractive to people. When the Spirit of God is not behind these, they come from a worldly, human wisdom, and there is no power in them. Also, people who come to a church just because they like these preachers are not seeing the heart of God. They may end up bouncing from church to church looking for a good sermon, and leave if they are uncomfortable. They never learn to recognize God's voice or presence in a church, but are looking instead for human wisdom.

1:22-24 "Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God."

We talked about how the Jews and Greeks viewed Christ and the crucifixion. The Jews believed Christ would come as a king, not a poor carpenter who would die a shameful death. The mindset of the Greeks was that you were mentally suited for whatever class you were born into - so Christ, who was born in a barn, did not seem like someone to follow. He also hung around with the poor class, so the story that he was God in the flesh would seem very foolish to them.

1:30 "It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God - that is, our righteousness, holiness, and redemption."

We have the wisdom of God, because Christ gave that to us. Also, we are righteous, holy, and redeemed because God has cleansed us!

Please feel free to add if there is anything I missed, or if you were not there but have comments about the text!

Hope to see more of you tonight - please call me if you need directions. We start at 6:30.
-Beth
This is a place to post notes from the Bible Study on 1 Corinthians at Glen and Beth's house. Please feel free to add any comments you may have about the text! I will try to post each day so you can keep up if you were unable to make it to the study.
-Beth