Nibs Notes for August

Monthly Words from Reverend Nibs Stroupe 

During the month of August, we’ll be continuing in our series on Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians, and we’ll be touching on some major topics such as the famous “love” chapter of I Corinthians 13, the first written evidence of the Lord’s Supper, the core preaching of the church, and the doctrine of the resurrection.  Indeed, this Letter likely made it into the canon of the Bible because it is the first summary of the theory of the practice of the faith, written by a Jew about a Jew for non-Jews.

We must also remember that Paul was writing this letter with an eye on the second coming of Jesus. In later letters, he seems less certain, but in this letter, he seems to believe that Jesus will return before Paul dies. In that sense, Paul’s mandates and ethics in I Corinthians must be seen in light of this interim period. He was not writing guidelines for all people for all time but rather guidelines for the newly converted Gentiles in Corinth who now await the return of Jesus. If the guidelines in it are written only for those living in 51 CE and not for us in 1851 or 1951 or 2010, why bother with it? Just leave it to the doctoral students who need to find dissertation topics!

At least two voices call out to us to continue studying and receiving the wisdom of I Corinthians. First, whereas Paul did not intend his guidelines to become canon law, the church has enshrined them and made them part of our sacred texts and tradition. So, I Corinthians now has become part of the guidelines for Christian living, no matter what age in which we find ourselves. Thus, we will always be wrestling with whether slaves should stay in that condition or whether widows should stay unmarried (chapter 7), or whether women can lead in worship (chapter 14).

But, a second, deeper voice calls out to us from I Corinthians, whatever our decisions are about the societal guidelines that Paul proposes for the short, interim time before Jesus returns. That voice is the Spirit calling out to us, as She speaks to the Corinthian Christians through Paul’s words, reminding them that they are now children of God through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. As daughters and sons of God, they (and we) are asked to re-examine our lives in light of the amazing love and grace of God. We are asked to live our lives as children of God, no matter what century or what circumstance in which we find ourselves. 

At the heart of this life is the power of love, which Paul describes in the famous chapter 13: “If I speak with the eloquence of human beings or even of angels, but I don’t have love in my heart, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.” The love that Paul describes here is not the sweet or sentimental kind that is pushed along by our feelings. It is rather the willingness to commit and to engage another person, another group, another community. This kind of love is demanding and calls for patience and endurance, for a willingness to remain committed when things don’t go well. It’s the kind of love that God has for us, and in this timeless chapter in I Corinthians, Paul calls for us to seek to imitate that kind of love in our own lives.

Peace,
Nibs Stroupe