Author: Nina Schmidt

Paul continues his teaching on spiritual gifts with what has magnificently been called “The Love Chapter.” As it stands, this soliloquy on love permits itself to be easily abused and that abuse usually comes in the definition of “love.” We, in our sinfulness, are all too eager to define love in a way most advantageous to us… most useful to us and our own agendas, religious or not. Because we so abuse the word “love,” God has taken its definition away from us and provided his own. Love—that is, God’s love for the world—is nothing other than his giving of Jesus Christ. To deliver God’s love is to deliver Jesus Christ. Read through this passage substituting “Jesus Christ” wherever the word “love” occurs.

Paul then goes on (vs. 8) to address the temporality of the spiritual gifts: they will pass away. He illustrates the temporality of the spiritual gifts by comparing them to the transition from childhood to adulthood. “But when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.” When adulthood comes, childhood passes away.

Psychologically, there are two things we know about childhood: children practice 1) magical thinking and 2) instant gratification. Magical thinking has two main parts. In one part, the child believes actions have no consequences. In the other part, the child believes they can possess things without any preparation. So, when the child demands pizza now, the practice of magical thinking ignores all the preparation necessary for the delivery of the pizza. Likewise, if the child leaves home in pursuit of having that pizza now, all the consequences of that leaving are ignored through the process of that magical thinking. You can see how this magical thinking combines with instant gratification. Instant gratification has no ability to wait. It has no patience. It is unable to live in hope.

Because you and I remain children, we remain subject to magical thinking and instant gratification. These childish practices undermine faith and hope. Magical thinking turns faith to sight. Instant gratification cannot live by hope. God in his love, Jesus Christ, must give us a foretaste of our adulthood before the perfect comes so that faith, hope, and love will be ours.

Table Talk: Describe some ways in which the word “love” is misused.

Pray: Heavenly Father, grant me relief from my childish ways so that I might walk by faith and not by sight, and that I may live in hope. Amen

1 Corinthians 13:1-13 (ESV)

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but I do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so that I can remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away everything I own, and if I give over my body in order to boast, but do not have love, I receive no benefit.

4 Love is patient, love is kind, it is not envious. Love does not brag, it is not puffed up. 5 It is not rude, it is not self-serving, it is not easily angered or resentful. 6 It is not glad about injustice, but rejoices in the truth. 7 It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

8 Love never ends. But if there are prophecies, they will be set aside; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be set aside. 9 For we know in part, and we prophesy in part, 10 but when what is perfect comes, the partial will be set aside. 11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. But when I became an adult, I set aside childish ways. 12 For now we see in a mirror indirectly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know in part, but then I will know fully, just as I have been fully known. 13 And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Paul preaches to the Corinthians. He draws upon their memory of their fathers’ experience in the wilderness. The cloud (vs. 10:1) that led them was the presence of God. The sea was their dry land passage through the Red Sea, escaping Pharoah’s army, a metaphor for baptism (vs. 10:2). They feasted upon the miracle of manna (Ex. 16:15). They dined upon the miracle of quail (Ex. 16:13). They drank from water that poured forth from solid rock (Num 20:8). Then Paul makes the turn from simply delivering up history to speaking like the preacher God called him to be. Paul proclaims, “…and the rock was Christ.” He preaches what Jesus says about himself, “From within him [me, the Christ] will flow rivers of living water” (Jn. 7:38).

Those ancient fathers Paul shares with the Corinthians were cut down in the wilderness. God was not pleased with them. To understand God’s displeasure, you must recall the story of Kadesh Barnea (De. 1:18-46). On the very verge of the land promised to them, the people failed to trust the Lord their God at his word. He had promised to lead them in the conquest of that land. Failing to trust the Lord’s promise, the people complained that the Lord had led them out of Egypt, only to be destroyed by these enemies. In judgment against them, the Lord vowed that the entire generation of adults would die in the wilderness. Only their babies and young children would enter the promised land.

This history provides the context for Paul’s athletic metaphors in the preceding verses (9:24-27). “Run to win…” “Exercise self-control…” “Don’t box the air…” “Subdue the body…” The fathers’ unfaithfulness at Kadesh Barnea interprets all these competitive comparisons. The fathers at Kadesh Barnea did not take the Lord at his word. In their complaint, they could just as well have called God a liar.  Such is the way of flesh… the way of the body… it demands signs and wonders: proof of the promise rather than faith in the promise. Flesh’s demand for proof must be subdued and controlled… so that faith remains in God’s promise and God is justified in his words. God is no liar!

Table Talk: Discuss the need of the flesh for proof and the comfort of faith in the promise.

Pray: Heavenly Father, put your word in my ears that I would have faith and not demand proof. Amen

1 Corinthians 9:24-10:5 (ESV)

24 Do you not know that all the runners in a stadium compete, but only one receives the prize? So run to win. 25 Each competitor must exercise self-control in everything. They do it to receive a perishable crown, but we an imperishable one.

26 So I do not run uncertainly or box like one who hits only air. 27 Instead I subdue my body and make it my slave, so that after preaching to others I myself will not be disqualified.

10 For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea, 2 and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, 3 and all ate the same spiritual food, 4 and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they were all drinking from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. 5 But God was not pleased with most of them, for they were cut down in the wilderness.

Paul preaches to the Corinthians. He draws upon their memory of their fathers’ experience in the wilderness. The cloud (vs. 10:1) that led them was the presence of God. The sea was their dry land passage through the Red Sea, escaping Pharoah’s army, a metaphor for baptism (vs. 10:2). They feasted upon the miracle of manna (Ex. 16:15). They dined upon the miracle of quail (Ex. 16:13). They drank from water that poured forth from solid rock (Num 20:8). Then Paul makes the turn from simply delivering up history to speaking like the preacher God called him to be. Paul proclaims, “…and the rock was Christ.” He preaches what Jesus says about himself, “From within him [me, the Christ] will flow rivers of living water” (Jn. 7:38).

Those ancient fathers Paul shares with the Corinthians were cut down in the wilderness. God was not pleased with them. To understand God’s displeasure, you must recall the story of Kadesh Barnea (De. 1:18-46). On the very verge of the land promised to them, the people failed to trust the Lord their God at his word. He had promised to lead them in the conquest of that land. Failing to trust the Lord’s promise, the people complained that the Lord had led them out of Egypt, only to be destroyed by these enemies. In judgment against them, the Lord vowed that the entire generation of adults would die in the wilderness. Only their babies and young children would enter the promised land.

This history provides the context for Paul’s athletic metaphors in the preceding verses (9:24-27). “Run to win…” “Exercise self-control…” “Don’t box the air…” “Subdue the body…” The fathers’ unfaithfulness at Kadesh Barnea interprets all these competitive comparisons. The fathers at Kadesh Barnea did not take the Lord at his word. In their complaint, they could just as well have called God a liar.  Such is the way of flesh… the way of the body… it demands signs and wonders: proof of the promise rather than faith in the promise. Flesh’s demand for proof must be subdued and controlled… so that faith remains in God’s promise and God is justified in his words. God is no liar!

Table Talk: Discuss the need of the flesh for proof and the comfort of faith in the promise.

Pray: Heavenly Father, put your word in my ears that I would have faith and not demand proof. Amen

1 Corinthians 9:24-10:5 (ESV)

24 Do you not know that all the runners in a stadium compete, but only one receives the prize? So run to win. 25 Each competitor must exercise self-control in everything. They do it to receive a perishable crown, but we an imperishable one.

26 So I do not run uncertainly or box like one who hits only air. 27 Instead I subdue my body and make it my slave, so that after preaching to others I myself will not be disqualified.

10 For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea, 2 and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, 3 and all ate the same spiritual food, 4 and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they were all drinking from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. 5 But God was not pleased with most of them, for they were cut down in the wilderness.

Peter is no fabulist. He does not tell tall tales. Peter, James, and John witnessed the Transfiguration and heard the Father’s voice speak from heaven, claiming Jesus as “his dear Son” (vs. 17). The Israelite tradition ensconced in their legal code required the testimony of at least two witnesses to establish a matter (Deu. 19:15 & Jn. 8:17 and others). Peter conveys the truth regarding Jesus’ receiving honor and glory from God. Under Israelite tradition and law, the matter was established and true.

Furthermore, Peter goes on to demonstrate the truth of the prophetic word. It is reliable (vs. 19). It is a light amid dimness (vs. 19). The words of the prophet are not mere imaginings (vs. 20). Those words are from God. They are delivered to the prophet by the Holy Spirit (vs. 21), not by human impulse. Peter invokes the two-witness rule once again.  Only this time, the witnesses are not Peter, James, and John but the prophet and the Holy Spirit.

At the time when the disciples replaced Judas (who had betrayed Jesus), the criterion for selection stated that the candidates be among those who had been with them accompanying Jesus (Acts 1:21). The candidate, one who would be chosen by the casting of lots, would be like the eleven remaining disciples: an official witness to the resurrection.

The Israelites… the Jews… had an established procedure for establishing a matter: the testimony of at least two witnesses. Peter appeals to this well-known procedure in his denial of conveying concocted fables. The other disciples, sent out by Jesus to bear witness to him, counted on the same procedure to establish the matter of Jesus’ resurrection. Your preacher, having heard the testimony of many witnesses spoken from one generation to the next, establishes the matter in your hearing.

Table Talk: Discuss how you establish a matter… establish it in truth… in fact… in reality… and under the law.

Pray: Heavenly Father, establish me in the reality of Jesus’ resurrection that I may know the truth of my Lord Jesus Christ. Amen

2 Peter 1:16-21 (ESV)

16 For we did not follow cleverly concocted fables when we made known to you the power and return of our Lord Jesus Christ; no, we were eyewitnesses of his grandeur. 17 For he received honor and glory from God the Father, when that voice was conveyed to him by the Majestic Glory: “This is my dear Son, in whom I am delighted.” 18 When this voice was conveyed from heaven, we ourselves heard it, for we were with him on the holy mountain. 19 Moreover, we possess the prophetic word as an altogether reliable thing. You do well if you pay attention to this as you would to a light shining in a murky place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. 20 Above all, you do well if you recognize this: No prophecy of scripture ever comes about by the prophet’s own imagination, 21 for no prophecy was ever borne of human impulse; rather, men carried along by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.