The church at Corinth was a troubled assembly wracked by personality cults (1 Corinthians 1, 3), lack of wisdom (ch. 2), spiritual pride (ch. 4), immorality (ch. 5), lawsuits between believers (ch. 6), troubled marriages (ch. 7), meat offered to idols (ch. 8), the need for self-discipline (ch. 9), and abuse of both the Lord’s Supper (ch. 11) and spiritual gifts (chs. 12–14). The seriousness of the problems is underlined by the fact that Paul steps away from his “typical” pattern in letters to churches. Normally, the first half of a letter is teaching, and the second half is practical application. As one teacher said, the first half tells us what to believe and the second half teaches us how to behave. In 1 Corinthians, Paul spends fourteen chapters troubleshooting before he gets to one chapter on the doctrine of the resurrection (ch. 15) and some closing practical thoughts (ch. 16).
Bill Crowde
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