A song as I journal

Today's reading is a reminder of our fundamental doctrine of faith and it got me into singing a song :)


1 Cor 15:1-7
 ¹Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. ²By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.
 ³For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, ⁴that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, ⁵and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. ⁶After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. ⁷Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, ⁸and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.


Apostle Paul said this is of first importance .. meaning, high on the list! Three simple words that encapsulate the Christian faith: DIED - BURIED - RAISED.


And as I meditated on this passage, I started singing this old song:

Living He Loved me

Dying He saved me

Buried He carried

My sins far away

Rising He justified

Freely forever

One day He’s coming back

O glorious Day

Casting Crown did a wonderful modern version of this song with this part in the chorus.

Here's the song in YouTube.

Here's a jazz version - Coooooool ...... YouTube

May we reminded how precious we are to Him!

Why not rather be wronged or cheated?

This is a tough one. This is an interesting position Apostle Paul had taken. He argued that there's much at stake here. Even our rights can and should be sacrificed for the greater good of the Name of Christ. Remember, this is said in the context of much disunity in the Church and other compromises mentioned in Paul's letter. The Corinthians have become very carnal and were going back to their old ways. They forgot their position in Christ, as Christians. There were lawsuits taken against each other. Paul sarcastically said that even the least in the church ought to be able to judge the case, than bringing it to pagans.

Paul took such a strong position that he went on to say "Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be cheated?"

This is radical and if we understand this in the context of the previous post I had on being a willing slave, how then do we die to our rights? If we have died to ourself and live for Christ, dead men have no rights! Isn't that's what missionaries do, dying to their rights for a comfortable life and moving to foreign culture for the sake for the Gospel? Isn't that's what many in our churches who give up what is their right to a comfortable private life, give it up instead to serve others regularly, within or without the church?

I think Paul's hitting the nail on the head, by basically saying that the heart of the problem is the problem of the human heart. We are inherently SELF-CENTRED!

1 Corinthians 6:1-8

¹If any of you has a dispute with another, dare he take it before the ungodly for judgment instead of before the saints? ²Do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if you are to judge the world, are you not competent to judge trivial cases? ³Do you not know that we will judge angels? How much more the things of this life! ⁴Therefore, if you have disputes about such matters, appoint as judges even men of little account in the church! ⁵I say this to shame you. Is it possible that there is nobody among you wise enough to judge a dispute between believers? ⁶But instead, one brother goes to law against another—and this in front of unbelievers!

 ⁷The very fact that you have lawsuits among you means you have been completely defeated already. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be cheated? ⁸Instead, you yourselves cheat and do wrong, and you do this to your brothers.

1 Corinthians

Those of us who have been following our Bible Reading Plan since 2009, you have so far covered these books:

OT: Genesis, Exodus, Deuteronomy, Ezra, Nehemiah, Micah

NT: Matthew, Mark, John, Acts, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, 1 & 2 Timothy, Philemon, James, 1 & 2 Peter, 1 2 3 John, Jude

Our current reading is 1 Corinthians.

Congratulations! You have faithfully read the Word of God and journal down your thoughts and applications of God’s revelation to you. I am reminded in today’s reading (1 Cor 2:6 – 3:4) that spiritual truth can only be understood by the spiritual mind. Therefore intelligence is not equivalent to spiritual insight. You can be super intelligent and are able to regurgitate every known fact around, yet you can be spiritually blind to the things of God.

Yesterday we read “ ²⁶Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. ²⁷But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. ²⁸He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, ²⁹so that no one may boast before him. ³⁰It 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. ³¹Therefore, as it is written: "Let him who boasts boast in the Lord." 1 Cor 1:26-31

Therefore we have the Spirit of Revelation in each of us, the Holy Spirit, who comes and guides us into all truth (John 16:13 But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come.)

Pray before you read the Word of God, because it is not only with our human minds that we understand, it must also be the spiritual mind that helps us grasps the truth and applies it to our lives. That’s why a person can know the word of God well and can quote effectively from the Bible, yet we see no real effect of the Word on his life. This the Bible calls a carnal man (as opposed to the spiritual man).

As you move into 1 Corinthians, here’s some quick background:

Of all the churches Apostle Paul founded, the Corinthian church is the one that gave him the most headache. That’s why they need two long letters from him. Their problems were serious.


1. They were deeply divided, different groups following different leaders.
2. They were very immoral, to the extent that a man was living in sin with his mother (possibly his stepmother). Even the pagans of the day would have condemned it.
3. Some were drunk while having Holy Communion and were not gracious and considerate towards their poorer Christian brethren.
4. Others practice an aggressive form of feminism.
5. They certainly were not clear of basic  Christian doctrines.

Let me quote from “Unlocking the Bible”, page 956

The city that Paul visited was very wealthy and terribly pagan. The inhabitants worshipped the gods of Greece and Rome, including Poseidon, god of the sea, and Aphrodite, goddess of love. The huge temple of Aphrodite housed 2,000 priestesses who were effectively prostitutes, since worship there involved intercourse with a priestess. Indeed, ‘to Corinthianize’ became a verb in the Greek language, meaning ‘to have promiscuous sex’. So this background explains in part why Paul needed to concentrate on male-female relationships in his Corinthians letter.

In fact he dealt head-on on this subject of worship at the temple of Aphrodite in 1 Cor 6:9-20.

With this background, you will appreciate Paul’s letters more.

Poseidon

Temple of Aphrodite

A painting by Andrew Annenberg 

Gateway to the Temple of Aphrodite

Ruins of Temple of Aphrodite