Learning from the Corinthians
A Sermon for Evensong
Some words
from this evening’s second reading: “I will pray with the spirit, but I will
pray with the mind also; I will sing praise with the spirit, but I will sing
praise with the mind also”.
This seems a splendid opportunity to
give a plug for something that will be coming in the autumn: a course of study
called ‘How to read the Bible (without switching off your brain)’. It is aimed at those within the church who
would like to know more about the Bible, and also at those who are not in the
church but are interested in what Christians believe. I very much hope that those who come along
will have a more rounded picture of the Bible by the end, and will learn
something about what it says (and what it doesn’t), how the Bible was written,
how Christians read the Bible and also how the Bible forms part of our prayer
and worship. A brain is required, but
not a huge background knowledge of the Bible.
St Paul’s first letter to the
Corinthians is a good letter with which to trail a series of engaged study of
the Bible. So this evening, I want to
introduce the whole letter to you. I
will then set the passage we have just read in its context. I hope that you might be inspired to go home
and read the whole letter (it will take you far less time than you think!).
Let us begin with an exercise of the imagination. Picture a church torn apart by questions of
sex and marriage. A church where the
secular law courts are being asked to judge between Christians. A church where money and status are being
used to determine the running of the church, where rich Christians lord it over
their poorer brothers and sisters. A
church which is arguing about how Christians should worship God. A church trying to be faithful to the Gospel
in the midst of a hostile world more interested in power, wealth and
self-indulgence. What does that church
look like? I suspect that you may be
picturing the contemporary Church of England.
However, it is a pretty good picture of the the first century church in
Corinth, to whom St Paul wrote.
Corinth was a large city with two ports linking the Aegean and Ionian
seas. It had been captured by the Romans
in 146BC and left virtually deserted until Julius Caesar re-founded it as a
Roman colony in 44BC. Many of the
colonists were freedmen, former slaves, and Corinth was unusual in allowing
them to hold office. Old Corinth (prior
to 146BC) had a reputation for sexual promiscuity, Aristophanes even coined the
verb ‘korinthiazesthai’, meaning to
engage in such practices. But by the
time of Paul’s letter Corinth was probably no different to anywhere else in the
ancient world. Corinth was famed for the
Isthmian Games, second only to the Olympics, and the highest political office
in Corinth was that of the Sponsor of the Games. Paul alludes to this in 1 Cor. 9.24-27. Like anywhere else in the Roman world,
temples and idols abounded in Corinth.
Meat, for those who could afford it, mostly originated in those temples
and the temples were also a popular place for eating out!
Into this context, Paul had come preaching the good news about
Jesus. He seems to have begun, as usual,
in the Synagogue. The leader of the
Synagogue, Crispus (1.14), became a Christian.
By the time of Paul’s letter, the Christian community in Corinth had
been in existence for about 5 years and there were now up to 200 Christians
meeting together in homes. Most of these
were Gentiles (non-Jews), and they represented a spectrum of social and
economic class. Paul, now in Ephesus,
has received a letter from the Corinthian church asking about a variety of
issues (7.1). He has also received
reports from ‘Chloe’s people’ (1.11; 11.18) about divisions and other problems
in the church. His letter is concerned
to answer their questions and to deal with the problems he has had reported to
him. Above all, however, he is concerned
to form them into a community united in love and formed into a church following
Jesus. Thus in the midst of rebukes and
censure, Paul is constantly reminding the Corinthians that they are part of the
body of Christ, they must support one another and they must live and act in
love for one another.
The passage that we have read this evening is comes at the end of a long
sequence that stretches from the beginning of chapter 12 to the end of chapter
14. The Corinthians fancy themselves as
spiritual giants. They have had an
experience of worshipping God with spiritual gifts, especially the gift of
speaking in tongues. This has intrigued them,
and they have asked Paul to tell them more.
It has also divided them, as people have begun to use spiritual
experiences as an indication that God has made them more important than their
neighbours. In writing to them,
therefore, Paul wants to give them more teaching on spiritual gifts, but he
also wants to correct the way in which they approach the use of the gifts of
the Spirit.
It is, therefore, no accident that chapter 12 is St Paul’s most
developed use of the metaphor of the Body (or the Body of Christ) to describe
the Church of God. Paul emphasises the
unity of the Body of Christ, in its diversity.
Here is the heart of his teaching:
“The body does not consist of one member but of many. If the foot were to say, ‘Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body’, that would not make it any less a part of the body … If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? … As it is, there are many members, yet one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I have no need of you’, nor again the head to the feet, ‘I have no need of you.’ On the contrary, the members of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and those members of the body that we think less honourable we clothe with greater honour … If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honoured, all rejoice together with it” (1 Cor. 12.14-26).
Paul
then turns, in the most famous passage of the letter to ‘a still more excellent
way’ (1 Cor. 12.31) – the way of love.
The great hymn to love, often read at weddings, is primarily about the
way in which Christians are to behave towards one another in the exercise of
their spiritual gifts. That is why the
passage begins ‘if I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not
have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal’ (1 Cor. 13.1). Only after these two chapters does Paul begin
to offer any practical advice to the Corinthian Church about how they might
exercise their spiritual gifts. He
continues to rely upon the teaching he has given, that they belong together in
the same body. Church is not a
competitive sport! And they are first
and foremost to love one another.
“Pursue love” begins our reading this evening. Without it, whatever they do has lost the
point. On the basis of this teaching,
you belong to one another and do everything in love, Paul asks them to use
their minds. It is tempting to
paraphrase him as saying ‘use your common sense’.
The
whole of Paul’s first letter to the Christians at Corinth is about how to be
the church. Some of it is very
practical, some deeply theological, and often, as in the passage we have heard
this evening, both mixed together. It
seems to me that his teaching that we belong together, we should do everything
in love and that in the light of this we should use our minds and think about
the effects of what we are doing, is not bad teaching for the church
today. Whether that be a local Christian
community, the national church, the Anglican Communion or the greater Church of
God, St Paul’s teaching that we belong to one another, that we should behave
towards one another in love, and that we should use our intelligence is not bad
advice.
The
important thing to notice is that it is spiritual gifts that are causing
the problems in Corinth. These gifts are
good things, they are not problematic in their nature. Similarly, in the church today, whether here
at Derby Cathedral (or, if I might be so bold, at St John’s ???), the Church of
England more broadly or the Church of God throughout the world, it is all too
often the gifts that God has given us that cause division. Whether that be our musical ability, our
intelligence, our appreciation of language, our sexuality, our ability to argue
a case or whatever. These are all gifts,
they are all good things. But if we do
not use them to build up the whole body of the church, if we do not use them in
love, if we do not think about how we are using them, then they will be
divisive and destructive. God has given
us gifts fir us to use. But he has given
them to use for the sake of others, not just for our own benefit.
St
Paul’s teaching for the church in Corinth has still a good deal to teach us as
we struggle to be the church in the 21st Century. God has given us
good gifts. But the gifts that God has given us are to be used for the good of
one another, they are to be used with love for one another, and we are to think
about how we use them.
Belong together, love one another, use your minds. Reading 1 Corinthians is like opening someone
else’s mail. We have the chance to
eavesdrop on someone else’s arguments.
And in doing this, we may also be able to hear the voice of the apostle
and of the Lord speaking to us today. Amen.
First given at Derby Cathedral 4.8.13.
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