1 Corinthians 1:1-9 - From Paul, called by God’s will to be an apostle of Jesus Christ, and from Sosthenes our brother.
To God’s church that is in Corinth:
To those who have been made holy to God in Christ Jesus,
who are called to be God’s people.
Together with all those who call upon the name of our
Lord Jesus Christ in every place—he’s their Lord and ours!
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord
Jesus Christ.
I thank my God always for you, because of God’s grace
that was given to you in Christ Jesus. That is, you were made rich through him in
everything: in all your communication and every kind of knowledge, in the same way that the testimony about
Christ was confirmed with you. The
result is that you aren’t missing any spiritual gift while you wait for our Lord
Jesus Christ to be revealed. He will
also confirm your testimony about Christ until the end so that you will be
blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, and you were called by him to
partnership with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
We move
now to 1 Corinthians which, according to most scholars is the next letter Paul
wrote (54-55 AD) after Galatians. The
letters to the Corinthians were among the longest letters in the letters we
have from Paul. This may be because Paul
knew this church well, for he spent over a year and a half in Corinth getting
this church up and running. After he had
moved on to start other churches, Paul heard about a handful of problems the
Corinthian church was having. He wrote
to them in hopes that he could offer them some help in addressing those
specific problems.
Before
we get to the problems Paul addresses, let’s notice a seemingly unimportant
detail in the introduction to the letter:
“From Paul, called by God’s will
to be an apostle of Jesus Christ, and from Sosthenes our brother.”
Paul mentions a man named Sosthenes, who Paul calls a “brother.” This means that Sosthenes was a fellow
Christian now. Sosthenes was not a
stranger to Corinth, but at one time, he was an enemy of the church in
Corinth. We read in Acts 18 about a
Sosthenes that was an appointed leader of the Jewish synagogue in Corinth. When Paul shows up and starts converting some
of the Jews in Corinth into Christians, Sosthenes has him brought up on charges
in order stop the conversions. The plan
backfires, and through a stream of ambiguous details, Sosthenes ends up being
beaten up.
So it is rather significant that Paul writes to the church in
Corinth and lists Sosthenes as a co-author and brother. Through the transformative power of the
gospel, a former opponent and persecutor has now become a present partner in
ministry. Sosthenes, like Paul himself,
was once a enemy of Christ and now has become an ambassador for Christ with
Paul, the very man Sosthenes intended to bring down.
This is
an important detail to share as we begin our journey through this first letter
to the people of Corinth, for it gives even greater power to Paul’s advice on
how to address the problems in the Corinthian church.
But for
today, we should note that possibility that people we have seen as an enemy
should never be completely written off.
Today’s adversary, through the power of Christ, can become tomorrow’s
partner.
Question: Is there someone you have seen as an enemy in the
past that, through the lens of the transforming power of Christ, might become
an ally?
Prayer: Lord Jesus, help us to see people as you do. Help us let go of our own biases of the past
so that we may see what you are doing now.
Amen.
Prayer Focus: Pray
for some people today that you would ordinarily not choose to pray for.
Song: That’s What
Faith Can Do
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