Robert Grisham Posts

Paul will receive a letter back from the Corinthian church, and then he’ll write a second letter, which we’ll get to tomorrow. For now, though, let’s go back to the book of Acts. As I wrote a few days ago, Paul’s third missionary journey was to Asia, and it was during this journey that he was able to spend a large block of time (3 years) in one city (Ephesus). How nice to not be run out of town two weeks after arriving!

By this point Paul was an old man. I’m about to turn 50 and don’t consider that old, but back then it was. He had to think about what would happen after he was no longer around. So he spent these three years in Ephesus training men and women who would start and lead new churches. The seven churches that we see in Revelation 2-3 were most likely started during this time.

Ephesus was a very large city. It was a port city, and like Corinth, was very diverse. Ephesus is the home of one of the seven ancient wonders of the world, the temple of Artemis. I plan to write a bit about Artemis when we get to Paul’s letter to Timothy.

It’s also during time time that a teenager named Nero will become emperor of Rome. Nero will play a big role in Paul’s story.

Paul’s time in Ephesus came to an end because he threatened the economic system in Ephesus. There was a silversmith named Demetrius who made silver shrines for the temple of Artemis. He rallied together other business owners in Ephesus to complain about Paul. They felt that Paul was leading people astray. “He says that gods made by human hands are no gods at all (Acts 19:26). He acknowledged that this was impacting his business, but he also pointed out that it was discrediting the great goddess Artemis (he probably wasn’t that concerned about that – it was all about the money).

Soon the whole city was in an uproar. Paul and his friends didn’t know what was going to happen to them. Fortunately, cooler heads prevailed, and the uproar ended. Paul figured he should take advantage of the calm and go ahead and leave Ephesus, so he did.

Today we have one more reading from 1 Corinthians.

Every Sunday morning at my church we take communion together. And quite often the person leading reads from 1 Corinthians 11. It’s a reminder of Jesus’ sacrifice, of how at that Passover dinner before his death, he helped his friends see that he was true bread that they were breaking and the true wine that was being poured out. He invited them to eat and drink with this in mind. By the time Paul was writing to the Corinthian church some 20 years later, this practice had been cemented into the life of the church, both Jewish and Gentile.

Paul needs to address a problem, though. In that day, the Lord’s Supper was an actual supper. It was a communal meal. Paul believes community is absolutely essential to the life of the church, but he needs them to know that what they are doing is causing more harm than good (1 Corinthians 11:17).

What was the problem that Paul wanted to address?

The church in Corinth was very diverse. It reflected their very diverse city. There were people in the church who were extremely wealthy, and there was also extreme poverty. There were business owners and there were slaves. To Paul the church was the one place in society where people from diverse backgrounds could come together and be one. Their diversity wouldn’t be eliminated. But what brought them together (Christ) was greater than what differentiated them. But at these dinners, the opposite was happening. Those who had food brought it to the meeting and ate, while those who didn’t have food came and ate nothing. This simply reflected the truth that division, rather than unity, was the result of their diversity.

Paul was strong in his condemnation of this behavior. He says, “So then, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord. Everyone ought to examine themselves before they eat of the bread and drink from the cup. For those who eat and drink without discerning the body of Christ eat and drink judgment on themselves” (1 Corinthians 11:27-29).

Every church I’ve been a part of has observed the ordinance of communion. Some did it quarterly. Others did it every Sunday. For most of my life I heard this passage and related to it as an individual. Did I have some unconfessed sin that would result in me taking communion in “an unworthy manner?” It’s not that I don’t think this is true, but I don’t believe this is what Paul was talking about. He was addressing them as a community, and the “unworthy manner” came when they failed to think about one another. It came when they failed to honor one another above themselves. And it came when some would have their fill while others were hungry.

Today’s reading is on 1 Corinthians 5-10.

As I begin to write, I want to acknowledge that there are verses in these passages that have caused a great deal of harm. I come away with some frustration reading them again this morning. Do I believe that Paul meant them to cause harm? I don’t. I have had the belief for a couple of decades that Paul wouldn’t have believed that someone halfway across the world (me) would be reading the letters he wrote almost 2000 years later. If he had known this, I think he would have written differently. That doesn’t mean that I don’t think what he wrote was inspired by God (God-breathed). I do. But I also believe it was Paul writing. Further, I think we need to remind ourselves that he wasn’t writing to us. He had a specific context in mind. He was writing to individual churches that were going through specific situations. That was his goal. I’m good with that goal, but I think it’s important to understand that.

I want to go back to something that had happened just a few years before. After the first missionary journey, Paul and Barnabas went to Jerusalem to share with Peter, James and the others why they they were adamant that the Gentile believers did not need to be circumcised (and thus be Jewish). This story is found in Acts 15. Peter, James and the other leaders listened to both sides, and in the end they agreed with Paul and Barnabas. They decided to write a letter, which would then be read among the new churches.

The phrase that has stood out to me in their letter is, “It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us.” There was no direct revelation from God. It wasn’t as black and white as they would have liked, but they were confident that they had listened well. There had been good discussion. And they had sought to surrender the decision to God through prayer. At the end of all of that, this was the best they could do: “It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us.”

But they did have a couple of black and white issues that they wanted to make sure that these Gentile churches followed. “You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality” (Acts 15:29).

Now fast forward just a few years later and we see Paul writing from Ephesus to the church in Corinth. Again, the purpose of this letter is to respond to questions they had but also to address problems that he has heard about. And he’s still no doubt contending with those Jewish leaders who believe strongly that these new Gentile believers must follow their Jewish law and customs.

Paul has been asked about whether or not they can eat food that has been sacrificed to idols. Most of the meat that was sold at the markets came from animals that had been slaughtered at pagan temple ceremonies. They wanted to know if they could still purchase it. And they knew what a challenge it would be to even know whether or not the meat they were buying was from an animal that had been sacrificed. This was very practical to this church, so Paul wanted to do his best to answer them.

Paul knew that this setting was night and day from Jerusalem. Peter had spent a little time in Galatia, but at this point he had probably never been anywhere as cosmopolitan and pluralistic as the city of Corinth. Because of that, Paul was about to take something prescribed by the church leaders in Jerusalem as black and white (don’t eat food that has been sacrificed to idols) and make it gray.

Here’s the gist of what he had to say: Don’t eat food sacrificed to idols if you’re eating while worshiping idols in a pagan temple. But other than that, unless you choose to be a vegetarian, it’s fine to continue to purchase meat from the marketplace, even if it’s from an animal that was sacrificed to an idol.

Today we could care less about this issue, but it was a big deal then. I imagine that Peter and James were less than thrilled when they first heard what Paul had said.

From the time that Israel became a nation, circumcision was a big deal. No one questioned it…until Paul. And then Peter and James. And not eating food sacrificed to idols was a big deal that no one questioned…until Paul.

What is the point of all this? It’s that I have problems with some of the things that Paul says. If I were to give just one example, it would be marriage. Paul was single. He chose this. It fit who he was and what he was called to do. And he says it pretty clearly to the members of this church: “It’s good to stay unmarried, as I do. But if you can’t control yourself, then you should marry, for it is better to marry than to burn with passion” (1 Corinthians 7:8-9).

I’ve officiated a few weddings in my day. Can you imagine the response if I had led with this!

Paul didn’t have a very high view of marriage. Does that mean that God doesn’t have a high view of marriage? No. It just means that Paul didn’t, at least not then. Maybe he changed his mind over time.

There are a lot of people today who believe that if you question something that Paul said, then you are also questioning God. I believe that puts God in a very tiny box. I’m a big fan of Jesus’ words that we must come as a child to God. We’re called to trust, and there are a lot of areas with my relationship with God where I continue to lean in, to trust, when things are difficult or I simply don’t understand. But I also want to put my big boy britches on and lean into thinking and questioning. That’s the way to go deeper in knowledge and understanding. These two things go together.

This line of thinking has not led me away from Scripture. It’s led me towards it. Having the freedom to wrestle has actually been life-giving to me.

Paul, Silas and Timothy spent 18 months in Corinth. When they left they went back to Antioch, and then shortly after they set out for their third missionary journey, which would take them to Ephesus, and where they would stay for 3 years. While in Ephesus Paul gets word that things are not going well for the Corinthian church. So he decides to write a letter to them. This letter has been lost, but he mentions it in the second letter he wrote, which we know as 1 Corinthians. After the church received the lost letter, they wrote him a letter that had a lot of questions. 1 Corinthians is a much longer letter than his first three, and a great deal of it covers the questions they asked.

Today’s reading covers the first four chapters of 1 Corinthians.

This church was filled with many smart and gifted people. Paul had started the church with Priscilla and Aquila, but they were now in Rome. And Paul was obviously in Ephesus. This group of smart and gifted people had begun to argue about who their leader was. Some felt it was Paul, since he had started the church. Others thought it was Apollos, a great orator who had recently spent time with them. Others thought it was Peter, who was one of the leaders of the church in Jerusalem. And then the guy looking for the gold star suggested it was Jesus.

Paul thought this argument was foolish, and he definitely had concerns about the many divisions in the church. But he doesn’t simply tell them to quit arguing. Instead and talks about Jesus, and specifically, the message of the cross.

The fact is that the message of the cross can come across as foolishness because it is steeped in weakness. The people in this church saw themselves as strong, not weak. Again, they were very smart and gifted. Paul wanted to remind them of who they were before their hearts were changed by Jesus. And he wanted to remind them that the same thing was true with him. When he first met them he didn’t come with lofty and impressive words. He simply shared Jesus. And that was enough.

Paul was concerned that pride had crept into this young church. He called them to humility. Without humility they wouldn’t grow past where they were. He says that they are still infants, unable to eat solid food. They haven’t matured, and it’s evidenced by their arguments over who is in charge. He says…

“I am writing this not to shame you but to warn you as my dear children. Even if you had ten thousand guardians in Christ, you do not have many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. Therefore I urge you to imitate me. For this reason I have sent to you Timothy, my son whom I love, who is faithful in the Lord. He will remind you of my way of life in Christ Jesus, which agrees with what I teach everywhere in every church” (1 Corinthians 4:14-17).

The last part of Paul’s letter to the Thessalonian church was about the promise that Jesus would one day return. It was meant to provide encouragement and comfort for them in the midst of their suffering.

I believe that the Bible is inspired by God. I think that’s what Paul means when he writes in a letter to Timothy that it’s God-breathed. It means that it wasn’t simply the work of a human. But it was the work of a human. Case in point…Paul doesn’t have a group of editors that goes through his letters before sending them. He writes what is on his heart. And sometimes he probably wishes that he had been a little more clear in what he wrote. I’m thinking for sure some of the things he said about women in other letters. But this is also one of those examples.

Those in the church in Thessalonica took his words about the second coming to heart. They thought Paul meant that it was right around the corner. Paul had said some strong things in that letter, and it freaked some of them out. Others decided that since Jesus was headed their way, they should chill for awhile. So they quit their jobs and just waited.

Word of this got back to Paul while he was still in Corinth, so he decided to write a second letter, hopefully better explaining what he meant. He encouraged them not to be alarmed, and for those who had quit their jobs, he urged them to get back to work and not be busybodies.

Here’s a favorite verse of mine from this letter…

“With this in mind, we constantly pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his calling, and that by his power he may bring to fruition your every desire for goodness and your every deed prompted by faith” (2 Thessalonians 1:11).

As I wrote yesterday, Paul had a rough time in Philippi. He was beaten and thrown into prison without a trial. But when he left he went to Thessalonica, and though he was not there very long, the people he met became very dear to him.

While Paul was in Athens, he got word that the new church in Thessalonica was going through severe persecution. He was unable to go to them, but he sent his protege Timothy. And when Timothy got back to Paul, Paul was relieved and overflowed with gratitude by Timothy’s report. Not only were these people standing firm in the face of persecution and suffering, but they were thriving.

At some point during Paul’s time in Corinth, he decided to write a letter to the church in Thessalonica. They had sent a letter to him, and he wanted to respond to their questions. But he also wanted to encourage them and remind them of what they meant to him. In the letter he describes himself as both a mother and a father. He also wants them to know that their story of facing adversity head on has spread throughout all of Greece.

My favorite verse in this letter is, “Because we loved you so much, we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well” (1 Thessalonians 2:8).

Today’s reading covers three full years. Many of the stories in Acts show Paul to be a bit of a super hero. I love that this story also shows some of his humanity. Today’s passage begins with Paul ready to hit the road again. He tells Barnabas, who agrees to join but wants to take his younger cousin (maybe nephew) Mark. Yes, this is the same Mark who will write one of the gospels. The problem is that Mark had abandoned them during their last journey, and Paul wasn’t ready to give him a second chance. So they went their separate ways. Barnabas took Mark and went to Cyprus.

Paul took Silas and headed back to the cities in Galatia where the churches had been started. In one city they invited a young disciple named Timothy to join them. At another point Luke (the author of Acts) joins them. A little later Paul had a vision that told him to go to Macedonia (Greece). This would begin his second missionary journey.

They went to Philippi, where a wealthy woman named Lydia was converted and then began leading a church. During their time there Paul and Silas were arrested after casting out a demon from a slave girl whose owner had been making money off her as a fortune teller. This evil slave owner rallied the crowd. Paul and Silas were beaten with rods and then thrown in prison. In prison they sang. They wouldn’t let their suffering bring them down. And then an earthquake happened, and their shackles fell off and the doors were open. The prison guard was about to kill himself, fearing what would happen to him once the prisoners escaped. But Paul reassured him that they were going to stay there. This man and his entire household became followers of Jesus as a result.

The next morning Paul let the city officials know that they had beaten and thrown into prison without trial a Roman citizen. This was a big mic drop, and the officials were scared. At this point they just wanted Paul and Silas to leave, which they did.

From there they went to Thessalonica and then to Berea and Athens. Athens was the first place where the reception did not go as planned. There was no beatings, but there was also no interest.

Paul and Silas traveled to Corinth after this, and they actually got to spend about 18 months there. This would be the longest they had spent in any one city. They met Priscilla and Aquila there, who would become true partners in this ministry. He would later send them ahead of him to Rome to start a church there.

One of the things I most love about this story is that as great as Paul is, he’s not a one man act. He builds community and he empowers others. His reason is that he knows he can’t do the work on his own. He has no idea when he’s going to be run out of town or even if he’s going to be alive tomorrow. He has to let go of control and allow others to do the work. He empowers both Jews and Gentiles, as well as both men and women. I honestly don’t know how you can read the book of Acts and not come away with the belief that ministry is based on gifting rather than gender. The church over time has read a few verses from a couple of his letters and then built doctrines that have promoted patriarchy. I’m grateful that a lot has changed even during my lifetime, but a lot of damage has been done, and that damage has led to a lot of suffering for everyone.

Up to this point our Scripture readings have been all narrative. We’ve covered close to 50 years in these readings, beginning with Jesus’ birth and now through Paul’s first missionary journey. The remainder of these readings go through the book of Acts, but one of the things I love about this Bible is that Paul’s writings are interspersed throughout the narrative of Acts.

After Paul and Barnabas spent some time in Jerusalem, they made their way back to Antioch. While there Paul decided to write a letter to the new churches throughout Galatia. We know this letter as, you guessed it, Galatians!

This letter is relatively short (only six chapters), but there is a lot in those six chapters. When I was a pastor I once spent eight or nine weeks teaching through this letter. I share that simply to say that it’s quite a daunting task to write one reflection post on this letter.

Here’s the context for the letter…

Those same Jewish leaders who confronted Paul in Antioch and then went to Jerusalem began traveling behind Paul to the churches in Galatia that were now 1-2 years old. They didn’t want to undo the work that Paul had done, at least in their minds. They just wanted to add to it. And what did they want to add on? It was their belief that Gentiles would need to adopt the Jewish customs and law in order to follow Jesus.

“It’s great that you have become followers of Jesus, but Paul left something out that is very important. This faith is a Jewish faith, and unless you follow our Jewish Law (Torah) you cannot follow our Jewish Messiah.”

And in order for this message to stick, they spent a lot of their time discrediting Paul.

Paul’s reason for writing this letter was threefold: first, to share a bit of his credentials; second, to remind them of his love for them; and third, to share why he felt that these Jewish leaders were absolutely wrong.

The theme of this letter is freedom. More than anything else Paul wanted these new believers to know that Jesus came to give freedom. And he felt that adding anything to this message meant the opposite of freedom. That’s why Paul talks so much about slavery in this letter. And it’s why he says towards the end of the letter, “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery” (Galatians 5:1).

Paul talks a lot in this letter about the law. I’ll admit that it’s challenging to wade through it, but he does so because, as much as he cares for the law, he believed it was totally insufficient to change hearts. Only Jesus could do that. And anything added onto the message of Jesus missed the message of Jesus.

Two days ago we heard Saul’s story, and that story ended with him meeting Barnabas, who became a sort of mentor to Saul. The two of them ended up going to Antioch, a large city in modern-day Turkey. Remember, after Stephen was killed the new followers of Jesus fled Jerusalem. Many went back to their homes, but some went to new cities, and while there they talked about what had happened to them in Jerusalem. One of those cities was Antioch. And just like in Jerusalem, many people believed what they said about this Jesus.

Word got back to the apostles in Jerusalem, and they sent Barnabas to Antioch to encourage these new believers. He asked Saul to join him, and for an entire year they were a part of this new church, which was made up mostly of Gentiles.

After the year was up, Saul and Barnabas were ready to go to other cities in order to tell people about Jesus and to form together communities of people who wanted to follow Jesus. The key was that they wanted to go to Gentile cities where people had never heard of Jesus.

Thus begins the first missionary journey (Acts 13-14). This journey spanned two years, covered over 1000 miles, and resulted in new churches being started in cities like Pisidian Antioch, Iconium, Lystra and Derbe. And also of note…somewhere during this journey Saul changed his name to Paul.

Whenever Paul and Barnabas would arrive in a new city, their custom was to go to the Jewish synagogue. The synagogue in each city would be comprised primarily of Jewish people but also some God-fearing Gentiles. Here Paul would be allowed to share his story. It would always begin with stories that everyone there knew. Stories of Abraham, Moses and David. But they would end with Jesus. And it was here, like with Stephen, that the Jewish people would often get upset.

It actually had less to do with the good news of Jesus and more to do with the insufficiency of the law, which was handed down through Moses. Towards the end of Paul’s first recorded sermon (Acts 13:13-43) Paul remarked, “I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. Through him everyone who believes is set free from every sin, a justification you were not able to obtain under the law of Moses.”

This theme of Jesus doing what the law was incapable of doing will be seen over and over again in Paul’s writings. He believed in his core that the law was not enough to truly change the heart and lead to transformation. Only Jesus could do this.

This message of Jesus was well received by many, though there were always some who felt that it was a dangerous message since, at least to them, it was an attack on the law and their customs. There were also the Jewish leaders who once again were jealous of the crowds that were coming. This was the case after that first sermon of Paul’s. The next Sabbath almost the entire city of Antioch Pisidia came out to hear Paul and Barnabas. The synagogue leader was not used to that kind of crowd.

In most of these cities Paul and Barnabas would be run out of town at some point. In Lystra the people were so mad that they stoned Paul and then dragged him outside the city, thinking he was dead. He wasn’t.

On their way back to Antioch they went back through each city and visited each of the new churches that had been started. At that time they appointed elders (leaders) in each church.

They were not the only ones to go to Antioch, though. Some of the Jewish leaders who were very concerned about what Paul and Barnabas were doing arrived in Antioch. Their message to this mostly Gentile church was that in order to follow Jesus you also had to follow the customs taught by Moses. What this in part meant was that the Gentile men would need to be circumcised. In other words, they wanted these people to become Jewish.

Paul and Barnabas believed strongly that this was wrong. So they all went to Jerusalem to meet with the apostles. When they got there Paul shared all that God had done in these Gentile cities. He believed that Jesus was enough. These Gentiles could follow Jesus without becoming Jewish.

James, the brother of Jesus, was the first to speak up. He believed that God’s plan included more than just the Jewish people, and he felt that it was important not to make things more difficult for the Gentiles than it needed to be. Therefore, circumcision was not going to be required. Yay!

James, Peter, John and the other leaders in Jerusalem had seen enough to know that Jesus challenged their customs. “The way we’ve always done it” normally wouldn’t cut it, so they continued to open themselves up to the opportunity to change their minds.

Since the time of Abraham, God’s plan had been to bless the nation of Israel so that they would therefore be a blessing to the entire world. And God sent Jesus not simply as the Messiah (rescuer) for the Jewish people but as Messiah for the entire world. But as we’ve seen before, God’s ways often looks very different from ours.

Today’s story centers on a Roman centurion living in Caesarea named Cornelius. Luke describes him as devout, generous and God-fearing. One day while he was praying he had a vision. The angel told him to go and find a man named Simon (Peter). That was it. But Cornelius sent some men to go find this Simon Peter.

The next day Peter was in a city called Joppa. It was about 40 miles from Caesarea. He was on the roof praying. He was also hungry. He too had a vision. In the vision a large sheet was let down, and the sheet showed every kind of animal. Then he heard a voice saying, “Get up. Kill and eat.”

Weird vision, I know. But it was even stranger to Peter. On that sheet were plenty of animals that it was ok to eat, but there were also a lot that were considered unclean. He had been brought up believing that it would be a great sin for him to eat something unclean. He said as much to the voice, and the voice said in response, “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.” This happened three times.

While Peter was wondering what in the world this vision was about, there was a knock on the door. The men who had been sent by Cornelius had found Peter, and they asked if he would return with them to meet Cornelius. So the next day they left for Caesarea.

While it was against the law for Peter to eat something unclean, it was also against the law for him to even associate with Gentiles, which is what Cornelius, his household, and all of his friends who had shown up were. Peter mentions this to them, but then tells them that these recent events were causing him to repent/rethink things.

After Cornelius shared the vision he had, Peter shared about Jesus. And he shared that he now believed that the message of Jesus was for all people, not simply the Jewish people. He said, “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts from every nation the one who fears him and does what is right” (Acts 10:34-35).

The Holy Spirit coming upon a person was the way that everyone knew that God was

After seeing the Holy Spirit come upon them just as it had that Pentecost day and in the days since, Peter then asked Cornelius and the others if they would like to be baptized. They said yes.

All was well and good until Peter got called to Jerusalem to explain his actions to the apostles. The key issue was a simple one. He had gone into the house of uncircumcised men and ate with them.

So Peter explained the vision and the two guys and the trip to Caesarea and then everything that happened after that. His final sentence to them was, “So if God gave them the same gift he gave us (the Holy Spirit), then who was I to think that I could stand in God’s way” (Acts 11:17).

I love the response by the apostles. This went against everything that they knew, but they trusted Peter, and they all had plenty of other experiences to look back on where Jesus did not do things the way they thought it would. So while it didn’t make sense to them, maybe it made perfect sense.

They said, “So then, even to Gentiles God has granted repentance (rethinking) that leads to life” (Acts 11:18).