May 27, 2016 1 Corinthians 12:27 – 14:1
Please note that this will be the last entry in this blog for an indeterminate length of time. Due to other personal responsibilities, I will be unable to attend the discussion group that stimulates this blog. The group will continue and I hope you will join them. I look forward to my opportunity to return.
In addition to studying Paul’s letters to churches, another goal of our discussion group has been to sharpen skills for serious study of the Bible. The framework for the study has been the inductive method of Observation, Interpretation, and Application (What does it say? What does it mean? What does it mean to me?). Part of that process that we had not yet discussed was the selection of a passage. As you being your study (in your personal quiet time or to lead a group), do you look at a verse or two? Do you take several chapters? How do you know how much to include in a study?
Most writing (personal letters, long essays, historical narratives) reflect the thought process of the writer (you, me, the apostles). Reading through a section of Scripture can help see where the writer’s thinking is going and when new topics are introduced. That can be a useful way to pick a passage to explore. Too short of a passage can be confusing because we don’t let the writer’s idea fully develop. Too long a passage can be equally bewildering if the author moves through several topics. Reading long passages of the Bible (or any other document) is important to get the overall picture and see how the writer links the different ideas or themes together. However, our focus in this group has been more detailed study, and for that we usually need to concentrate on a specific passage. The intention is to dig as deeply as possible and mine all we can from what the writer says on a specific idea he is presenting.
With all that in mind, we did not start with a pre-determined (by me) passage as we have for the last year or so. Instead, our conversation began with the question, “Where should be divide the passage for this morning?” Last week we ended our dialog (always very open-ended) at about 1 Corinthians 12:27, “Now you are Christ’s body, and individually members of it.” How much further should we go in Paul’s letter?”
After reading the text individually for several minutes, there were a number of suggestions. We could finish the chapter (to verse 31). But ending at a chapter division is not always helpful, since the chapter division were added about a thousand years after Paul (and the other authors) wrote the books of the Bible. (The verse numbering was added even later). The divisions of chapters and of verses were not part of the original, inspired text. Those divisions are sometimes convenient for locating a text, but they can also introduce awkward interruptions in the writer’s thought process.
The end of verse 31 contains an enticement to continue, “I will show you a still more excellent way.” Chapter 13, the well-known chapter on love, shows us, as one member suggested, how the gifts are to play out in life. Maybe going to the end of that chapter would be a good idea. Near the middle of that section on love (v. 8) one person suggested Paul’s transition from the past and present (vss. 1-8, e.g., “love is patient, love is kind,…”) to the future (vss. 8-13, e.g., “love never fails, but gifts of prophecy will fail,…”). Reading about the gifts and their functions in the church through Paul’s words about the current exercise of love (1 Corinthians 12:27-13:8) would make sense.
The first verse of chapter 14 suggests an interesting connection between what Paul has been saying about gifts (chapter 12), what he says about love (chapter 13), and what he will soon be saying about gifts again (chapter 14). Consider the end of chapter 12 and the beginning of chapter 14: “But earnestly desire the spiritual gifts. And I will show you a still more excellent way….Purse love, yet desire earnestly spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy.” The similar language and the inverted sequence of ideas could be written this way:
But earnestly desire the spiritual gifts.
And I will show you a still more excellent way
…. [Paul’s description and exhortation about love]
Purse love,
yet desire earnestly spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy.
He summarizes the end of chapter 12 with a call to earnest desire, then he points to the “more excellent way” of love. After his section on love, he summarizes with a call to pursue that way, and returns to the earnest desire for gifts.
Paul seems to intend this parallel or “chiastic” (crosswise) sequence . Gifts, love, …, love, gifts. That kind of pattern is a frequent characteristic in Hebrew literature, especially in the poetry of the Psalms. (For more information see Chiastic Structure in Psalms). Paul’s Hebrew mind may have found that arrangement a logical way to interrupt his discourse gifts. He wanted to emphasize the importance of the loving use of gifts. Then he returned to his main topic to help the Corinthians understand how spiritual gifts are integral to the life of the church.
We briefly talked about the controversy that often accompanies discussions on spiritual gifts. “When the perfect comes, the partial will be done away” (1 Corinthians 13:9). That verse is sometimes used to argue for the “cessation” or end of spiritual gifts (or at least the “dramatic” expressions such as tongues and healings, the so-called “charismatic” gifts). If “the perfect” refers to the canon of the New Testament (so the argument goes) then after about 400 A.D. the gifts would no longer be necessary. The consensus of our group was that to equate “the perfect” with the canon seems unlikely. A more convincing suggestion was that the gifts will no longer be of any importance in the perfect kingdom established when Jesus returns in glory.
The majority of our remaining time was spent on Paul’s repeated use of the word “desire” in 12:31 and 14:1 (the “bookends” of the chiasm mentioned above). Like all of the verbs in the passage, these are plural, addressing the whole church at Corinth. Was Paul encouraging each member to desire their own gift? Was he challenging them to desire the gifts corporately? Was he calling them to use their gifts? Was there some action for them to take in that desire for the gifts? Several suggestions were offered. We are to cultivate our gifts, to try out different gifts, to be involved with people to see what gifts produce fruit in our ministry.
Paul doesn’t actually say any of those things explicitly. He says (twice) to “desire” (zeloute, ζηλοῦτε) the gifts, to be passionate, “zealous” about gifts. As one participant summarized, we are to have a Spirit-controlled obsession about gifts. The Spirit is the one who distributes the gifts (12:11) exactly as God (the Father) desires (12:18). The gifts are clearly intended for the common good (12:7) in order to build up or “edify” the church (14:3-5, 12, 17, 26 – mentioned seven times in that chapter!). Perhaps the desire, the passion is about how we can build up the body, how we can help others be spiritually formed to be more like Jesus by the use of whatever gifts we have. In fact (looking ahead just a bit), 1 Corinthians 14:12 specifically links that desire (the same word, but translated “zealous”) with building up others: “Since you are zealous of spiritual gifts, seek to abound for the edification of the church.” That certainly sounds like a “Spirit-controlled obsession” and (another comment), passionate living for Christ and His body.
Perhaps the common problem with our usual approach to spiritual gifts and inventories and assessments is that we are focusing too much on the gifts and not enough on their intended purpose. We like clarity and closure and certainty. “I have the gift of _______” becomes our final answer. We like things that are simple. The problem is that such simplicity may make us less sensitive to God’s leading in different situations: “I don’t have the gift of ____.”
Our group considered the possibility that spiritual gifts are not necessarily permanent. God the Holy Spirit is free to adjust and arrange and readjust and rearrange the distribution of gifts among members of the body. Perhaps the “boiling over” zeal and desire we are supposed to have about spiritual gifts is not about “finding my gift.” Instead, the same degree of zeal can be focused on others in the Body of Christ, continually asking, “What can I do in this situation or for this person to help in their spiritual formation? How can I use whatever gifts or skills or resources I have to help this person become more like Christ? That sounds like a desire that will build up the church.
That kind of desire fits with the other part of the chiastic bookend: “Pursue love” (14:1). The desire to build up the church in whatever way we can is not to be a burdensome duty. People are not our projects. Making disciples is not a task we must mechanically fulfill. “Desire” may be a feeling, but “pursue” is an active engagement. We are to do something energetic about love. The verb used for pursue (diokete, διώκετε) is an intense word more often used in the sense of “chase after to persecute” (e.g., Matthew 5:10, “Blessed are those who are persecuted (‘pursued’) because of righteousness”). “Pursue love” may sound sentimental to our ears, but Paul had a much more serious image in mind. Chase, hunt, and hound opportunities to express the kind of love he described in chapter 13. The goal of that love is the building up of the Body, the spiritual formation of each other. The gifts are merely the means for seeing that happen. Spending more energy and effort toward finding ways to express love by helping each other grow will increase our desire for gifts just as Paul exhorted. Our desire will not be for the gifts themselves. Our passionate prayer will be, “God, grant me the gifts I need to help this person.” As we pursue love, that kind of desire will boil over in our lives.