1 Corinthians 3:16-23

Sorry about that... I really had not enough time to write on all of 1 Corinthians 3. Hopefully that won't happen again, but then I can't guarantee it. A lot can be said when every word is truth. Today I will simply be finishing up the last part of chapter 3, which shouldn't be too long, but who knows what could happen??

Alrighty, time cruch ~ 1 hour till I must leave for the all-nighter ^_^. That'll be great fun.

Continuing straight from last week, verses 16-17 are quite disturbing to me. If you want to read this, it's very much like a threat. I like it, because people sometimes think the God of the New Testament and the God of the Old Testament are different (one being war hungry and the other being lovey dovey and ultra forgiving). Not here. No way. No how. God dwells in Christians, and if anyone tries to mess with that, they're on God's hit list. You don't want to be on God's hit list.

Now, the final verses of chapter 3 Paul devotes to cautioning the Corinthians to avoid relying on worldly wisdom. Verse 18 sounds much like Christ's view on leadership and rank in the kingdom of heaven. What that does for me is it further assures me that this is indeed from God, not from men. Who in their right mind would say "become a fool that you may become wise" (v.18)? What is that? Foolishness of God, that's what it is. And I'll take that any day over the wisest wisdom of man. The wisdom of man doesn't seem to be very impressive anyways when Paul starts quoting Old Testament scripture describing it (vv.19-20). Read it for yourself, I can't say it any better than God.

Most mind boggling verses in the Bible I've come across in the Bible so far: 21 and 22. When I first read 21 I thought to myself "Everything is the Corinthians? Well... maybe he doesn't really mean that and he's just being... philosophical or something." So I read on. And what did I find? I found verse 22! Surprise! Paul then clarifies: yes indeed, life, death, Paul, Apollos, Peter, the world! All are theirs! Shoot, it's all mine too! Wow. God is good isn't He? I'm not really sure of all the implications of what Paul means by saying "These things are yours," but John MacArthur seems to think Paul means that God has provided all these good things for us. Awesome, but something in me says there's more. Maybe I'm just being greedy and power hungry... Well, let's not have that shall we?! Onto verse 23.

It simply says believers belong to Christ as Christ belongs to God. That is so encouraging to me, because that tells me that our relationship with Christ is (or should be) the same as Christ relationship with God. And that relationship is the most intimate relationship ever. It's oneness! Some religions want to be one with nature. We'll do them one better here. Let us strive to be one with Christ, just as Christ is one with God. That sounds like an amazing adventure, with great rewards at the end as well! For those of you who haven't started - or who aren't working towards that end at the present - I highly recommend it.

Well, thats all for today. Forgive me if it seemed rushed, but I hope it wasn't any less encouraging! Come back tomorrow for chapter 4!