This year, I’m excited about our study of 1 Corinthians which will include:
- preaching through the book on Sunday mornings;
- a Corinthians-style worship service for Thanksgiving where the congregation is encouraged to bring an item for our worship display, an offering to support Indigenous Relations, an item for the Food Bank, and/or a Scripture or story to share;
- a new Connection Group focusing on Sacred Pauses & 1 Corinthians.
To introduce the focus and content of the letter, I wrote the following litany:
For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. (3:11)
The foundation for blessing and grace. The foundation for our unity.
I always thank my God for you because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus. (1:3, 4)
The source of wisdom. The source of our ministry and teaching.
God is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. (1:30)
What is God’s wisdom for human sexuality, legal disputes, marriage, singleness, widowhood, food sacrificed to idols? What is God’s wisdom for testing and temptation?
Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body. (6:19-20)
How do we glorify God in what we wear for worship, how we celebrate the Lord’s Supper? How do we recognize and release the gifts of the Spirit for the common good?
And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three, and the greatest of these is love. (13:13)
Let us receive and proclaim the good news of Jesus’ death and resurrection. Let us give thanks for this life and for the resurrection of the dead.
Death has been swallowed up in victory. Where, O death is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting? (15:54-55)
For Jesus Christ is our sure foundation.
For Jesus Christ is our sure foundation. “The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you.” (16:23)