1 Corinthians (Program #19) – Growth in Life Needed (2)

In first Corinthians the apostle Paul confronts the difficult situation in the church there in a very wise way. He first identifies that their problems would due primarily to a shortage of the growth in the divine life. Although they had received the initial gifts of the divine life and the Holy Spirit they were still infants or babes in Christ.

He then unveils to them the marvelous progression of God’s economy. First they need to realize that they are all plants growing on God’s farms. Then the goal is to be built up together into a building and finally that this building is destined to become God’s dwelling place, His temple.

How about you and me? Have we received such a vision, such a revelation or are we like the Corinthians satisfied to remain in our spiritual infancy and hang on to personal preferences in our own traditions?

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1 Corinthians (Program #17) – The Church, God’s Farm, God’s Building (2)

The believers in Corinth in the early church were rich in many things. They have received the initial gifts of the divine life and the Holy Spirit. They were enriched in all knowledge and they even have many miraculous gifts in their midst.  Yet Paul referred to them as infants or babes in Christ. How could that be with all that God had given them?   Primarily is because they neglect the mater of life and growing spiritually in the divine life. So, the apostle Paul points out to them in clear types and pictures the importance and necessity of the divine life.

Listen again as his words are so full of references to life and growth:

3:5-9 “What then is Apollos? And what is Paul? Ministers through whom you believed, even as the Lord gave to beach one of them. I planted, Apollos watered, but God caused the growth.  So then neither is he who plants anything nor he who waters, but God who causes the growth.  Now he who plants and he who waters are one, but each will receive his own reward according to his own labor.  For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s cultivated land, God’s building.”

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1 Corinthians (Program #16) – The Church, God’s Farm, God’s Building (1)

The first two chapters of Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians are very rich in their presentation of Christ. Paul clearly was doing all he could to bring the troubled Corinthians to Christ in their experience.

But in Chapter three Paul turns his focus to the church. Though not in shallow or superficial language rather he speaks in marvelous profound expressions referring to the church in types.  First as a farm growing, producing a rich crop. Then as a building and ultimately as a temple, a divine dwelling place, build out of priceless materials such as gold, silver and precious stones. Of course these materials are not literally either but types of the transformation work that the Holy Spirit is engaged in with all of us, God’s redeemed.

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1 Corinthians (Program #3) – Introduction (3)

Many new believers shortly after receiving Christ as their Savior and experiencing a wonderful and dynamic salvation, go through a period of doubting and questioning. It seems that the new life they found in Christ to somehow evaporated. At such a time it’s common to question whether or not we are really saved. But to the Corinthian believers, Paul pointed out that we all receive two initial gifts when we received Christ.  First, we received eternal life, that’s the uncreated divine life of God. And we also received the Holy Spirit.  Based upon the word of God and these two indisputable gifts we have an outward assurance and the inward confirmation that he who has the Son has the life.

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Acts (Program #70) – The Propagation in Asia Minor and Europe through the Ministry of Paul’s Company (36)

From the Epistles of the Apostle Paul in the New Testament come profound and inspiring passages such as “For me to live is Christ”, “Whether in life or in death, Christ shall be magnified in my mortal body,” and also “that I may be found in Him”. Where did these incredible utterances come from? Was Paul simply a mouthpiece of the Holy Spirit as the word of God came forth? Or where these phrases the expressions that flowed out of his own experience of the living Christ? We will view the living of the Apostle Paul under the most extreme circumstances as recorded in the pages of Acts on today’s life study of the Bible.

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Acts (Program #44) – The Propagation in Asia Minor and Europe through the Ministry of Paul’s Company (10)

If we were embarking on a mission to preach the Gospel, surely we would expect the Holy Spirit to assist us, even empower us. But, did you know that the book of Acts tells of the Holy Spirit and the Spirit of Jesus even forbidding the Apostle Paul from doing just that? It’s a surprising story that’s full of spiritual insight when we dig into it. Stay with us for a rich and enlightening life study of the Bible.

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