Bible in 90 Days - Day 82 (1 Corinthians 15-Galatians 3:25)

Lord, open our hearts and minds

by the power of your Holy Spirit,

that we may hear your Word with joy. Amen.

Chapter 15 is a great summary of the Gospel with firm assurance that there is indeed life after this one. In the 58 verses of chapter 15, there is one that really is a head-scratcher. Baptized for the dead? The Mormons have a very developed practice of baptizing the dead vicariously by baptizing living people for them. We don’t. Why not? First of all, it is not clear exactly what Paul is referring to, and there have been many opinions on this. Second, this is just one verse out of the whole Bible. One verse is still important, but we always use all of Scripture to interpret Scripture, and we have no other references to a practice like this. Third, we don’t see the early church doing this, so it doesn’t seem to be a widespread practice. Fourth, Paul is not saying to do it or not to do it; he is just making reference to something that he sees happening. These are the kinds of questions we ask of tough verses. One of my seminary professors frequently said, “Where the Bible shouts, we shout. Where the Bible whispers, we whisper.” Chapter 15 shouts the resurrection of the dead, and so do we.

Interesting note on a common Christian word – 1 Corinthians 16:22 ends with the desire, “Come, O Lord!” Paul wrote this Aramaic phrase in his Greek letter. The Aramaic is “Marana tha!” which is where our word “Maranatha” comes from. It is the only time this Aramaic phrase occurs in the Bible. The rest of the times it is in Greek.

2 Corinthians is Paul’s response to a church that is doubting him personally. This theme comes out already in the opening of the letter (1:1-11) Paul argues that to reject him is to reject the Gospel, because he has been faithful to the Gospel. One of the complaints is that Paul suffers too much to be a great apostle. Paul argues that his suffering is a source of comfort for the church. But as always, Paul isn’t pointing to himself primarily; he is pointing to Christ.

The opening of chapter 2 refers to the “painful visit” Paul has made to Corinth since the last letter. There has been some real conflict between Paul and this church.

Galatians is written to a church that has been infiltrated by another message after it was planted on the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Paul spends the letter getting back to basics, and he spends time going back to our common theme of the covenant and God’s grace.