New Testament · Letters

1 Corinthians chapter 1

From Paul, called to be an of Jesus by the will of God, and from our brother —To of God in , to those in Jesus the One, called to be , along with everyone everywhere who calls on the name of our Jesus the One, theirs and ours:May and be yours from God our Father and the Lord Jesus the One.I always thank my God for you because of the undeserved kindness he gave you through Jesus the One.Through him you’ve been in every way—in all your speaking and in all your .This confirms that the about the One has been firmly established among you,so that you don’t lack any as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus the One to be .He will also keep you standing firm all the way to the end, so that you’ll be on of our Lord Jesus the One.God is —the one who called you into with his Son, Jesus the One, our Lord.I’m urging you, , by the authority of our Lord Jesus the One: all of you need to be on the same page. Stop letting tear you apart. Instead, be completely united—same mind, same purpose.I say this because people from have told me that there’s among you.What I mean is this: one of you says, “I follow Paul,” another says, “I follow ,” another, “I follow ,” and another, “I follow the One.”Has the One been divided into pieces? Was Paul for you? Were you in Paul’s name?I’m thankful that I didn’t submerge any of you except and ,so that no one can say you were submerged in my name.(Oh wait, I also submerged the household of . Beyond that, I don’t remember if I submerged anyone else.)Because the One didn’t send me to submerge people—he sent me to tell the . And not with either, so that wouldn’t be emptied of its power.I know the message of the execution stake sounds like to people who are on the path to destruction. But to us who are , it is the of God.: “I will destroy the cleverness of the clever, and I will set aside the intelligence of the intelligent.”So where does that leave the ? The ? The skilled debater of ? Hasn’t God exposed the world’s cleverness as foolishness?Since the world, with all its , failed to know God through its own wisdom, God decided to use the “nonsense” of the message we announce to rescue those who it.Jewish people ask for and search for clever arguments,but we announce —an idea that’s an to Jewish people and nonsense to non-Jewish people.But for those who are —both Jewish and Greek—the One is the power of God and the of God.Because God’s “” is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s “weakness” is stronger than human strength.Just look at your own group, brothers and sisters. By human standards, not many of you were , not many were powerful, not many came from .But God what the world considers foolish to put the clever to shame, and God chose what the world considers weak to put the strong to shame.God chose the of the world, the looked-down-on——to the things that do,so that no one can in front of God.It is because of God that you are part of the One, Jesus—who has become for us , and the basis for our and our and our .The result is what’s written: “If you’re going to about something, brag about what the Lord has done.”