What's It All About Introduction

Corinthians 1: 26-31 GJW
26 Now look at your calling brothers. From a fleshly perspective not many of you were wise ones, not many powerful ones, not many well-born ones. 27 But God chose the stupid ones of the world so that he might shame continually the wise ones and God chose the weak ones of the world so that he might continually shame the strong ones. 28 And God chose the commonplace ones of the world and the contemptible ones and the ones who don’t seem to exist in order that he might make useless the ones who are 29 so that each living being will not boast before God. 30 But out of Him you yourselves are in Christ Jesus who became our wisdom from God as well as the righteousness and holiness and deliverance. 31 This is so that just as it has been written, “The one boasting, he must boast in the Lord.”


One of the most difficult parts of Biblical interpretation and teaching is the stretch required to get past one’s preconceived ideas about what the Bible says and what one thinks the Bible ought to say. We are programmed at nearly every level to think of choice as the pre-eminent right of every human being. We choose all day, choose what we will eat, choose who we will email, choose our TV shows, choose to exercise or not, choose what clothes we will wear and when to take our shower. We love the right to choose our representatives in government and although there are many who “choose” not to vote, we could never imagine giving up that right by choice. We even choose our religion and choose how we will practice that religion. We are choosy and choosers. No one tells us what to do!

The passage we are looking at today makes a mess of our theology. It is, as we can see, big on choice. Our passage speaks of choosing but not once are we the one making the choice. It talks about a calling but it is not us calling, it describes a comparative analysis but not by us and not in a way that makes sense. It simply does not fit at all the paradigm we have of choice and decision-making. It is not a “Christian” passage if what we mean by Christian is what we think Christian ought to be.

I have tried to render a literal translation so that the major themes Paul had as he wrote the Corinthian church would stand out for those of us used to reading the Scriptures without an eye for the important details. The first one that pops up is found in verse 26. Paul tells us that we must pause a moment and examine closely our calling. Stare at it. Ponder it deeply. Take time to think about it and how it came to you. Don’t just slough off casually the inception of your Christian life. It is crucial to consider if you are going to know much about God and yourself.

Calling is a funny word in a sense. It implies someone else doing this. The word invitation comes to mind. The calling Paul describes is not to some sort of specialized ministry, it is the calling to salvation. That is clear because he is writing the entire church, not a specific group of leaders. In fact, if we can take the liberty of saying it, the letter is written to us and not all of “us” have a specialized ministry but all of us have a calling to eternal life. Paul is telling us that we need to look at the part of our salvation he labels a calling…the invitation. We are Christian because God issued an invitation. My daughter went to her friend’s party because she was invited…my daughter did not invite herself to it. The starting point of this discussion is that each of us who are Christian received an invitation from God and that is how we got to where we are. Jesus underscores this in John 15: 16. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit-fruit that will last. (NIV)
To Be Continued...