Day 330 Reading Schedule: 1 Corinthians 12-14

1 Corinthians 12: Diverse Gifts and Unity, Paul's Teachings 

[Overview] 

This chapter deals with incidents that occur in the church due to the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, this chapter is also called the 'Chapter of Gifts'. At that time, the work of the Holy Spirit, which was characteristic of the early church, was taking place intensely in the Corinthian church. However, there were some true things and some false things. Many people who claimed to have received the gifts of the Holy Spirit appeared in the Corinthian church, and some of them were causing confusion in the church by falling into excitement and delusion, and even creating conflicts within the church. Therefore, through this chapter, Paul tried to correct the wrong views on the spiritual gifts that appeared in the Corinthian church by clarifying the true nature of the gifts.  This chapter consists of a general explanation of the gifts of the Holy Spirit (verses 1-11), the unity of the members (verses 12-20), the mutual complementarity of each member (verses 21-26), and an explanation of the offices and gifts (verses 27-31).

1 Corinthians 13: Love is more important than anything else

[Summary]

This chapter is so important that it can be called the 'golden chapter of the New Testament'. In this chapter, Paul, who was discussing the source and purpose of spiritual gifts to the Corinthians who were always strife and conflict over the issue of spiritual gifts, mentions the 'gift of love', which can be said to be the most essential of the spiritual gifts. According to Paul, the essential issue is whether one has the true Spirit of Christ, and if one truly has the Spirit of Christ, one must use the spiritual gifts given by the Holy Spirit in accordance with God's will. What the Corinthians who were always strife desperately needed was the gift of love.  This chapter consists of the first half (verses 1-7) that mentions the characteristics of Christian love and the second half (verses 8-13) that mentions the eternity of love. All spiritual gifts that lack love are false and have no meaning in the community. Paul concludes that all spiritual gifts of Christians can shine only through love, and that only 'love' gives value to all gifts. 

1 Corinthians 14: The Gift of Tongues

[Overview]

This chapter teaches about prophecy and tongues. The teaching about the gifts of the Holy Spirit that has continued since chapter 12 comes to an end in this chapter. The tongues that were prevalent in the Corinthian church at that time were mysterious and could not be understood without the gift of interpretation, and there was a tendency to ignore other gifts of the Holy Spirit because they were too absorbed in the mystery of tongues. As a result, even the order of the church was endangered. Therefore, Paul teaches the correct meaning of tongues through this chapter.  This chapter can be divided into the gifts of prophecy and tongues (verses 1-6), the proper use of tongues (verses 7-19), the attitude of unbelievers toward tongues (verses 20-25), and orderly worship (verses 26-40).