1 Corinthians 11:17-16:2

Living Bible

¹⁷ Next on my list of items to write you about is something else I cannot agree with. For it sounds as if more harm than good is done when you meet together for your communion services. ¹⁸ Everyone keeps telling me about the arguing that goes on in these meetings, and the divisions developing among you, and I can just about believe it. ¹⁹ But I suppose you feel this is necessary so that you who are always right will become known and recognized!

²⁰ When you come together to eat, it isn’t the Lord’s Supper you are eating, ²¹ but your own. For I am told that everyone hastily gobbles all the food he can without waiting to share with the others, so that one doesn’t get enough and goes hungry while another has too much to drink and gets drunk. ²² What? Is this really true? Can’t you do your eating and drinking at home to avoid disgracing the church and shaming those who are poor and can bring no food? What am I supposed to say about these things? Do you want me to praise you? Well, I certainly do not!

²³ For this is what the Lord himself has said about his Table, and I have passed it on to you before: That on the night when Judas betrayed him, the Lord Jesus took bread, ²⁴ and when he had given thanks to God for it, he broke it and gave it to his disciples and said, “Take this and eat it. This is my body, which is given^[a] for you. Do this to remember me.” ²⁵ In the same way, he took the cup of wine after supper, saying, “This cup is the new agreement between God and you that has been established and set in motion by my blood. Do this in remembrance of me whenever you drink it.” ²⁶ For every time you eat this bread and drink this cup you are retelling the message of the Lord’s death, that he has died for you. Do this until he comes again.

²⁷ So if anyone eats this bread and drinks from this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner, he is guilty of sin against the body and the blood of the Lord. ²⁸ That is why a man should examine himself carefully before eating the bread and drinking from the cup. ²⁹ For if he eats the bread and drinks from the cup unworthily, not thinking about the body of Christ and what it means, he is eating and drinking God’s judgment upon himself; for he is trifling with the death of Christ. ³⁰ That is why many of you are weak and sick, and some have even died.

³¹ But if you carefully examine yourselves before eating you will not need to be judged and punished. ³² Yet, when we are judged and punished by the Lord, it is so that we will not be condemned with the rest of the world. ³³ So, dear brothers, when you gather for the Lord’s Supper—the communion service—wait for each other; ³⁴ if anyone is really hungry he should eat at home so that he won’t bring punishment upon himself when you meet together.

I’ll talk to you about the other matters after I arrive.

12 And now, brothers, I want to write about the special abilities the Holy Spirit gives to each of you, for I don’t want any misunderstanding about them. ² You will remember that before you became Christians you went around from one idol to another, not one of which could speak a single word. ³ But now you are meeting people who claim to speak messages from the Spirit of God. How can you know whether they are really inspired by God or whether they are fakes? Here is the test: no one speaking by the power of the Spirit of God can curse Jesus, and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” and really mean it, unless the Holy Spirit is helping him.

⁴ Now God gives us many kinds of special abilities, but it is the same Holy Spirit who is the source of them all. ⁵ There are different kinds of service to God, but it is the same Lord we are serving. ⁶ There are many ways in which God works in our lives, but it is the same God who does the work in and through all of us who are his. ⁷ The Holy Spirit displays God’s power through each of us as a means of helping the entire church.

⁸ To one person the Spirit gives the ability to give wise advice; someone else may be especially good at studying and teaching, and this is his gift from the same Spirit. ⁹ He gives special faith to another, and to someone else the power to heal the sick. ¹⁰ He gives power for doing miracles to some, and to others power to prophesy and preach. He gives someone else the power to know whether evil spirits are speaking through those who claim to be giving God’s messages—or whether it is really the Spirit of God who is speaking. Still another person is able to speak in languages he never learned; and others, who do not know the language either, are given power to understand what he is saying. ¹¹ It is the same and only Holy Spirit who gives all these gifts and powers, deciding which each one of us should have.

¹² Our bodies have many parts, but the many parts make up only one body when they are all put together. So it is with the “body” of Christ. ¹³ Each of us is a part of the one body of Christ. Some of us are Jews, some are Gentiles, some are slaves, and some are free. But the Holy Spirit has fitted us all together into one body. We have been baptized into Christ’s body by the one Spirit, and have all been given that same Holy Spirit.

¹⁴ Yes, the body has many parts, not just one part. ¹⁵ If the foot says, “I am not a part of the body because I am not a hand,” that does not make it any less a part of the body. ¹⁶ And what would you think if you heard an ear say, “I am not part of the body because I am only an ear and not an eye”? Would that make it any less a part of the body? ¹⁷ Suppose the whole body were an eye—then how would you hear? Or if your whole body were just one big ear, how could you smell anything?

¹⁸ But that isn’t the way God has made us. He has made many parts for our bodies and has put each part just where he wants it. ¹⁹ What a strange thing a body would be if it had only one part! ²⁰ So he has made many parts, but still there is only one body.

²¹ The eye can never say to the hand, “I don’t need you.” The head can’t say to the feet, “I don’t need you.”

²² And some of the parts that seem weakest and least important are really the most necessary. ²³ Yes, we are especially glad to have some parts that seem rather odd! And we carefully protect from the eyes of others those parts that should not be seen, ²⁴ while of course the parts that may be seen do not require this special care. So God has put the body together in such a way that extra honor and care are given to those parts that might otherwise seem less important. ²⁵ This makes for happiness among the parts, so that the parts have the same care for each other that they do for themselves. ²⁶ If one part suffers, all parts suffer with it, and if one part is honored, all the parts are glad.

²⁷ Now here is what I am trying to say: All of you together are the one body of Christ, and each one of you is a separate and necessary part of it. ²⁸ Here is a list of some of the parts he has placed in his Church, which is his body:

²⁹ Is everyone an apostle? Of course not. Is everyone a preacher? No. Are all teachers? Does everyone have the power to do miracles? ³⁰ Can everyone heal the sick? Of course not. Does God give all of us the ability to speak in languages we’ve never learned? Can just anyone understand and translate what those are saying who have that gift of foreign speech? ³¹ No, but try your best to have the more important of these gifts.

First, however, let me tell you about something else that is better than any of them!

13 If I had the gift of being able to speak in other languages without learning them and could speak in every language there is in all of heaven and earth, but didn’t love others, I would only be making noise. ² If I had the gift of prophecy and knew all about what is going to happen in the future, knew everything about everything, but didn’t love others, what good would it do? Even if I had the gift of faith so that I could speak to a mountain and make it move, I would still be worth nothing at all without love. ³ If I gave everything I have to poor people, and if I were burned alive for preaching the Gospel but didn’t love others, it would be of no value whatever.

⁴ Love is very patient and kind, never jealous or envious, never boastful or proud, ⁵ never haughty or selfish or rude. Love does not demand its own way. It is not irritable or touchy. It does not hold grudges and will hardly even notice when others do it wrong. ⁶ It is never glad about injustice, but rejoices whenever truth wins out. ⁷ If you love someone, you will be loyal to him no matter what the cost. You will always believe in him, always expect the best of him, and always stand your ground in defending him.

⁸ All the special gifts and powers from God will someday come to an end, but love goes on forever. Someday prophecy and speaking in unknown languages and special knowledge—these gifts will disappear. ⁹ Now we know so little, even with our special gifts, and the preaching of those most gifted is still so poor. ¹⁰ But when we have been made perfect and complete, then the need for these inadequate special gifts will come to an end, and they will disappear.

¹¹ It’s like this: when I was a child I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child does. But when I became a man my thoughts grew far beyond those of my childhood, and now I have put away the childish things. ¹² In the same way, we can see and understand only a little about God now, as if we were peering at his reflection in a poor mirror; but someday we are going to see him in his completeness, face-to-face. Now all that I know is hazy and blurred, but then I will see everything clearly, just as clearly as God sees into my heart right now.

¹³ There are three things that remain—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.

14 Let love be your greatest aim; nevertheless, ask also for the special abilities the Holy Spirit gives, and especially the gift of prophecy, being able to preach the messages of God.

² But if your gift is that of being able to “speak in tongues,” that is, to speak in languages you haven’t learned, you will be talking to God but not to others, since they won’t be able to understand you. You will be speaking by the power of the Spirit, but it will all be a secret. ³ But one who prophesies, preaching the messages of God, is helping others grow in the Lord, encouraging and comforting them. ⁴ So a person “speaking in tongues” helps himself grow spiritually, but one who prophesies, preaching messages from God, helps the entire church grow in holiness and happiness.

⁵ I wish you all had the gift of “speaking in tongues,” but even more I wish you were all able to prophesy, preaching God’s messages, for that is a greater and more useful power than to speak in unknown languages—unless, of course, you can tell everyone afterwards what you were saying, so that they can get some good out of it too.

⁶ Dear friends, even if I myself should come to you talking in some language you don’t understand, how would that help you? But if I speak plainly what God has revealed to me, and tell you the things I know, and what is going to happen, and the great truths of God’s Word—that is what you need; that is what will help you. ⁷ Even musical instruments—the flute, for instance, or the harp—are examples of the need for speaking in plain, simple English^[b] rather than in unknown languages. For no one will recognize the tune the flute is playing unless each note is sounded clearly. ⁸ And if the army bugler doesn’t play the right notes, how will the soldiers know that they are being called to battle? ⁹ In the same way, if you talk to a person in some language he doesn’t understand, how will he know what you mean? You might as well be talking to an empty room.

¹⁰ I suppose that there are hundreds of different languages in the world, and all are excellent for those who understand them, ¹¹ but to me they mean nothing. A person talking to me in one of these languages will be a stranger to me and I will be a stranger to him. ¹² Since you are so anxious to have special gifts from the Holy Spirit, ask him for the very best, for those that will be of real help to the whole church.

¹³ If someone is given the gift of speaking in unknown tongues, he should pray also for the gift of knowing what he has said, so that he can tell people afterwards plainly. ¹⁴ For if I pray in a language I don’t understand, my spirit is praying, but I don’t know what I am saying.

¹⁵ Well, then, what shall I do? I will do both. I will pray in unknown tongues and also in ordinary language that everyone understands. I will sing in unknown tongues and also in ordinary language so that I can understand the praise I am giving; ¹⁶ for if you praise and thank God with the spirit alone, speaking in another language, how can those who don’t understand you be praising God along with you? How can they join you in giving thanks when they don’t know what you are saying? ¹⁷ You will be giving thanks very nicely, no doubt, but the other people present won’t be helped.

¹⁸ I thank God that I “speak in tongues” privately^[c] more than any of the rest of you. ¹⁹ But in public worship I would much rather speak five words that people can understand and be helped by than ten thousand words while “speaking in tongues” in an unknown language.

²⁰ Dear brothers, don’t be childish in your understanding of these things. Be innocent babies when it comes to planning evil, but be men of intelligence in understanding matters of this kind. ²¹ We are told in the ancient Scriptures that God would send men from other lands to speak in foreign languages to his people, but even then they would not listen. ²² So you see that being able to “speak in tongues” is not a sign to God’s children concerning his power, but is a sign to the unsaved. However, prophecy (preaching the deep truths of God) is what the Christians need, and unbelievers aren’t yet ready for it. ²³ Even so, if an unsaved person, or someone who doesn’t have these gifts, comes to church and hears you all talking in other languages, he is likely to think you are crazy. ²⁴ But if you prophesy, preaching God’s Word, even though such preaching is mostly for believers,^[d] and an unsaved person or a new Christian comes in who does not understand about these things, all these sermons will convince him of the fact that he is a sinner, and his conscience will be pricked by everything he hears. ²⁵ As he listens, his secret thoughts will be laid bare, and he will fall down on his knees and worship God, declaring that God is really there among you.

²⁶ Well, my brothers, let’s add up what I am saying. When you meet together some will sing, another will teach, or tell some special information God has given him, or speak in an unknown language, or tell what someone else is saying who is speaking in the unknown language, but everything that is done must be useful to all, and build them up in the Lord. ²⁷ No more than two or three should speak in an unknown language, and they must speak one at a time, and someone must be ready to interpret what they are saying. ²⁸ But if no one is present who can interpret, they must not speak out loud. They must talk silently to themselves and to God in the unknown language but not publicly.

^29-30 Two or three may prophesy, one at a time, if they have the gift, while all the others listen. But if, while someone is prophesying, someone else receives a message or idea from the Lord, the one who is speaking should stop. ³¹ In this way all who have the gift of prophecy can speak, one after the other, and everyone will learn and be encouraged and helped. ³² Remember that a person who has a message from God has the power to stop himself or wait his turn.^{[e] 33} God is not one who likes things to be disorderly and upset. He likes harmony, and he finds it in all the other churches.

³⁴ Women should be silent during the church meetings. They are not to take part in the discussion, for they are subordinate to men^[f] as the Scriptures also declare. ³⁵ If they have any questions to ask, let them ask their husbands at home, for it is improper for women to express their opinions in church meetings.

³⁶ You disagree? And do you think that the knowledge of God’s will begins and ends with you Corinthians? Well, you are mistaken! ³⁷ You who claim to have the gift of prophecy or any other special ability from the Holy Spirit should be the first to realize that what I am saying is a commandment from the Lord himself. ³⁸ But if anyone still disagrees—well, we will leave him in his ignorance.^[g]

³⁹ So, my fellow believers, long to be prophets so that you can preach God’s message plainly; and never say it is wrong to “speak in tongues”; ⁴⁰ however, be sure that everything is done properly in a good and orderly way.

15 Now let me remind you, brothers, of what the Gospel really is, for it has not changed—it is the same Good News I preached to you before. You welcomed it then and still do now, for your faith is squarely built upon this wonderful message; ² and it is this Good News that saves you if you still firmly believe it, unless of course you never really believed it in the first place.

³ I passed on to you right from the first what had been told to me, that Christ died for our sins just as the Scriptures said he would, ⁴ and that he was buried, and that three days afterwards he arose from the grave just as the prophets foretold. ⁵ He was seen by Peter and later by the rest of “the Twelve.”^{[h] 6} After that he was seen by more than five hundred Christian brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died by now. ⁷ Then James saw him, and later all the apostles. ⁸ Last of all I saw him too, long after the others, as though I had been born almost too late for this. ⁹ For I am the least worthy of all the apostles, and I shouldn’t even be called an apostle at all after the way I treated the church of God.

¹⁰ But whatever I am now it is all because God poured out such kindness and grace upon me—and not without results: for I have worked harder than all the other apostles, yet actually I wasn’t doing it, but God working in me, to bless me. ¹¹ It makes no difference who worked the hardest, I or they; the important thing is that we preached the Gospel to you and you believed it.

¹² But tell me this! Since you believe what we preach, that Christ rose from the dead, why are some of you saying that dead people will never come back to life again? ¹³ For if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ must still be dead. ¹⁴ And if he is still dead, then all our preaching is useless and your trust in God is empty, worthless, hopeless; ¹⁵ and we apostles are all liars because we have said that God raised Christ from the grave, and of course that isn’t true if the dead do not come back to life again. ¹⁶ If they don’t, then Christ is still dead, ¹⁷ and you are very foolish to keep on trusting God to save you, and you are still under condemnation for your sins; ¹⁸ in that case, all Christians who have died are lost! ¹⁹ And if being a Christian is of value to us only now in this life, we are the most miserable of creatures.

²⁰ But the fact is that Christ did actually rise from the dead and has become the first of millions^[i] who will come back to life again someday.

²¹ Death came into the world because of what one man (Adam) did, and it is because of what this other man (Christ) has done that now there is the resurrection from the dead. ²² Everyone dies because all of us are related to Adam, being members of his sinful race, and wherever there is sin, death results. But all who are related to Christ will rise again. ²³ Each, however, in his own turn: Christ rose first; then when Christ comes back, all his people will become alive again.

²⁴ After that the end will come when he will turn the Kingdom over to God the Father, having put down all enemies of every kind. ²⁵ For Christ will be King until he has defeated all his enemies, ²⁶ including the last enemy—death. This too must be defeated and ended. ²⁷ For the rule and authority over all things has been given to Christ by his Father; except, of course, Christ does not rule over the Father himself, who gave him this power to rule. ²⁸ When Christ has finally won the battle against all his enemies, then he, the Son of God, will put himself also under his Father’s orders, so that God who has given him the victory over everything else will be utterly supreme.

²⁹ If the dead will not come back to life again, then what point is there in people being baptized for those who are gone? Why do it unless you believe that the dead will someday rise again?

³⁰ And why should we ourselves be continually risking our lives, facing death hour by hour? ³¹ For it is a fact that I face death daily; that is as true as my pride in your growth in the Lord. ³² And what value was there in fighting wild beasts—those men of Ephesus—if it was only for what I gain in this life down here? If we will never live again after we die, then we might as well go and have ourselves a good time: let us eat, drink, and be merry. What’s the difference? For tomorrow we die, and that ends everything!

³³ Don’t be fooled by those who say such things. If you listen to them you will start acting like them. ³⁴ Get some sense and quit your sinning. For to your shame I say it; some of you are not even Christians at all and have never really known God.^[j]

³⁵ But someone may ask, “How will the dead be brought back to life again? What kind of bodies will they have?” ³⁶ What a foolish question! You will find the answer in your own garden! When you put a seed into the ground it doesn’t grow into a plant unless it “dies” first. ³⁷ And when the green shoot comes up out of the seed, it is very different from the seed you first planted. For all you put into the ground is a dry little seed of wheat or whatever it is you are planting, ³⁸ then God gives it a beautiful new body—just the kind he wants it to have; a different kind of plant grows from each kind of seed. ³⁹ And just as there are different kinds of seeds and plants, so also there are different kinds of flesh. Humans, animals, fish, and birds are all different.

⁴⁰ The angels^[k] in heaven have bodies far different from ours, and the beauty and the glory of their bodies is different from the beauty and the glory of ours. ⁴¹ The sun has one kind of glory while the moon and stars have another kind. And the stars differ from each other in their beauty and brightness.

⁴² In the same way, our earthly bodies which die and decay are different from the bodies we shall have when we come back to life again, for they will never die. ⁴³ The bodies we have now embarrass us, for they become sick and die; but they will be full of glory when we come back to life again. Yes, they are weak, dying bodies now, but when we live again they will be full of strength. ⁴⁴ They are just human bodies at death, but when they come back to life they will be superhuman bodies. For just as there are natural, human bodies, there are also supernatural, spiritual bodies.

⁴⁵ The Scriptures tell us that the first man, Adam, was given a natural, human body^[l] but Christ is more than that, for he was life-giving Spirit.

⁴⁶ First, then, we have these human bodies, and later on God gives us spiritual, heavenly bodies. ⁴⁷ Adam was made from the dust of the earth, but Christ came from heaven above. ⁴⁸ Every human being has a body just like Adam’s, made of dust, but all who become Christ’s will have the same kind of body as his—a body from heaven. ⁴⁹ Just as each of us now has a body like Adam’s, so we shall some day have a body like Christ’s.

⁵⁰ I tell you this, my brothers: an earthly body made of flesh and blood cannot get into God’s Kingdom. These perishable bodies of ours are not the right kind to live forever.

⁵¹ But I am telling you this strange and wonderful secret: we shall not all die, but we shall all be given new bodies! ⁵² It will all happen in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, when the last trumpet is blown. For there will be a trumpet blast from the sky,^[m] and all the Christians who have died will suddenly become alive, with new bodies that will never, never die; and then we who are still alive shall suddenly have new bodies too. ⁵³ For our earthly bodies, the ones we have now that can die, must be transformed into heavenly bodies that cannot perish but will live forever.

⁵⁴ When this happens, then at last this Scripture will come true—“Death is swallowed up in victory.” ^55-56 O death, where then your victory? Where then your sting? For sin—the sting that causes death—will all be gone; and the law, which reveals our sins, will no longer be our judge. ⁵⁷ How we thank God for all of this! It is he who makes us victorious through Jesus Christ our Lord!

⁵⁸ So, my dear brothers, since future victory is sure, be strong and steady, always abounding in the Lord’s work, for you know that nothing you do for the Lord is ever wasted as it would be if there were no resurrection.

16 Now here are the directions about the money you are collecting to send to the Christians in Jerusalem;^[n] (and, by the way, these are the same directions I gave to the churches in Galatia). ² On every Lord’s Day each of you should put aside something from what you have earned during the week, and use it for this offering. The amount depends on how much the Lord has helped you earn. Don’t wait until I get there and then try to collect it all at once.