Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

³ Grace to you and peace from God our father and Messiah Jesus the Lord.

⁴ I always thank my God for you, for the grace of God that was given to you in Messiah Jesus. ⁵ You were enriched in him in everything, in every kind of speech and knowledge, ⁶ just as the messianic message was established among you, ⁷ so that you aren’t missing out on any spiritual gift as you wait eagerly for our Lord, Messiah Jesus, to be revealed. ⁸ He will establish you right through to the end, so that you are blameless on the day of our Lord, Messiah Jesus. ⁹ God is faithful! And it is through God that you have been called into the fellowship of his son, Messiah Jesus, our Lord.

Beware of divisions!

¹⁰ Now I must appeal to you, my brothers and sisters, through the name of Messiah Jesus our Lord, that you should all be in agreement, and that there should be no divisions among you. Instead, you should be fully equipped with the same mind and the same opinion.

¹¹ You see, my dear family, Chloe’s people have put me in the picture about you—about the fact that you are having quarrels. ¹² What I’m talking about is this. Each one of you is saying, “I’m with Paul!” “I’m with Apollos!” “I’m with Cephas!” “I’m with the Messiah!”

¹³ Well! Has the Messiah been cut up into pieces? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized into Paul’s name?! ¹⁴ I’m grateful to God that I didn’t baptize any of you except Crispus and Gaius, ¹⁵ so that none of you could say that you were baptized into my name. ¹⁶ (All right, I did baptize Stephanas and his household as well. Apart from that, I don’t know if I baptized anybody else.) ¹⁷ This is the point, you see: the Messiah didn’t send me to baptize; he sent me to announce the gospel! Not with words of wisdom, either, otherwise the Messiah’s cross would lose its power.