We can continue with a outline of first Corinthians, which Paul writes around 54 AD from Ephesus to the Corinthians. And we know from the content of first Corinthians that Paul is responding to some news he has received, more precisely some questions he has received from the Corinthians. And so part of first Corinthians is an answer to questions. So we see a certain level of maturity on the part of the Corinthians who say, now that I'm a Christian, what about marriage, what about sexuality, what about authority, etc. So there's a little bit of that and we can probably say, safely say that a part of the Corinthians church has those questions and they are bringing those in the hope perhaps that as Paul addresses them, that that will help the Corinthians church. So there may be some people in the Corinthians church who say, the best way we can contribute to the health of the church is to ask Paul some questions. It's very possible. I notice that sometimes in the way my wife asks me questions or I ask her a question when we discuss a certain issue with other people that is sometimes a very helpful means. So sometimes that is a way you can get involved in resolving church issues or questions not so much by standing up and lecturing and telling, but perhaps by asking a person that you think is stressed, where the end that has the trust of other people to get some information and some input, that may be a fact here. Because the first major section of first Corinthians, one 10 to 620, one 10 to 620 deals with Paul's responses to questions from the Corinthian community. And one 10 to 420 deals with a problem of factions, the theme of disunity, the theme of particular loyalties to one person versus another shows you that problem and so here Paul deals with particular questions concerning factions within the community. And then 5, chapter 5 to 6, chapter 5 and 6 deal basically with immorality and arrogance, immorality and arrogance issues that are also brought to the Paul. Now this first section I should be a little more precise is not so much written questions, but those are questions that are brought to Paul by messengers, by those who communicate to him about the Corinthian church. Starting with chapter 7, Paul gets involved in more specific written questions, at least specific questions. So first, oral questions, reports that he receives, he responds to them, chapter 7 to chapter 16, Paul deals with questions brought to him. So sometimes in your NIV translation, for instance, or also in other English translations you will have a quotation. In the beginning of a chapter that makes a statement and then Paul deals with that, it's most likely that those statements are written or specific questions brought to Paul. One deals with marriage, chapter 7, you are quite aware of that, marriage and connected with those questions are questions of divorce, and then also celibacy. How should that be viewed? Paul has a very careful approach to that issue. Chapters 8 to 11 deal with food and idolatry, food dedicated to idols and questions of freedom. Here the gospel of grace is being qualified in a good and careful way. Chapter 112, following through chapter 14, Paul deals with questions concerning worship, spiritual gifts. Then the well-known, famous chapter 15 deals with a resurrection, and you see in that kind of a philosophy, Neil Platonic philosophy. The teaching on the bodily resurrection of Christ and of the believers is a very significant final conclusion to his argument that what you do with your body is important now. So you see, you remember maybe from 1st and 2nd Thessalonians that I said Paul argues from the end from the coming of Christ. In the resurrection chapter, Paul again draws attention to the future of what happens to the body, certainly beginning with a physical resurrection of Jesus, but he says there again massively against their philosophy. That God is redeeming body and mind. Now the whole thing of being sown in weakness, being sown into death and being raised immortal, physically raised immortal, speaks about that fact that God has created matter and matter is good. And he is going to deal with that even to the point of the resurrection. So the future hope is tied up with physical renewal and that's so strange, so foreign, so non- Platonic to the Corinthians ears that they would say there is a future to the body. There is a future to that which God has created. God is the creator of the physical universe as much as he is the creator of the soul. So the resurrection chapter fits right into the whole mentality and the problem of the Corinthians, it is not just some excursus. And then chapter 16 deals with the Paul's plans of a collection, it's a little bit of a concluding section, but again you see that Paul is trying to help the Corinthians to understand that when they look beyond and they give, they support. They are actually maturing in their Christian understanding of fellowship, of corporateness, of being together rather than being individual. And I've already mentioned that the Corinthian church was a very individualized and separated type of a church. So that should be good enough in terms of the outlines, so we see a little bit of what is happening with the Corinthians. Let's just briefly look at some major themes in Corinthians in the Corinthian church. We are coming to number three in your outline concerning first Corinthians number three themes and texts. I at least want to mention a few points. One thing is, is that in first Corinthians you do not have a big doctrine about some major truth. It is very much an application letter of how does the truth of Christ apply to some of these areas that I have outlined here. And so when Paul speaks about Christ, he applies the truth about Christ in their midst to their situation. And the way he does that is that he uses a Greek term that was familiar to their ears, namely that Christ is wisdom, Christ is wisdom. Now initially the Corinthians would say, wonderful. Sounds intellectual. Sounds like that's what we need for our educated minds. Christ, the one we serve is wisdom. And so they can still continue initially in this misconception that what they do in their lives, their morality, their interpersonal relationships is kind of disconnected. They have this wonderful enlightened understanding that Christ is their wisdom and then comes the hammer. When Paul identifies that wisdom as a wisdom lived out, it is not just a logical, a esoteric concept far from it, it is actually lived out. It is a way of life. Christ is your wisdom. And so he brings in this Jewish understanding that wisdom is where true knowledge is applied to life. That's wisdom, true knowledge is applied to life. And so he teaches them that as they are connected with Christ the Lord, wisdom they are led into a life of application. A life of living that out, that truth and realities about Christ. So you can't get stuck and stay stuck in your concept of ideas you come right down to practical application. The second main point concerning Christ I believe is regarding the resurrection point that I have just made to you. Here Paul spends a whole chapter to describe how their Lord was physically raised and has begun a physical life of immortality. He has been raised from the death physically and he rules physically now. Although invisible he will come back into the visible world. So yes invisible but physically resurrected. So we know that the future life is a physical life as much as is a mental and a spiritual life. You see that those two points then that Christ is our wisdom for life and Christ has been raised physically are both major thrusts against the teaching of the neoplatonic teaching of the time. The other area besides teaching about Christ is what does Paul teach about man, human beings, what does Paul teach about human beings. And there we find that the Corinthian church was so happy to hear the gospel of grace with their ears. Because the gospel of grace to their ears tickled nicely and it said wow I get something and there's no cost. I receive forgiveness and there are no strings attached. I am freed. I am forgiven and then I can please myself. Pour a hallelujah. That's the gospel we wanted to hear. All along Paul has given us what we wanted. We can be saved. We can be glad about our salvation and then do as we please. So a perfect classical case of antinomianism. And we see in parts of the letter to the Corinthians how Paul deals with that whole understanding that now they feel that they can do what they want. For instance 1 Corinthians 6 verse 12 says this and I believe Paul is quoting here something that they said something that he heard from them. Everything is permissible for me. So the philosophy in their mind was now that I have the gospel of grace now that I'm forgiven everything is permissible for me. So the mill of new platonic separation of body and mind received further water from this wrongly understood gospel of grace. Namely we've always thought that it doesn't matter what I do with my body. And now the gospel tells me everything is okay. Whatever I do everything is permissible for me. So let me do it. So Paul deals with that challenge carefully in first and in second Corinthians. And he basically says this. Perhaps most pointedly clarified in second Corinthians we're coming back to that. Namely let the grace of God bear fruit in your life. We're coming back to that passage later on. Let the grace of God bear fruit in your life. Have you been freed by God's forgiveness to please yourself, to live in your God alien ways, to pursue your God alien philosophy, to continue in your habits that do no good to you and are an offense to the living God. Is that what grace is about simply for God to cut you some slack in order for you to continue to conduct your life like pigs in the pickstall. Is that the purpose of salvation? Is that liberty? Or are you called by grace into a life of growing in Godliness so that you bear fruit? So that the forgiveness you have received, you can pass on. So that the authority that you have received from God you can live under and pass on. So that the love, the sacrifice, the kindness, the strength, the abilities that you are receiving, you can make useful for others to the glory of God. That is the purpose of grace. There is a purpose. There's a goal. And so any church that struggles with antinomialism, with taking grace as cheap grace, as Dietrich Bonhover, I called it Beliegegnade, any church that misunderstands grace in that way needs to understand what Paul is going after in appealing to them. Fortunately Paul does not say which often is being done in churches. You've received grace, you better straighten out now. Disjointed with Paul their growth in Godliness is an outgrowth of the grace they have received. Stay with grace, stay with the mercy of God. Don't disconnect and start your own agenda. Always stay connected to grace but the mercy, the sacrifice, the love of God towards you has a goal to bear fruit in your life. It is like ferment, it works, it creates space, it moves you in a certain direction. You can't stay still. I find it so hard to believe that you can hold a grudge for 30 years, deep seated grudge, and confess every week how merciful Christ is to you. I know however that some pains that we have experienced in life sit very deep and are very hard to get out and to bring into this light of God's forgiveness towards us. vis-à-vis the wrong that has been done to us. I'm quite aware of that and I don't want to belittle the great challenge of reconciliation but see grace. The true grace, the expensive grace of God is compelling you to deal with that. Maybe over years, yes. God is, patience and has gratefulbearance but that there would be fruit growing out of that so that in the end you can see. And look, the person in the eye or the situation that you have suffered from to say, this has been the most painful thing in my life. But because of the grace of God, I can be gracious. That's what Paul is pursuing with First Corinthians. Not a cheap grace, not an antinomianism to what you please persist in whatever you are stuck in, but let that grace that God is giving you, let it bear fruit in your conduct, moral conduct, sexual conduct in your life in general. And to achieve that, Paul is teaching in First Corinthians a difference between flesh and body. Now we have to be careful in how we define these words in the various respective letters of Paul, but in First Corinthians the difference between flesh and body is this. Flesh is that which is against God's purposes. Against God's purposes, body is the physical body that God created and that needs to be used as an instrument of godliness. So Paul is giving here and specifying in Romans even more a clear distinction against platonic thought. And that is this. Plato divides the world into mind and body. As I have told you, body is the lower area. It's insignificant. It is to be overcome. Mind is that which is good, which is great. Paul's division is this way. And he says either flesh, flesh or spiritual, spiritual. So the dividing line is vertical, not horizontal, which means you can either live a life in your mind and in your body that is against the purposes of God flesh. Or you can live in your mind and in your body a life that is dedicated to the purposes of God spirit according to the spirit. Paul and in Romans deals with that division, living according to the flesh or living according to the spirit. See, some people misunderstand that and say that Paul is teaching living according to the mind versus living according to the body, but that's absolutely wrong. This dividing line is Plato. It's not Paul. This is the dividing line and this is the dividing line of God's word. Your mind and your body can be fleshly. Your mind and your body can be spiritual. Spiritual means according to the purposes of God surrendered to the purposes of God under God's authority. According to the flesh means independent of God, a philosophy that says man's mind is autonomous, a morality that says I do as I please. Nobody is to tell me my business. That's started in first Corinthians between the division between flesh and body. And so Paul makes it very clear that there's a difference then for the Corinthians, Corinthians between eating food and sexuality. I haven't explored that issue a lot, but I suspect that many philosophies, including the stoic one, identified sexuality and food. Definitely the platonic thought said food and sexuality are the same thing. Whereas the gospel would clearly say that we need food to live. There is a clear need for that. In terms of sexuality, there is a spiritual aspect to that. And so when Paul teaches about marriage and speaks about sexual intercourse, he makes it very clear that there is a spiritual emotional union that goes far beyond the physical act and therefore it is not like eating food. So I think that's a big area and I can't get into that, but I think you will encounter people that will tell you that sexuality and food are pretty much the same side of the coin. Paul teaches that there is a deeply spiritual aspect, so if you have intercourse with a prostitute, you're becoming one with that person. There is a spiritual union and you cannot get out of that. That union is established like glue and that is why it's so important to speak with younger people about the reality and the truth of sexual union and what that really implies. Paul is quite explicit about that in first Corinthians because of this neoplatonic thought that says what I do with my body doesn't matter. It matters because the soul is deeply connected. Your mind is deeply connected and the whole person is involved in that act. So there is a substantial difference between sexuality and between food. These are some of the main points that Paul outlines and addresses in regard to Christ, teaching about Christ for one thing and in regard to man for the other. Now we need to move on to second Corinthians actually here. Obviously there are many detailed themes that I have not addressed, the most difficult ones being the place of the woman of women in the church and in marriage, which are addressed in first Corinthians. The question of tongues as ununderstandable forms of speech or alternatively, which is more my view, languages, the question of head covering for women, the question of eating food dedicated to adults. I thought that was an old theme until I taught at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in a gentleman from Indonesia. That's quite common there and the question arises all the time. Do you go to your friend and eat food that has been dedicated to adults? So it's not completely passé as a question, but there are also principles that follow from that that Paul deals with. It is very difficult for me to move so fast across these issues, particularly the very important issue on women's plays in the church. So I'll spend a few minutes and I'll just tell you a few points on that issue because that's one of them relating to the Corinthian church and relating to bringing them from where they are to a godly understanding of what should be a pattern. Now I cannot do justice to this issue so don't expect me to deal with that issue. But I can tell you a few points that I believe are important when you approach that subject from first Corinthians and obviously you need to look beyond that. First of all, I have a feeling at least from my understanding of the church in Germany you have to fill in your blanks for the United States and whatever other nation you represent here that the place of women in marriage in the church hasn't been really right traditionally speaking. I have seen too many men that relate it to their wives in marriage as a second class citizen as somebody who cannot be consulted, who cannot be received advice from or sought advice from somebody who just needs to be really minding her own business. I've heard that too much. That's absolutely horribly wrong because the goal of sanctification of man and woman is that they would come back to the original design of God's creation and that is a complementary in design. I do support authority and submission. I do support structure. I see it clearly outline in Scripture but not on the back of an abuse and suppression a second class citizen of the woman. So if that's not dealt with forget the entire theological discussion just forget it. That problem of second class citizens has to be dealt with squarely and then we can sit down peacefully and say what place does God give you? What place does God give me? I don't have any bones to pick. I don't have any kind of agenda. I'll take the place God gives me as a male. You take the place God gives you as a female. We know we respect each other as equal as of equal dignity, importance and weight before God. We're going to respect each other but also we're going to follow the functions that God sees for you and me. Not because I am more capable than you are or inverted, not because I'm male and you're female but because that is God's wise design but it's all done on top of a reconciled and a peaceful place of man and woman being recipients of God's grace and equal importance. So I think rather than to go into these sticky passages and hammer certain theological themes which in one some ways I also stand to certain authority and submission structures you need to start in the beginning. You cannot build good order, godly order on the back of unresolved problems. I think the racial problem of racial reconciliation has to deal with that as well. We can't just put band-aids on top of things that are really wrong. They have to be healed. And so if you come out of families where women where second or third-class citizens you've got to think again what plays does the woman have in God's creation? I can tell you I've heard some women present the gospel in a wonderful way. I am for one, not somebody that believes that women cannot communicate or speak or teach. Wonderful. The issue is only what plays does God give us in marriage and in the church plays does he give us. So we need to think about that on the basis of a reconciliation and I've had to learn a lot in my own marriage not just to give this verbiage to you, but to honestly be able to say to you, I value my wife at least as much as myself. Her inside her questions, her perspectives, her sense of what's going on, her questions, her discernment, why am I a loser if I don't pay attention to them? Same in the church. The church that I was involved with in Germany, we had some senior women in the church, they were not even recognized as deaconesses. That wasn't the issue, but their wisdom and their advice had to be sought by us as elders. We would have been absolutely foolish if we had ignored their great sense of. Weak people in the church, overlook people in the church, needs in the church that I was oblivious to, they were such important parts of the health of the church. And so that has to be intact before we talk about functions. There has to be this sense of not just pat on the back, we'll give you something to do, that a real, genuine sense of we need each other for the health of the church. We really need each other and we're going to live that out. I'm going to take you seriously. I was shocked when I heard one woman in the church that I go to say that she feels so good that her pastor is really taking her seriously. That shouldn't be, that shouldn't be an expression of surprise, that should be the norm. We must listen to each other and take each other seriously and then we can look at what does first Corinthians 11 say about head covering, about authority and submission. What does first Corinthians 14 say about women being quiet in the church which I interpret in the sense of teaching authoritatively, but it cannot be on the poison of subjugation and of second class citizens, it just won't work. So that's my main appeal, not so much for the discussion that I am involved with as well, and I have a certain position that is a conservative position really on eldership, on headship in the family, but it must be on the basis of this sense, clarity of mutual support and mutual recognition. Now the thing that I'm so intrigued about in first Corinthians, that's why I'm making this little excursus here, despite the time clock clicking, is first Corinthians 11, 3, 2 and 3, and let's turn to that just briefly because I think there's a highly theological origin for us to reflect on equal significance and different function in marriage and in the church between male and female. And I find that for myself to be one of the central areas why I am not an egalitarian, why I am part of the complementarian camp, and that means I do not believe that man and woman in marriage and in the church should be equal in all respects. I think something is the miss because of first Corinthians 11, and so I am a complementarian, but please understand on the basis of mutual true sincere mutual respect and not just lip service. This is what Paul says about man and woman. Now I want you to realize that the head of every man is Christ, here man male is under authority, and the head of the woman is man male, and the head of Christ is God. See that's the real bang, because you would not question from your understanding of the New Testament that Jesus is God, that Jesus is the eternal son of God, that Jesus is the mediator of creation, that he is co-equal with the Father, that he shares all the truths of divine nature as the Father. So there is absolute equality in terms of divine nature between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and yet Paul can say that the head of Christ is God. How can he say that if there is equality? He can because the mystery of the God head holds both. He can say that equality and functional differentiation in its own self. So God without creation, without male and female, has a pattern, a principle of equality and mutual love, mutual service perfect in its character. While differentiation and function that the Son can say to the Father, year will be done, that the Father is clearly the head of the Son. There is equality and order in the God head, and that principle, that beautiful character about the God head, is to be reflected in marriage and in the Church, made visible, so that human beings that live according to the purposes of God somehow reflect part of the character of God. See, that's why I'm not in egalitarian. Not because I have a certain extra grind, or I think there should be a certain male monopoly, or any of that nonsense. Because I believe the assignment of function is to reflect God's character both for people to see outside of the Church, that we, male and female in marriage, have a mutual respect and love, mutual sacrifice, mutual giving, seeking the good of the other one, and yet we have an authority and submission, structure. Where we have that order, we have that togetherness and that mutual respect that says there must be some kind of a structure here, but it is never a political power struggle, it is more an order of authority and submission. So I think marriage and the Church, in terms of its gender specific function, is to reflect God's character and not the inferiority of women, and we have to be so careful there, and it's going to take a lot of work, not for us only to speak about it, but to demonstrate in our lives, that we can get that together. Equality of dignity, difference of functionality, and that's better than any women's lib egalitarian or whatever else approach that is being pushed at us, at the Church, at Scripture, from the outside, in order to make good the wrong that was done. You see, the egalitarian push is a reaction partially to the wrong doing of the Church in regard to the dignity of women, so I don't blame those who overreact, but I don't want to play into it out of guilt. I want to stay still and say, there are some real questions being asked, there are some real problems that we have, but let's not sell out, let's recover the gospel, let's recover why we are here, why we are man and woman. In marriage, in the Church, let's reflect the glory of God, and first Corinthians 11 gives us a blueprint of what's going on here. So do not misuse authority and submission as a means of second-class citizens because the Father never treats the Son that way. And so the commission of the husband to give his life, as Christ has given his life for the Church, obviously not that a human being, a man could atone for his wife, but to be so sacrificial, to be so ready to seek the good of his wife. In all matters, physical, spiritual and emotional, what a commission, what a testimony and what a sign to a hurting world that has no clue about that kind of love, because then you can also, and then you can also speak about the fact that there is an authority and submission structure, but that's not going to be a real problem. I know from my wife that she is willing and disposed to be my help made and to surrender herself willingly to me as she sees my sacrificial love for her. Obviously, women also shouldn't say, well, the reason I cannot do what is biblically asked of me is because you're such a redneck, you're such a stiffneck, you're a German. You know, if you were at least a Texan, maybe there would be some hope that you are useless. That's a cop-out. We both need to work on our sides, but I know that she is being won by that motion. So submission isn't really a problem. Being mistreated as a second-class citizen is a problem. And so we have a lot of gospel work to do, and I'm afraid we are pretty much on the level of the Corinthians which evidently had that problem. Women's live very much, a sense of independence, a sense of not accepting certain structures, and also a sense of male abuse. The Hellenistic, Roman world is full of male chauvinism. It's full of legalized suppression of women, and so obviously some of that would come out. I'm free in Christ, which I don't care for this structure anymore, out. So there's this over-reaction, two suppressive systems by the liberty of the gospel. Everything is justified now, and Paul is saying the purpose that we have is to reflect the glory of God, the grace of God, the forgiveness of God is enabling us, making us free to be reconciled as man and woman, to be reconciled as male and female in the church, and then in that mutual respect to see that there is a structural differentiation. So I do, and I may disappoint some of you. I do support that I believe that there is an appointment for men to be elders and to be teachers of the Word of God. I do understand First Corinthians 14 in that sense. There is a good ground to say this particular passage in First Corinthians where it speaks about women prophesying, speaking from the Word of God and instructing, et cetera, is more in the private sphere around the table of instructing people, and that the public worship has a certain order, but please not because males are more capable. Or women are less capable. There's a certain order given, but on the other hand, we also need to recover Titus 24, which speaks about the instructional commission of women to women. Most of the living churches have at least 60% of women in the church. So women are to instruct women. You're doing the majority of the teaching in the church. So there are many areas that we need to look at and recover without being driven by an agenda of mass equality, but rather by this more relaxed sense of what would God want us, what place would God want us to take. I can honestly tell you, I don't mind not being the head in my family, rather not. I'd rather not have the responsibility of looking for the spiritual welfare of my family. I'm such a bad person in that sense. I'm afraid God is giving me that job because I'm so bad at it. I've got to learn something about it. Maybe my wife would be much more apt to that kind of care. Maybe I'm getting certain functions because I need to grow. That's speculation that may be, but definitely not a difference of function because of ability because of disposition that you would say women shouldn't teach because they are easily misled. Well, some men are very easily misled. So I'm giving you some basis and there has to be a lot of discussion and further biblical search. So I am conservative in my understanding of scripture, but I am emphasizing that we cannot simply shove this structure onto a history that may have to require a lot of forgiveness, a lot of reconciliation, and a lot of reproachment in marriages and in the churches so that we can come from a place of peace forward to these functions that God may give us. You had a question though. A brief definition of headship. In this passage here, it is a question of authority. A lot of discussion has happened obviously in terms of what authority and headship mean. I still think in the Pauline usage there is a reference to authority to a responsibility. See, it's not just I tell what everybody does, but it is I'm responsible for this my household and its welfare. So headship is responsibility as much as it is anything else. And I believe that at times in a marriage for instance there may come a point where a decision has to be made. And I think a final decision of the head of the household is okay so long as the wife knows she's been heard very carefully, very thoroughly and she can trust that. So if I look at my marriage, those kinds of calls have not been very frequent at all because we debated, we dialogue, we prayed. I have tried to exercise that responsibility together so that we discern together where we need to go. I think it would be a leadership issue in that sense of initiating, you know, what are we doing in our family in terms of devotions? What does the church need in terms of its spiritual growth, leadership in terms of visionary for thinking? But again, when you are involved in that kind of a process, consult your wife, be involved with the women of the church when you debate or when you think about growth. So yes, leadership, visionary, moving forward, giving directions but not in your little group or worse yet as one man just standing there and saying this is the way we're going to go, even if it's over a cliff. So yes, there is a certain responsibility, leadership, activity, but it's not over dead bodies, it's with your wife, it's with the church, consulting, listening, working together. And I come back to the Godhead understanding, we need to reflect how God deals with himself within the Godhead. God says, this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. There's such a love, such a service. Yes. I think so. You're actually dealing with a core issue in first Corinthians 11, this following section is concerning head covering. It's definitely respect. It is a disgrace for you as a woman in the Corinthian church to have short hair or to be uncovered. It is, you know, compared to a life or a circumstance of a prostitute. So you're actually your covering is a form of respect for you but also a signal of you that you are under the authority of your husband. I would say the reference to man in this particular context here is husband, but I would also say if you understand household in the Greco-Roman world, you will see that if that holds true between husband and wife, there is ramification for the household where there may be unmarried women that are part of that household structure. So we shouldn't import our small family husband and wife and one and a half children type of understanding of what a family is. So we would say what applies to the heads of that household, namely husband and wife, then filters into the whole structure so that there is a place for the woman, for instance, younger women, to be under the authority of the older women, perhaps of the mother. You know, if you look at Luther's household, for instance, I think Katie had quite her hands full with a good number of women in her household to take care of. It's actually an interesting study of how that household function would have been going absolutely bankrupt if Katie hadn't been around. Luther was hopeless in terms of earning money and so she had to run a lot and structure a lot in the household. She had enormous responsibilities and Luther called her the princess and the queen of Vittenberg and was very glad that she did as much as she did, so there was a lot of responsibility that was in her shoulders.