Although often overlooked today, whether or not to eat food that had been sacrificed to idols was a major issue in first-century Christianity, especially in urban centers like Corinth. The city was teeming with temples, idols, and smaller shrines. Divinities abounded and devotees made offerings regularly from a little wine poured out at a home shrine to full animal sacrifices amid the pomp and circumstance of a city-funded celebration in the main forum. It’s hard for us to imagine the immense social pressure, especially on elite Christians, to attend state sacrifices, eat meals at temple dining rooms, and accept invitations to banquets at which meats from animals sacrificed to the gods would be served. Join me to see what the idolatry landscape was like in Corinth and how Paul instructed the Christians there to navigate the situation with fidelity and grace.

Scriptures Covered: 1 Corinthians 8:1-13; 10:14-11:1

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The Romans looked at families and marriage very differently than most of us do today. In this session we’ll cover arranged marriages, the double standard for adultery, and the new Roman Women who were breaking all the rules. This will put us in a good place to read chapter 7 of 1 Corinthians and see how Christian marriage, divorce, and remarriage differed from how the world lived. We’ll see that not only was Christian marriage incredibly honoring to wives, it also provided a better foundation on which to build intimacy and mutuality.

Scriptures Covered: 1 Corinthians 7:1-16

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How should Christians deal with internal disputes? As with so many other issues, the Christians in Corinth were failing to distinguish between the body of Christ and the world. Today we’ll consider what Paul wrote in the first half of 1 Corinthians chapter six. In order to get a handle on his instructions to the church, we’ll consider the Roman legal system and how litigation worked. We’ll see that Paul wanted them to work out their grievances internally rather than going to court before unbelievers. However, does this mean that Christians should never go to court? Find out in this episode.

Scriptures Covered: 1 Corinthians 6:1-11

Correction: in this presentation I said Cicero would put pebbles in his mouth and speak into the crashing waves at the ocean to strengthen his voice and articulation. I had that wrong. It was actually Demosthenes who did that not Cicero. Pace Robert Harris.

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So often we default to categories of thought prevalent in our time and without realizing it, read them into the Bible. As it turns out, first-century people living in Corinth did not think about sexuality like we do at all. In today’s episode, I want to begin by focusing rather closely on 1 Corinthians 6.9, which mentions same-sex relationships. This verse has been at the center of major translation disagreements that have sometimes opened the door wide to committed same sex relationships and at other times closed the door so tightly that even celibate men get locked out merely for experiencing attractions to the same sex.

In what follows we’ll carefully examine not only the Greek underlying the bewildering array of English translations of 1 Corinthians 6.9, but also critical background information from both Greek and Roman cultures. This will put us on solid ground to understand precisely what behavior Paul is forbidding for Christians in Corinth. Next we’ll dip our toes into chapter seven and see how advantageous singleness is for Christians whether same-sex or opposite-sex attracted.

Scriptures Covered: 1 Corinthians 6.9-11; 7.7-9, 28, 32-40

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Do you know what blows my mind? That with all the permissiveness and sinfulness of the Roman world, what the Corinthian Christians were doing shocked Paul. He said that the sexual immorality of one man among them was so bad that such was not even found among the gentiles. That’s quite an indictment! Today we’re going to cover 1 Corinthians 5 and the second half of chapter 6. Both of these have to do with sexual immorality and, as such, today’s content is not appropriate for children. We’re going to cover the incident where a man was with his father’s wife as well as Paul’s condemnation of those who indulged in the use of prostitutes. It’s going to be a spicy episode.

Scriptures Covered: 1 Corinthians 5.1-13; 6.12-20

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Paul wrote extensively about worldly wisdom in 1 Corinthians. Due to the prevalence and esteem of philosophical schools, Paul probably felt a need to explain how Christianity measured up. In this lecture we’ll survey the five main philosophical options available to first-century Corinthians, including Platonism, Cynicism, Skepticism, Epicureanism and Stoicism. Then once we get a cursory grasp of how each of these worldly approaches worked, we’ll contrast them to Paul’s idea of spiritually discerned truths, which are available only to the mature in Christ.

Scriptures Covered: 1 Corinthians 1:17-25; 2:1-16; 3:1-4

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Now that we’ve familiarized ourselves with the city of Corinth and Paul’s missionary activity there, we’re ready to dive into 1 Corinthians. As I mentioned previously, my strategy for this class is to focus on the major themes rather than covering every verse. Our first theme is the issue of divisiveness among the Christians at Corinth, which spans the first four chapters of the letter. In this episode we’ll look at the factions in the church in light of two major contributing background forces: imperial celebrity culture and competition for status among Corinth’s elite. By situating ourselves firmly within the context of first-century Roman Corinth, we’ll see that worldly pride, ambition, and sectarianism infiltrated the church and how Paul inverted their sense of status by pointing to his message about Christ’s crucifixion.

Scriptures Covered: 1 Corinthians 1:1-3, 10-13; 26-29; 3:5-9; 4:1, 7-13; 6:9-11

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How did Christianity come to Corinth in the first place? Although many times we are left speculating about how an ancient church got started, we have definitive knowledge about the Corinthian church from Luke, Paul’s traveling companion. In what follows we’ll work through Acts chapter 18 to see how Paul initially founded the church in Corinth. We’ll also take time to consider what life was like for Paul as a tentmaker, how he broke from the synagogue, and how we date Paul’s time there using the Gallio inscription from Delphi.

Scriptures Covered: Acts 18.1-19; 1 Thessalonians 2.9; 2 Thessalonians 3.7-8

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Today we’re beginning something new. I’ve been working on this class on 1 Corinthians for months and months. I had taken classes on 1 Corinthians at Boston University twice. The first time we just read through the entire epistle in Greek. The second time was when we learned about what modern scholars said about Corinth. I’ve taught this epistle in the past both in a home bible study (in Rhode Island) and at the college level (in Georgia). Then, last April I had the opportunity to visit many ancient cities in both Turkey and Greece, including Corinth, which gave me first-hand knowledge and experience with the site and the museum. Then we hiked up the Acrocorinth to get a good view of the ocean and the ancient site. From all of this I’ve put together a class on 1 Corinthians that I hope will make the Bible come alive for you in a new and exciting way.

Now, when most people pick up their Bibles and read 1 Corinthians, they approach it as if this was a modern document addressing our concerns today. Of course, there is a lot in 1 Corinthians that directly applies to us today, but there’s also a huge potential for misunderstanding when we read today’s issues and categories into Scripture. A better approach, and the approach I’ll be taking in this class, is to do the hard work of adjusting our minds to think like they thought in their time and place. When we do that we can see through their eyes and this will tremendously help us to understand what Paul was doing in the epistle he wrote them. Today is an introduction to the city of Corinth to help you start getting your bearings. Then next week we’ll look at what happened when Paul came there.

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As we left things last time, Vaughn Madsen of New Zealand had been on a quest for biblical truth that resulted in repeated rejection from churches and Bible studies. Apart from his kids, Vaughn was alone. He met a couple of random people in street evangelism who agreed with him about Jesus, but that was it… for years. Even his wife, Sharon, didn’t agree with him. No matter how much he tried, he couldn’t manage to convince her otherwise. He prayed and prayed. He waited. He was patient. Then in the last two years something changed. Today you’ll find out what that was as we listen in to the exciting conclusion of the story.

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