Jul 30, 2016
JEREMIAH 19-20:
yesterday’s reading, we again heard some
often-quoted verses. These verses come just after verses in chapter
17 where the Lord himself beautifully paraphrased
Psalm 1:
9
“Who can understand the human heart?
There is nothing else so
deceitful;
it is too sick
to be healed.
10 I, the
Lord, search the minds
and test the hearts of
people.
I treat each of
them according to the way they live,
according to what they do.”
Then in chapter 18, we also heard the famous passage about the Lord being like a potter, which Paul refers to in Romans 9.
PSALM 147:
Again this is quite a contrast with Jeremiah’s
feelings which we just read! This is our second Hallelujah psalm.
And hallelujah has been translated according to its meaning here as
“Praise the LORD.” This psalm has incredible depth.
1CORINTHIANS 3:10—4:
Paul is still ‘going on about’ the same thing.
He is going to return to the subject of himself and Apollos in
chapter 4— which summarizes the division in the Corinthian church.
To give the connection, let’s start reading at chapter 3 verse
10.
Translation
notes:
3:16 Surely you
know that you are [included as a part of] God's temple and that
God's Spirit lives in you!
17 God will destroy anyone who destroys God's
temple. For God's temple is holy, and [we— all of God’s people//you
yourselves] are his temple.
[Translations in English often fail to make
clear that ‘you’ in Greek is plural here. The Corinthians as a
group are being built into the temple of God— as Paul says in
Ephesians 2. It seems a bit more natural or complete in English for
Paul to include himself in the body of Christ, so it is possible to
use ‘we’ and a modifying phrase, as I have suggested above. There
is another verse we will soon read where Paul says that we each
individually are a sanctuary/temple of the Holy
Spirit.]
21 No one, then,
should boast about what human beings can do. [(Implicit info:) Because
of being joined as one with Christ,] Actually everything belongs to you:
22 [So that
includes] Paul
[and] Apollos, and
Peter; this world, life and death, the present and the future—all
these are yours,
4:1 You should think of us
[apostles//0] as Christ's servants, who have been put in charge of
God's secret truths.
17
For this purpose I am sending to you Timothy, who is my own dear
and faithful son in the Christian life. He will remind you of the
[way of living//principles] which I follow [, and which is
appropriate for all of us who are joined in union with Christ
Jesus.//in the new life in union with Christ Jesus] [0//which] I
teach [these principles] in all the churches everywhere.