Dear God,
Because your love is better than life I will praise and honor you. And I will do so by reading your living Word.
Lots of good stuff in here. Become all things to all men. Don't do anything that might make your brother stumble. This world is temporary. Run to get the prize. Focus your attention on God for now. If God brings the man of your dreams into your sight, go for it. Otherwise, keep focusing solely on God.
Love,
Me
I Corinthians 6-9
6
So basically, he's saying that Christians should not have to bring other Christians to court, to the government. They should be able to come before the church to have their disputes resolved.
Honor God with your body. If you commit adultery or whatever, you are basically making Christ do it. How sick is that thought? But how sicker to think that he was punished for doing it anyways? Wow.
7
So. It is better not to be married unless you can't help yourself. Then you should. See, I think I can help myself. But basically my thing here is that if I can serve God better while single, I will. And if someone comes along who will help me and him serve God better, then I will marry him. It's as simple as that. What's not so simple is knowing if the man is going to help me serve God better. :-) But I have an amazing Adviser to help me. And I also don't have to think about it at the moment, thank goodness.
Basically here Paul is saying that this world is temporary and fleeting. We must live as though the things of the world did not engross us. They should not.
Right now all that needs to concern me is how to please God. The rest will follow if I begin there.
8
Food sacrificed to idols. They could eat it, and it would make them no better or worse. But they should be careful not to make other believers stumble. And here's the application: Do not do anything that will cause other brothers to stumble, even if you feel like it's okay for you.
9
Paul's now talking about how he could demand some material living from his spiritual harvest with the Corinthians, but he's not going to because he wants to preach the gospel voluntarily--he is compelled to do it in Christ, but he doesn't want to preach because he gets paid. Interesting.
Paul became all things to all men to win some to Christ. How can I better do that? It's kinda what Tom was saying. He has a friend who gets as close to the line as possible to pull people over to his side. Tom stays as far away from the line as he can so that he can win people by his differences. Which one do I want? One is like Paul, one is like Tom? I dunno haha.
And running to get the prize. What am I doing to give myself strict training? Well, I don't wake up at the crack of dawn, though maybe I should. My quiet times aren't very long, I don't have a solid prayer time--it's kinda scattered throughout the day. I should do something about that. :-)
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