Lessons #09 and 10
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+ 1. It is best to use this note after you have listened to the lessons because there are +
+ comments given in the actual exposition not in the note. +
+ 2. The Bible abbreviations are as follows: CEV =Contemporary English version, +
+ CEB = Common English Bible, ESV= English Standard Version, +
+ GWT = God’s Word Translation, ISV = International Standard Version, +
+ NAB=New English Bible, NASB= New American Standard Bible, +
+ NEB= New English Bible, NET = New English Translation, +
+ NLT = New Living Translations NJB = New Jerusalem Bible, +
+ NJV = New Jewish Bible, TEV = Today’s English Version. +
+AMP = Amplified Bible +
+ 3. Notes have not been edited for grammatical errors. +
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Three reasons for thanksgiving (1 Cor 1:4-7)
4 I always thank God for you because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus. 5 For in him you have been enriched in every way—in all your speaking and in all your knowledge— 6 because our testimony about Christ was confirmed in you. 7 Therefore you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed.
The focus of this section of 1 Corinthians is thanksgiving to God on behalf of the Corinthians. Thus, Apostle Paul was thankful to God because of His grace to the Corinthians, their enrichment, and the confirmation of Christ’s testimony in them, implying they do not lack any spiritual gift. Based on the apostle’s thanksgiving to God, you, as a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, have the responsibility to always be thankful to God because of His grace to you, your spiritual enrichment, and the confirmation of Christ’s testimony in you.
Thanksgiving, as a concept, is an expression of appreciation for benefits or blessings one receives. It is something that we do primarily to God as an expression of gratitude for His blessings to us and also an expression of our dependence upon Him. There is no question that God is the recipient of our thanksgiving but that does not mean we should not be thankful to fellow humans in appreciation for the favor shown to us. The Holy Spirit through Apostle Paul indicates that it is fitting to thank a fellow human being when they do something good for us. It is for this reason that the apostle expressed appreciation to Aquilla and Priscilla for risking their lives because of their fellow believers, as we read in Romans 16:4
They risked their lives for me. Not only I but all the churches of the Gentiles are grateful to them.
The clause Not only I but all the churches of the Gentiles are grateful to them is more literally for which not only I am thankful, but also all the churches of the Gentiles. Of course, the apostle’s gratitude is given in such a way that we should understand that ultimately, thanksgiving is that which is directed to God.
It is our duty as believers to be involved in thanksgiving to God. This, we learn firstly from the psalmist who commanded believers to do so in Psalm 107:8–9:
8Let them give thanks to the Lord for his unfailing love and his wonderful deeds for men, 9for he satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things.
The Lord Jesus conveyed to us that it is important we give thanks to God for His blessings. This, He made clear through His question when He healed ten lepers but only one of them returned to show appreciation to Him, as recorded in Luke 17:17–18:
17 Jesus asked, “Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine? 18 Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?”
The question of our Lord in verse 18 indicates that it is expected for believers to thank God for His goodness towards us. We are obligated to thank God if indeed we understand that we do not deserve any of the blessings He bestows upon us.
There are several reasons to be thankful to the Lord. For example, we should be thankful to the Lord for answered prayers. It was this reason of answered prayer that led to the prayer of thanksgiving of Hannah, the mother of Samuel, recorded in the second chapter of Samuel when the Lord answer her prayer and gave her a son. Let me cite only a verse of that prayer of 1 Samuel 2:1:
Then Hannah prayed and said: “My heart rejoices in the LORD; in the Lord my horn is lifted high. My mouth boasts over my enemies, for I delight in your deliverance.
Another reason to offer thanks to God is His provisions of food. Thus, we should offer thanks to God for food before we partake of it. The Lord Jesus showed us by example that it is necessary to do so. Thus, before the miracle of feeding several thousands of people with five loaves of bread and two fish, He offered thanks to God the Father, as recorded in John 6:11:
Jesus then took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed to those who were seated as much as they wanted. He did the same with the fish.
Apostle Paul followed our Lord’s example in that he offered thanks to God for his food before the passengers with him in a ship, according to Acts 27:35:
After he said this, he took some bread and gave thanks to God in front of them all. Then he broke it and began to eat.
Anyway, there are several other reasons for thanksgiving to God by the apostle other than the ones he gave in our passage of 1 Corinthians 1:4-7, that we will get to shortly. In the other epistles of the apostle we find that there are two major reasons he thanked God for believers – one related to believers’ spiritual life and the other to God’s work. The apostle thanked God because of the faithfulness of believers or their implicit trust in the Lord. Thus, he thanked God for the Roman believers because of their faith in Romans 1:8:
First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is being reported all over the world.
He thanked God for the faith of the Colossians in Colossians 1:3–4:
3 We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, 4 because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints—
He thanked God for the faith of the Thessalonians in 2 Thessalonians 1:3:
We ought always to thank God for you, brothers, and rightly so, because your faith is growing more and more, and the love every one of you has for each other is increasing.
It is not only for a local congregation that the apostle thanked God relating to faith but also for an individual, as he did for his friend, Philemon, in Philemon 4–5:
4 I always thank my God as I remember you in my prayers, 5 because I hear about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints.
Thus, we see that the apostle thanked God severally for believers’ faith which is brought about in them by God. Likewise, the apostle thanked God for election, as he did on behalf of the Thessalonians in 2 Thessalonians 2:13:
But we ought always to thank God for you, brothers loved by the Lord, because from the beginning God chose you to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth.
A believer who understands that his/her salvation was possible only because of God’s election should remain thankful to the Lord. I mean if you understand that God chose you of all humans to be saved then there should be no day in your life that you do not thank Him for your election. I am not using a hyperbole when I say, you should thank God every day for your salvation. No! I mean you should literally thank Him every day for choosing you as His own if indeed you understand what it means that you are of the elect.
We should develop the habit of giving thanks to God. Apostle Paul, no doubt, had formed the habit of being thankful to God as he stated in the sentence I always thank God. It is the apostle claim that he at all times or on every occasion of prayer gives thanks to God. In effect, he is saying, being thankful to God has become a second nature to him. It is a way of life for him to be in a state whereby he thanks God continuously. It does not necessarily mean that he stops every moment to thank God per say but that his whole attitude of life is that of thanksgiving to God. He was consumed with being grateful to God that every moment of his life is one in which he appreciates God. This should also characterize you as a believer. Your whole outlook in your spiritual life should be one that is characterized by thankfulness to God.
A life of thanksgiving to God is an indication of sound spiritual life. In effect, if you have a sound spiritual life that involves learning and applying the word of God correctly under the filling of the Spirit, you should reflect that in always giving thanks to God. But that is not all. If you have a sound spiritual life your thanksgiving to God should not only be because of His goodness to you but because of His goodness to other believers, with whom you are acquainted. The truthfulness of what we have said is evident in Apostle Paul’s practice as reflected in our passage of study in the phrase of 1 Corinthians 1:4 for you. The apostle tells the Corinthians that he was always thanking God for them. He was under the filling of the Spirit as he wrote that phrase. The implication is that his thankfulness to God on behalf of the Corinthians is one that is due to his spiritual condition and his spiritual status. The apostle was a matured believer who was under the control of the Holy Spirit that he recognized that it was important to be thankful to God for other believers. It is for this reason we insist that being thankful to God for other believers is a good indicator of the soundness of one’s spiritual life. Being thankful to God for others implies a person is not merely focused on self but thinks of other believers. Anyway, we insist that as a believer you would show spiritual maturity when you not only are thankful to God for yourself but for other believers with whom you are acquainted.
Thanksgiving to God is an act or an attitude that results from recognition of what He has done. The fact that thanksgiving is always a result of a benefit received is introduced in our passage of study with the word because of in 1 Corinthians 1:4. The expression “because of” is translated from a Greek preposition (epi) that may mean “upon” but it has several usages. In our passage, there are two possible usages of the preposition that make sense in our passage. The first is as a marker of perspective with the meaning “concerning, on the basis of, in regard to.” The second is as a marker of reason hence means “because of, on the basis of.” The two usages are related that it is better to understand the Greek preposition as that which gives reason for the apostle’s thanksgiving. Hence, the apostle in the use of the Greek preposition that is translated “because of” conveys that there are reasons for his thanksgiving to God for the Corinthians. Precisely, there are three reasons the apostle gave in the section of 1 Corinthians 1:4-7 that we are considering for his thanksgiving to God for the Corinthians.
A first reason the apostle always thanked God for the Corinthians is God’s grace enjoyed by them as in the verbal phrase of 1 Corinthians 1:4 because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus. It is fitting that the apostle would provide his first reason for thanking God for the Corinthians as His grace. Why is it fitting you may ask? It is first because of what God has done for the Corinthians and so for all believers. God has purified them so that they are qualified to become His unique people. There could be no greater display of grace on the part of God than to purify a human being in such a way that the individual becomes acceptable to Him to include the person in the family of God. It is inconceivable that God would include human beings as members of His family but indeed those who are believers in the Lord Jesus Christ are members of God’s family as indicated in Hebrews 2:11:
Both the one who makes men holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers.
The phrase of the same family is literal all from one that means that Jesus Christ and believers share common humanity but because Jesus Christ is God, the implication is that believers become members of the family of God. To belong to the family of God is indeed an act of goodness of God. Hence, it is fitting for the apostle to thank God for His grace towards the Corinthians that made them members of God’s family whom He purified and accepted as His own people. Another reason it is fitting for the apostle to give God’s grace as the first reason for thanking God for the Corinthians is because of the many failures of the local church in Corinth that are stated in the epistle that we will consider in due time. The idea of grace should remind the Corinthians that despite their many failures they belong to God because of His grace to them. Thus, it is important the apostle begins with the concept of grace in his treatment of the subject of thankfulness to God for them.
Grace as a word may refer to favor that is shown to another because of some expected benefit even though the benefit to the one that shows the favor may not be explicit as was the case with Festus wanting to demonstrate favor to the Jews at Paul’s expense by suggesting he should stand trial in Jerusalem, as we read in Acts 25:9:
Festus, wishing to do the Jews a favor, said to Paul, “Are you willing to go up to Jerusalem and stand trial before me there on these charges?”
Here “favor” is probably a reference to the benefit that Festus anticipates from the Jews that will be returned to him if he is on their good side. In other words, he expects good behavior from the Jews in return to the favor he wanted to render them. Grace may refer to gift that one gives to another, as in 1 Corinthians 16:3:
Then, when I arrive, I will give letters of introduction to the men you approve and send them with your gift to Jerusalem.
The word “gift” is from the same Greek word (charis) translated “grace” in 1 Corinthians 1:4 in that grace shown to someone in need has the sense of “gift.” This gift that is delivered to the believers in Jerusalem is based on a benefit that is derived by Gentile believers through the ministry of Jewish believers so that the apostle argued that there is a sense the Gentiles owe believers in Jerusalem their help, as he stated in Romans 15:27:
They were pleased to do it, and indeed they owe it to them. For if the Gentiles have shared in the Jews’ spiritual blessings, they owe it to the Jews to share with them their material blessings.
Hence, it is possible that human favor cannot be entirely seen as without purpose or benefit to the one who shows it. But this is different from favor that God shows since the favor God shows is not in any way dependent on benefit that He would receive from humans. He does not benefit from man in any way since there is nothing He needs from humans. Thus, it is not surprising that we have the question in Job 22:2:
“Can a man be of benefit to God? Can even a wise man benefit him?
The grace that the apostle had in mind is favor from God that is evident in all He has done for the salvation of the Corinthians that certainly includes the various spiritual gifts they have received but the emphasis is on favor shown with respect to their salvation. Anyway, it is because the favor God shows, does not benefit Him as a human favor could possibly benefit the one who shows it to another that the apostle described the grace or the favor he had in mind as divine when he wrote in the words of the NIV of 1 Corinthians 1:4 his grace or literally the grace of God.
The apostle not only indicated that the favor he is thankful is divine, that is, it is from God, but he also described it as that demonstrated to the Corinthians and so to all believers as in the verbal phrase of 1 Corinthians 1:4 given you or more literally the one having been given you. The word “given” is translated from a Greek word (didōmi) that may mean “to give up” in the sense of dedicating oneself for a specific cause or even to sacrifice, as it is used to describe the sacrificial death of Christ for us in Titus 2:14:
who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.
The word may mean “to give” in the sense of to grant, as Apostle Paul used it to describe the authority the Lord gave him in 2 Corinthians 13:10:
This is why I write these things when I am absent, that when I come I may not have to be harsh in my use of authority—the authority the Lord gave me for building you up, not for tearing you down.
The word may be used to describe what God grants or bestows on individuals. Thus, it is used for the gifts that Christ gave to believers following His ascension, as described in Ephesians 4:8:
This is why it says: “When he ascended on high, he led captives in his train and gave gifts to men.”
It is in the same sense of granting something to someone that the word meaning “to give” is used regarding the Holy Spirit in 1 Thessalonians 4:8:
Therefore, he who rejects this instruction does not reject man but God, who gives you his Holy Spirit.
It is probably in the sense of to grant or to show favor that the word is used in our passage of 1 Corinthians 1:4. So, the apostle is thankful for the favor the Lord demonstrated to the Corinthians. Because the Greek used an aorist tense, it is the divine favor that was demonstrated to the Corinthians at the time of salvation that the apostle had in mind since God’s dealings with us is characterized by His grace. In effect, the apostle focused on the divine favor that was evident at the time the Corinthians believed. It is God’s special favor that He grants that enables a person to believe once the gospel has been presented to the person. This divine favor, of course, goes back to the issue of election. That aside, the apostle was thankful that the Lord would show such favor or goodness to the Corinthians so that they are His people.
The divine favor that is demonstrated to the Corinthians and so to all believers is indeed because of Jesus Christ, as implied in the last phrase of 1 Corinthians 1:4 in Christ Jesus. The Greek phrase translated in Christ Jesus is subject to at least three possible ways of reading it in the English because of the Greek preposition used. It could be read as in association with Christ Jesus, implying that divine favor is shown to the Corinthians and so to all believers as they associate with Christ. Another reading of the phrase is by Christ Jesus. This reading would mean that Christ Jesus is the agent through whom divine favor is shown to the Corinthians. Another reading of the Greek phrase is because of Christ Jesus implying divine favor shown to the Corinthians is because of Christ Jesus. All three readings and consequent interpretations make sense and do not contain anything that is false. Nonetheless, it seems that it is the third interpretation of divine favor being shown to the Corinthians because of Christ Jesus that the apostle meant. This is because the first two interpretations while they do not contain error carry implications that are difficult to fit in the verse we are considering. To say that divine favor is shown to the Corinthians in their association with Jesus Christ would mean that divine favor or God’s grace was shown to them after they have believed. For it is only if a person has believed that the individual could be said to be in union or in association with Christ but not before that. However, we have indicated that grace in our verse refers to divine favor shown at the point of salvation that includes spiritual gifts. Therefore, it is unlikely the apostle was thinking of something that occurred after salvation unless, of course, one takes “grace” to mean “spiritual gift” which sequentially is received after salvation. Because we believe “grace” in our passage refers primarily to divine favor shown to Corinthians as unbelievers that led to their salvation, it is unlikely that the apostle meant to convey that divine favor is shown to the Corinthians because they are in Christ. Again, we do not dispute the truth that God’s favor is shown to us as believers because we are in Christ but that in this particular context that that is not what the apostle meant. The second interpretation of divine favor shown by Jesus Christ while it is true is unlikely in our context because the apostle had already indicated that Christ Jesus is the source of grace in his greeting in 1 Corinthians 1:3:
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Since grace is from Jesus Christ as well as the Father, the apostle would not be stating that Christ is the agent of showing divine favor to the Corinthians unless again if one takes grace as “gift” implying that Jesus Christ gives spiritual gifts. For the reasons we have given, we contend that the Greek phrase translated in Christ Jesus in NIV and majority of our English versions should be understood to read because of Christ Jesus so that it is because of Him that divine favor was shown to Corinthians and so to all believers or even if one takes grace as a reference only to spiritual gifts, our explanation still stands because spiritual gifts to believers are because of Jesus Christ. All spiritual blessings that come to believers are because of the work of Jesus Christ on the cross. Take for example, forgiveness of our sins is because of Jesus Christ, as the Holy Spirit conveyed through Apostle John in 1 John 2:12:
I write to you, dear children, because your sins have been forgiven on account of his name.
Since every spiritual blessing we receive is because of the work of Jesus Christ on the cross, it is fitting to believe that the apostle meant to convey that God’s grace or divine favor is shown to the Corinthians and so to all believers prior to salvation because of Christ Jesus. In other words, there is no reason for God to show His favor to us if His Son Jesus Christ did not pay for our sins on the cross. Hence, we believe that divine favor or grace is shown to Christians because of Jesus Christ. In any event, the first reason the apostle always thanked God because of the Corinthians is the divine favor shown to them because of Jesus Christ.
A second reason the apostle thanked God for the Corinthians is because of their complete enrichment with emphasis here on their spiritual enrichment. This complete enrichment is stated in 1 Corinthians 1:5 For in him you have been enriched in every way. Of course, we are certain that verse 5 is concerned with a second reason for the apostle being thankful to God for the Corinthians because of the first word for of the verse. The word “for” is translated from a Greek conjunction (hoti) that has several usages. It could be used as a marker of direct discourse, in which case, it is not translated in the English but represented by quotation marks, as for example, in quoting from the OT Scripture by the apostle in 1 Corinthians 14:21:
In the Law it is written: “Through men of strange tongues and through the lips of foreigners I will speak to this people, but even then they will not listen to me,” says the Lord.
The sentence it is written is followed in the Greek text with the Greek word (hoti) used in 1 Corinthians 1:5 with the sense of quotation hence it is not translated but reflected in the English using quotation marks. The Greek conjunction can be used as a marker of discourse content, whether direct or indirect hence means “that” as the apostle used it in his epistle to the Galatians in Galatians 1:20:
I assure you before God that what I am writing you is no lie.
The Greek conjunction may be used as a marker of reason or cause hence means “because”, as it is used in 1 John 3:12:
Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother’s were righteous.
It is in this sense of marker of reason that the Greek conjunction is used in 1 Corinthians 1:5 so that we are certain that what follows is the apostle’s second reason for thanking God for the Corinthians.
Anyway, we asserted that the second reason the apostle thanked God for the Corinthians is because of their complete enrichment with emphasis here on their spiritual enrichment. We use the word “complete” because of the phrase of 1 Corinthians 1:5 in every way. The expression “every way” is translated from a Greek word (pasa) that may mean the totality of any object and so means “all, every, each, any” as it is used to refer to our Scripture being inspired by God the Holy Spirit in 2 Timothy 3:16:
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,
The Greek word in question may refer to any entity out of a totality with the meaning “any and every, every” as it is used to describe the doctrinal stability of matured believers in Ephesians 4:14:
Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming.
The Greek word can be used as a marker of highest degree of something hence means “all, full, greatest.” The translators of the NIV used the meaning “completely” to translate it in Ephesians 4:2:
Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.
The phrase completely humble is more literally all humility. The word may pertain to a high degree of completeness or wholeness with the meaning “whole”, as in Ephesians 2:21:
In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord.
The word may mean “every kind of, all sorts of” in the sense of everything belonging, in kind, to the class denoted by the noun qualified by our Greek word, as the word is used in relation to evil desires in Romans 7:8:
But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of covetous desire. For apart from law, sin is dead.
In our passage of 1 Corinthians 1:5, the word is used three times probably with different senses. In the first usage, it is in the sense of the totality of any object that it is used hence it is because of the total enrichment of the Corinthians that the apostle always thanked God.
It is our assertion that the enrichment of the Corinthians by God involves totality of His enrichment in the sense that it involves both spiritual and physical enrichment although the emphasis in our passage is on the spiritual as we will demonstrate shortly. The reason for making this assertion is the expression you have been enriched which is translated from a Greek verb (ploutizō) that in the Septuagint is used in the sense of making someone rich or wealthy as when Abraham refused to accept booty from the king of Sodom lest he claims he made him rich, as we read in Genesis 14:23:
that I will accept nothing belonging to you, not even a thread or the thong of a sandal, so that you will never be able to say, ‘I made Abram rich.’
In the NT, the Greek word is used with the meaning “to make rich” but making one rich is to be understood both literally in the sense of making someone wealthy and figuratively in the sense of making someone rich spiritually. It is in the sense of making someone rich spiritually that our Greek word is used in the oxymoron found in the declaration of the apostle in 2 Corinthians 6:10:
sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything.
This verse contains an oxymoron in the sense that the apostle stated that despite being poor he made many rich. Certainly, the apostle could not have meant he made many people wealthy in a material sense since he was poor in a material sense. Furthermore, we know that a poor person could not make someone rich. Of course, one could argue that a poor person could work for someone to make the employer rich. This is unlikely because the work of one poor employee could hardly make the employer wealthy. Therefore, the apostle must have meant making many rich in a spiritual sense of sharing the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ with them and consequent teaching of the word to them. It is only if we understand the assertion of 2 Corinthians 6:10 this way that what the apostle stated makes sense. So, the Greek word used in our passage of 1 Corinthians 1:5 is used in 2 Corinthians 6:10 in the sense of making someone rich in a spiritual sense. However, the word may mean to make someone wealthy in a material sense as it is used in the Septuagint. Such a use is also implied in the declaration of the apostle in 2 Corinthians 9:11:
You will be made rich in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God.
In this passage, when the apostle wrote You will be made rich in every way he meant that God will enrich the Corinthians both materially and spiritually. Generosity involves two factors. The first is the spirit of generosity. In effect, a person must have the spirit of generosity to be generous to others. This spirit of generosity is certainly a gift from God since He is the One that makes us willing to do His will. Thus, unless He gives a person the spirit of generosity, then a person would not possess it. Without possession of the spirit of generosity, a person would not be generous even though the individual is wealthy. A second factor involved in generosity is the availability of resources. A person cannot give what the individual does not have. Therefore, if a person does not have resources but has the spirit of generosity the person has no way of demonstrating that spirit. Since these two factors are essential in generosity, it follows that when the apostle wrote in 2 Corinthians 9:11 that the Corinthians will be made rich so that they can be generous on every occasion, he meant that the Lord would not only make them willing to be generous but He would also provide them the resources they need to be generous. Hence, in the passage of 2 Corinthians 9:11, our Greek word translated “enriched” in 1 Corinthians 1:5 has the sense of both literally making someone rich and figuratively making someone rich in a spiritual sense.
Now, we must be careful here because of the prosperity preachers could take hold of the assertion of the apostle in our passage of 1 Corinthians 1:5 you have been enriched in every way to mean that believers are rich both materially and spiritually. The passage does not imply that every believer would be wealthy financially, but we know that every believer is rich in the sense that the Lord is every believer’s sufficiency. If you are a believer, the Lord has promised to take care of your needs as that is the reason, the Lord commands us not to worry in Matthew 6:33–34:
33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
But the promise to take care of us does not necessarily mean that we all will have abundance of material things. No! The promise is to take care of our basic needs. Nonetheless, there are those the Lord would bless in a material sense so that they become wealthy. That aside, the thing we know for certain is that the Lord has made all believers rich in the spiritual sense. Anyway, the focus of the enrichment the apostle was concerned regarding the Corinthians is spiritual not material although that cannot be discounted.
It is our assertion then that when the apostle wrote in 1 Corinthians 1:5 For in him you have been enriched in every way that his focus was on the spiritual enrichment. This is first implied in the phrase in him that refers to the Lord Jesus Christ. The phrase in him is one that is predominantly used by Apostle Paul with respect to spiritual blessings of believers. For example, the spiritual enrichment of God’s righteousness is one that is associated with the phrase in him in 2 Corinthians 5:21:
God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
The spiritual enrichment of forgiveness of sins is one that relates to the phrase in him in Ephesians 1:7:
In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace
Election is indeed a spiritual enrichment that is also associated with the phrase in him in Ephesians 1:11:
In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will,
Thus, you get the idea that the phrase in him in 1 Corinthians 1:5 is intended to remind us that the enrichment the apostle had in mind is concerned primary with the spiritual.
In any case, the assertion that the apostle is primarily concerned with spiritual enrichment is evident in the two examples of enrichment he mentioned in the passage of 1 Corinthians 1:5 that we are considering. The first example of spiritual enrichment is concerned with communication as in the phrase of 1 Corinthians 1:5 in all your speaking. The word “all” is from the same Greek word translated “every way” in the first part of the verse. In the phrase in all your speaking the sense of the Greek is “every kind of” so that it is every kind of communication or speaking that is envisioned. The word “speaking” is translated from a Greek word (logos) that have several meanings in the NT but in our context, it refers to word or speech as an act hence “speaking” in various situations such as preaching the word, prophesying or speaking in tongues. In Christ, the Corinthians received spiritual enrichment that involves communication of God’s truth but some of them have received the spiritual enrichment of communicating, specifically a message of wisdom, as we can gather from 1 Corinthians 12:8:
To one there is given through the Spirit the message of wisdom, to another the message of knowledge by means of the same Spirit,
It is a spiritual enrichment to have God’s truth and it to communicate to others. The point is that the Corinthians have received spiritual enrichment associated with communication of God’s word.
A second example of spiritual enrichment the apostle mentioned is knowledge as in the phrase of 1 Corinthians 1:5 in all your knowledge. The word “knowledge” is translated from a Greek word (gnōsis) that may mean the content of what is known, as the word is used in 2 Corinthians 2:14:
But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ and through us spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of him.
The word may mean “knowledge” in the sense of comprehension or intellectual grasp of something as the word is used in 1 Corinthians 8:1:
Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that we all possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.
It is in this sense of comprehension or intellectual grasp of something that the word is used in our passage of 1 Corinthians 1:5. Corinthians have received enrichment of knowledge in that they first comprehended the gospel message to be saved but then they have the enrichment of knowledge in that they were capable of grasping doctrines of the Christian faith the apostle taught them. The spiritual blessing of enrichment of knowledge is not stagnant but dynamic; it is for this reason that the apostle in several of his apostolic prayers for believers petitioned the Father for it on behalf of believers as in Philippians 1:9:
And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight,
In any event, it is our assertion that the enrichment the apostle had in mind regarding the Corinthians is primarily spiritual as we have demonstrated. Hence, the second reason the apostle thanked God for the Corinthians is their spiritual enrichment that involve gift of speaking and understanding of God’s word.
Let me end by asking you, do you know that it is a spiritual enrichment to have knowledge of God’s word? If not, that may explain why you are lukewarm towards God’s word. If you recognize that is a great spiritual enrichment to receive the teaching of God’s word, then you should show it by doing everything you can to benefit from the teaching of God’s word that comes this pulpit. You should endeavor to enrich your knowledge of God’s word by going home and spending time reviewing your note and re-listening to the teaching of God’s word you heard taught. My friends, God has provided us spiritual enrichment of knowledge through the teaching of His word. Therefore, I challenge you to cease what has been graciously provided to you. Show that you appreciate God for His grace in your salvation.
12/29/17