1 Corinthians 1-4
The Gender Struggle Version
*Warning: this is not actual scripture, however, the issues that Paul seems to be addressing in 1 Corinthians 1-4 seem rather similar.
Chapter 1
Greetings
1 Paul, called by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus, and our brother Sosthenes, 2 To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours: 3 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Thanksgiving
4 I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus, 5 that in every way you were enriched in him in all speech and all knowledge— 6 even as the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you— 7 so that you are not lacking in any gift, wisdom or power, as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ, 8 who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
Divisions in the Church
10 I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you find a way to agree, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment. 11 For it has been reported to me by Chloe's people that there is quarreling among you, my brothers and sisters. 12 What I mean is that each one of you says, “I will only follow male leaders,” or “I will only respect them if they include women as leaders,” or “I follow years of church tradition,” or “I only follow things the Bible says explicitly.” 13 Is Christ divided? Were men-leaders crucified for you? Or were you washed clean by a woman-leader's serving hands? 14 I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, 15 so that no one may say that you were washed clean by my doing. 16 (I did baptize also the household of Stephanas. Beyond that, I can’t remember whether I baptized anyone else.) 17 For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not by the power of my compartmentalized testosterone-bathed man-brain nor by the power of an interconnected, estrogen-run woman-brain, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power and be dependent on hormones.
Christ the Wisdom and Power of God
18 For the word of the cross is folly to those whose systems of power are wasting away, but to us who are being renewed, it is the power of God. 19 For it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.” 20 Who is the one who truly understands the way the Holy Spirit works in the mind? Who is really the one who decides another's good? Who is the best defender of the church? Has not God made foolish all human strengths? 21 For since, according to God’s wisdom, the world did not know God through its modes of truth-finding and truth-defending, it pleased God through our seemingly foolish and weak message to save those who believe. 22 For men insist their being made first is a sign, and women insist God wants them given equal authority, 23 but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to equality-demanding women and folly to men’s theories about creation's order, 24 but to those who are called, both men and women, they understand that Christ reveals God's first and fairest. 25 For God’s treatment of us with all its seeming unfairness is more loving than women’s version of equality. And God’s power manifested in weakness and injury is stronger than men’s biochemical advantages. 26 For consider your “riches,” brothers and sisters: many of you, according to American standards, respected each other’s civil rights, many of you owned property, were able to vote, and had good jobs, many were born into families with money or privilege or fame or strength. 27 But God chose those without “rights” and “privileges” in this world to shame those who have “rights” and “privileges.” God chose the meek, gentle, and humble in the world to shame those who have that commanding, authoritative, politically fair presence; 28 God chose what is of no value and despised in the world, even things that seem out of control, to bring to nothing that idealistic American version of equality, 29 so that no human being might boast before God’s presence. 30 And because of him, you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption. 31 As it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”
Chapter 2
Proclaiming Christ Crucified
1 And I, when I came to you, brothers and sisters, I did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with speeches like an army commander or with fairness according to the world’s standards. 2 For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. 3 And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, 4 and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, 5 so that your faith might not rest in the power or wisdom of humans but in the power of God.
Wisdom from the Spirit
6 Yet among the spiritually mature we do have things to share, although our teaching isn’t like Ted Talks or like the speeches of presidents, whose wisdom and authority are doomed to pass away. 7 But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. 8 None of the governing leaders of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. 9 But, as it is written, “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him”— 10 these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. 11 For who knows a person's thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. 12 Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. 13 And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. 14 The person so engrossed with creation order and forcing others to be fair does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. 15 The spiritual person is able to decipher God’s good for themself but is evaluated by no one. 16 “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.
Chapter 3
Divisions in the Church
1 But brothers and sisters, I could not address you as spiritual people, but as people still stuck in fleshly things, as infants in Christ. 2 I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready, 3 for you are still of the flesh. For while you are suspicious of each other and there is grasping for control among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way? 4 For when one says, “I only follow male leaders,” and another says, “Everything men get, women must get too!” are you not being merely human? 5 What then are men? What are women? Servants only through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. 6 I planted, women nurtured, men guarded, but God gave the growth. 7 So neither he who plants nor she who nurtures nor he who guards is anything, but only God who gives the growth. 8 He who plants and she who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. 9 For we are God's fellow workers. You are God's workmanship, God's building. 10 According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it by serving you and teaching you and guiding you. Let each caretaker take care how he builds upon it. 11 For the only foundation for differentiation and equality is the foundation that is Jesus Christ. 12 Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw— 13 each instructor’s work will become clear, for the Final Day will strip it bare, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what a teacher has been compelling you to trust in. 14 If the work survives, that servant will receive a reward for instilling in you a trust for our eternal Savior. 15 If anyone's work is burned up, that servant will suffer loss for instructing you to trust in man's theories or American equality, though the instructor himself will be saved, but only as through fire. 16 Do you not know that you all are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in both men and women? 17 If anyone tears asunder God's temple, God will tear him apart. For God's temple is holy, and you all are that temple. 18 Let no one deceive herself. If anyone among you thinks that she is treating others equally in this present time, let her accept less-than-equal treatment so that she may follow God’s fairness. 19 For the ideas of American equality and masculine strength are folly with God. For it is written, “He catches those who tout equality acting unfairly themselves,” 20 and again, “The Lord knows the trust men put in their masculinity, instead of their heavenly warrior.” 21 So let no one boast or put his trust in mere human understanding or strength. For all spiritual things are yours, 22 whether male or female or traditional or charismatic or informational or formational or the past, present, or future —all are yours, 23 and you are Christ's, and Christ is God’s.
Chapter 4
1 This is how one should regard us Apostles, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. 2 Moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found faithful. 3 But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by any human court. In fact, I do not even judge myself. 4 For I am not aware of anything against myself, but neither do I acquit myself. It is the Lord who judges me and acquits me. 5 Therefore do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. Then each one will receive his commendation from God. 6 I have applied all these things to myself and Apollos for your benefit, brothers and sisters, that you may learn by us not to go beyond what is written about leaders, that none of you may be puffed up in favor of male leaders as opposed to female leaders. 7 For who sees anything different in God’s distribution of spiritual gifts to men and women? What do you have that you did not receive from God? If then you received it from God, why do you boast as if gender were your spiritual gift? 8 You think you've already got all you want? You think you're already rich? Without us you’ve made yourselves kings and queens to judge? I wish that you actually did judge good from evil, so that we might share that privilege of ruling with you! 9 For I think that God has exhibited us apostles as last of all in earthly standards, like people gone sour on social media, because we have become a spectacle to the world, to angels, and to men. 10 We are not treated as respected professors for Christ's sake, but you are. We are not impressive pictures of masculine strength, but you are. You publish books and read all the knowledgeable scholars, but we are considered irrelevant. 11 To the present hour, we hunger and thirst because we refuse to climb the corporate ladder. We are out of fashion and talked about and not invited over for meals, 12 and we work for our food, working blue-collar jobs. When insulted, we compliment; when ignored, we don’t insist we have ecclesiastical authority; 13 when our unconventional ways are slandered, we turn the other cheek. We have become, and still are like the scum of the world, the refuse of all things. 14 I do not write these things to make you ashamed but to admonish you as my beloved children. 15 For though you have countless theologians and authors who give information and teach archeology, you do not have many real grandfathers and grandmothers of wisdom who abide in Christ. For I became your grandfather in Christ Jesus through the gospel. 16 I urge you, then, be imitators of my foolishness. 17 That is why I sent you Timothy, my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, to remind you of the way I do ministry in Christ, as I teach everywhere in every church. 18 Some are arrogant, as though I were unable to see through you. 19 But I will come to you soon, if the Lord wills, and I will discover not the talk of these arrogant people but if they have the power to live like Christ. 20 For the kingdom of God does not consist in talk of who has a right to rule but in powerful acts of submissive love. 21 What do you wish? Shall I come to you with a spanking spoon, or with love in a spirit of gentleness?
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Very good!