The Living Bible (364 page)

1 Corinthians
11

And you should follow my example, just as I follow Christ’s.

    
²
 I am so glad, dear brothers, that you have been remembering and doing everything I taught you.
³
 But there is one matter I want to remind you about: that a wife is responsible to her husband, her husband is responsible to Christ, and Christ is responsible to God.
⁴
 That is why, if a man refuses to remove his hat while praying or preaching, he dishonors Christ.
⁵
 And that is why a woman who publicly prays or prophesies without a covering on her head dishonors her husband, for her covering is a sign of her subjection to him.
*
⁶
 Yes, if she refuses to wear a head covering, then she should cut off all her hair. And if it is shameful for a woman to have her head shaved, then she should wear a covering.
⁷
 But a man should not wear anything on his head when worshiping, for his hat is a sign of subjection to men.
*

    
God’s glory is man made in his image, and man’s glory is the woman.
⁸
 The first man didn’t come from woman, but the first woman came out of man.
*
⁹
 And Adam, the first man, was not made for Eve’s benefit, but Eve was made for Adam.
¹⁰
 So a woman should wear a covering on her head as a sign that she is under man’s authority,
*
a fact for all the angels to notice and rejoice in.
*

    
¹¹
 But remember that in God’s plan men and women need each other.
¹²
 For although the first woman came out of man, all men have been born from women ever since, and both men and women come from God their Creator.

    
¹³
 What do you yourselves really think about this? Is it right for a woman to pray in public without covering her head?
^14-15
 Doesn’t even instinct itself teach us that women’s heads should be covered? For women are proud of their long hair, while a man with long hair tends to be ashamed.
¹⁶
 But if anyone wants to argue about this, all I can say is that we never teach anything else than this—that a woman should wear a covering when prophesying or praying publicly in the church, and all the churches feel the same way about it.

    
¹⁷
 Next on my list of items to write you about is something else I cannot agree with. For it sounds as if more harm than good is done when you meet together for your communion services.
¹⁸
 Everyone keeps telling me about the arguing that goes on in these meetings, and the divisions developing among you, and I can just about believe it.
¹⁹
 But I suppose you feel this is necessary so that you who are always right will become known and recognized!

    
²⁰
 When you come together to eat, it isn’t the Lord’s Supper you are eating,
²¹
 but your own. For I am told that everyone hastily gobbles all the food he can without waiting to share with the others, so that one doesn’t get enough and goes hungry while another has too much to drink and gets drunk.
²²
 What? Is this really true? Can’t you do your eating and drinking at home to avoid disgracing the church and shaming those who are poor and can bring no food? What am I supposed to say about these things? Do you want me to praise you? Well, I certainly do not!

    
²³
 For this is what the Lord himself has said about his Table, and I have passed it on to you before: That on the night when Judas betrayed him, the Lord Jesus took bread,
²⁴
 and when he had given thanks to God for it, he broke it and gave it to his disciples and said,
“Take this and eat it. This is my body, which is given
*
for you. Do this to remember me.”
²⁵
 In the same way, he took the cup of wine after supper, saying, “This cup is the new agreement between God and you that has been established and set in motion by my blood. Do this in remembrance of me whenever you drink it.”
²⁶
 For every time you eat this bread and drink this cup you are retelling the message of the Lord’s death, that he has died for you. Do this until he comes again.

    
²⁷
 So if anyone eats this bread and drinks from this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner, he is guilty of sin against the body and the blood of the Lord.
²⁸
 That is why a man should examine himself carefully before eating the bread and drinking from the cup.
²⁹
 For if he eats the bread and drinks from the cup unworthily, not thinking about the body of Christ and what it means, he is eating and drinking God’s judgment upon himself; for he is trifling with the death of Christ.
³⁰
 That is why many of you are weak and sick, and some have even died.

    
³¹
 But if you carefully examine yourselves before eating you will not need to be judged and punished.
³²
 Yet, when we are judged and punished by the Lord, it is so that we will not be condemned with the rest of the world.
³³
 So, dear brothers, when you gather for the Lord’s Supper—the communion service—wait for each other;
³⁴
 if anyone is really hungry he should eat at home so that he won’t bring punishment upon himself when you meet together.

    
I’ll talk to you about the other matters after I arrive.

1 Corinthians
12

And now, brothers, I want to write about the special abilities the Holy Spirit gives to each of you, for I don’t want any misunderstanding about them.
²
 You will remember that before you became Christians you went around from one idol to another, not one of which could speak a single word.
³
 But now you are meeting people who claim to speak messages from the Spirit of God. How can you know whether they are really inspired by God or whether they are fakes? Here is the test: no one speaking by the power of the Spirit of God can curse Jesus, and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” and really mean it, unless the Holy Spirit is helping him.

    
⁴
 Now God gives us many kinds of special abilities, but it is the same Holy Spirit who is the source of them all.
⁵
 There are different kinds of service to God, but it is the same Lord we are serving.
⁶
 There are many ways in which God works in our lives, but it is the same God who does the work in and through all of us who are his.
⁷
 The Holy Spirit displays God’s power through each of us as a means of helping the entire church.

    
⁸
 To one person the Spirit gives the ability to give wise advice; someone else may be especially good at studying and teaching, and this is his gift from the same Spirit.
⁹
 He gives special faith to another, and to someone else the power to heal the sick.
¹⁰
 He gives power for doing miracles to some, and to others power to prophesy and preach. He gives someone else the power to know whether evil spirits are speaking through those who claim to be giving God’s messages—or whether it is really the Spirit of God who is speaking. Still another person is able to speak in languages he never learned; and others, who do not know the language either, are given power to understand what he is saying.
¹¹
 It is the same and only Holy Spirit who gives all these gifts and powers, deciding which each one of us should have.

    
¹²
 Our bodies have many parts, but the many parts make up only one body when they are all put together. So it is with the “body” of Christ.
¹³
 Each of us is a part of the one body of Christ. Some of us are Jews, some are Gentiles, some are slaves, and some are free. But the Holy Spirit has fitted us all together into one body. We have been baptized into Christ’s body by the one Spirit, and have all been given that same Holy Spirit.

    
¹⁴
 Yes, the body has many parts, not just one part.
¹⁵
 If the foot says, “I am not a part of the body because I am not a hand,” that does not make it any less a part of the body.
¹⁶
 And what would you think if you heard an ear say, “I am not part of the body because I am only an ear and not an eye”? Would that make it any less a part of the body?
¹⁷
 Suppose the whole body were an eye—then how would you hear? Or if your whole body were just one big ear, how could you smell anything?

    
¹⁸
 But that isn’t the way God has made us. He has made many parts for our bodies and has put each part just where he wants it.
¹⁹
 What a strange thing a body would be if it had only one part!
²⁰
 So he has made many parts, but still there is only one body.

    
²¹
 The eye can never say to the hand, “I don’t need you.” The head can’t say to the feet, “I don’t need you.”

    
²²
 And some of the parts that seem weakest and least important are really the most necessary.
²³
 Yes, we are especially glad to have some parts that seem rather odd! And we carefully protect from the eyes of others those parts that should not be seen,
²⁴
 while of course the parts that may be seen do not require this special care. So God has put the body together in such a way that extra honor and care are given to those parts that might otherwise seem less important.
²⁵
 This makes for happiness among the parts, so that the parts have the same care for each other that they do for themselves.
²⁶
 If one part suffers, all parts suffer with it, and if one part is honored, all the parts are glad.

    
²⁷
 Now here is what I am trying to say: All of you together are the one body of Christ, and each one of you is a separate and necessary part of it.
²⁸
 Here is a list of some of the parts he has placed in his Church, which is his body:

    
Apostles,

    
Prophets—those who preach God’s Word,

    
Teachers,

    
Those who do miracles,

    
Those who have the gift of healing;

    
Those who can help others,

    
Those who can get others to work together,

    
Those who speak in languages they have never learned.

    
²⁹
 Is everyone an apostle? Of course not. Is everyone a preacher? No. Are all teachers? Does everyone have the power to do miracles?
³⁰
 Can everyone heal the sick? Of course not. Does God give all of us the ability to speak in languages we’ve never learned? Can just anyone understand and translate what those are saying who have that gift of foreign speech?
³¹
 No, but try your best to have the more important of these gifts.

    
First, however, let me tell you about something else that is better than any of them!