This is the transcript of Restitutio episode 596: 1 Corinthians in Context 13 - Communion with Sean Finnegan

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596 1 Corinthians 13.mp3

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00:00
Hey there, I'm Sean Finnegan. And you are listening to restitutio, a podcast that seeks to recover authentic Christianity and live it out. Today. So much was going on at the communion meal in Corinth. Some people were overdoing it, even getting drunk while others went hungry in order to better understand.

00:02
I'm.

00:21
Paul's instructions in first Corinthians 11 will take some time to consider how the Romans did meals.

00:27
Then we'll draw on archaeological discoveries from Corinth to reconstruct what the meeting space would have been like for Christian gatherings. Lastly, we'll see how strongly Paul rebuked their lack of unity and concern for those in need, and see how he challenged them to think of the meal as a spiritual event with different rules than typical banquets.

00:47
Here now is Episode 596, part 13 of our first Corinthians in context class communion.

01:01
To begin with, I'd like to read from first previous Chapter 11, verse 17. It says now in the following instructions, I do not commend you because when you come together, it is not for the better, but for the worse. For to begin with, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions.

01:22
Among you and to some extent, I believe it.

01:26
Indeed, there have to be factions among you for only so will it become clear who among you are genuine when you come together. It is not really to eat the Lord's supper.

01:36
For when the time comes to eat, each of you proceeds to eat your own supper and one goes hungry and another becomes drunk. What do you not have households to eat and drink in?

01:49
Or do you show contempt for the Church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? What should I say to you? Should I commend you in this matter? I do not commend you.

02:04
So as we can see from reading this section.

02:08
Our topic is dinner.

02:11
Our topic is food and houses, and there's a lot of dysfunction going on in the church accords. I don't know how many communion services you've been to, but I've never been to 1 where the people got drunk.

02:26
At least not that I know of, and so this is this is kind of wild and exciting. Well, not really exciting. Sad but.

02:35
I think understanding the background information will help us get a sense of like what's going on. We're not just dealing.

02:41
With crazy people.

02:43
We're dealing with specific situations that have explanations for how they were thinking so.

02:50
As it turns out, in the 1st century in the 60s, we have a guy named Seneca the Younger and he wrote about how popular fine dining was becoming in the Roman.

03:04
His name is Seneca the Younger. As I mentioned in his letter on ethics, he writes all is quiet within the schools of rhetoric and philosophy. But how crammed the kitchens are and how many young people crowd around the stoves of the wastrels I exclude the throngs of bakers and waiters.

03:24
They rush to bring in the dinner when the signal has been given. Ye gods, the number of people that just one belly keeps busy. In the case of those mushrooms, the gourmet poison, do you think that they are having no hidden effect on you, even if they have not yet done anything obvious?

03:43
See, you shouldn't eat mushrooms. That's what I'm learning here. Tonight he goes on. Do you really suppose that the ice you are eating during summer does not cause hardening of your liver?

03:54
Do you really believe that those oysters, sluggish creatures fattened on mud are not infecting you with any of their slimy heaviness?

04:04
As regards imported garam, the costly wrought of bad fish, do you really believe its salty decay will not give you heart?

04:11
Burn. Do you think that those festering foods that are taken almost straight from the fire into the mouth are harmlessly extinguished in your intestines? How foul and unhealthy the ensuing belches are? How disgusted people are with themselves when they breathe out last night's drunken binge?

04:30
You can be sure that their intake is rotting rather than being digested.

04:36
And that's why no one invites A stoic to a dinner party. You don't need that guy around who's criticizing everything. That's not really my point. My point is, the culinary arts were at a high point in the middle of the 1st century. At the time Paul's writing first Corinthians, and they had a lot of sophistication. They had a lot of developed palettes.

04:59
And people were into their food.

05:02
Sometimes dinner parties could be massive, especially in Corinth, Plutarch says in his book table talk during the Isthmian Games, the second time so Spice was exhibitor or president. I avoided the other banquets at which he entertained a great many foreign visitors at once and several times entertained all the citizens.

05:23
And Plutarch is writing about incidents that occurred between the year 70 and 90 AD. So he's he's right within our time period as well. And he's saying that this President of the game. So I gotta feed taste was actually paying for lots of banquets all over town. In several instances, he actually provided food for all the citizens.

05:44
So that is a massive display of wealth to be able to feed so many people.

05:52
Banquets were opportunities also for hosts to influence those who were there, especially politically, pseudo Quintus Cicero writes in his handbook of Electioneering, never to leave town, is very rewarding, yet the gains from your personal attendance consist not merely in being at Rome and in the forum.

06:13
But in canvassing, continuously soliciting the same people many times.

06:19
It sounds like that extended warranty phone call we kept getting for years, right? It's like canvassing.

06:24
Us over and over.

06:26
Like, did you know? Yeah. Hang up. Block calls back again. It's just, like, incredible. Anyhow, back to the reading. He says, soliciting the same people many times. And so far as possible.

06:39
Not letting anybody be in a position to say that he has not been canvassed by you and thoroughly and diligently canvas too. Next generosity has a wide field. It is shown in the use of 1's private means for although this cannot reach the masses, the masses like hearing it praised by your friends.

06:58
It is shown in banquets to which you and your friends should often convoke the people at large or tribe by tribe. Also in rendering services which you will widely advertise. This is election advice for people that are looking to run for political office. How do you get elected? Well, you got a canvas.

07:19
People part of that canvassing part of your influencing people to vote for you is to provide them with banquets, have them over.

07:29
For dinner, spend big and they will feel indebted to you. This is the idea of reciprocity. Somebody gives you something and now you say, oh, well, I kind of want to give you something back. Right. So you give dinner, they give.

07:44
Votes.

07:45
That's the idea. It's simple.

07:48
If you were invited to a banquet.

07:51
First of all, you definitely are going to go because it's free food. Like, come on, you would definitely also realize that you would be in some way indebted to whoever the host of that banquet was. Now here's the thing that might blow your mind, and that is that in giving dinners in the ancient world, it was customary.

08:12
To give different food to different people based on your status, OK.

08:17
So plenty of the younger writes about this in book. Two of his letters, he says I happen to be dining with a man, though no particular friend of his, whose elegant economy as he called it, seemed to me a sort of stingy extravagance.

08:32
That's an interesting turn of phrase. Stingy extravagance. Stingy means you're cheap. Extravagance means you spend big. I wonder what he means.

08:41
The best dishes were set in front of himself in a select few and cheap scraps of food before the rest of the company.

08:49
He had even put the wine into tiny little flasks, divided into 3 categories, not with the idea of giving his guests an opportunity of choosing, but to make it impossible for them to refuse what they were given.

09:03
One lot was intended for himself and for us, and another for his lesser friends. All his friends are graded, and the third for us and our freedmen.

09:11
My neighbor at table noticed this and asked me if I approved. I said I did not.

09:17
So what do you do? He asked.

09:20
I serve the same to everyone for when I invite guests. It is for a meal not to make class distinctions.

09:28
I have brought them as equals to the same table, so I give them the same treatment and everything. Even the freedmen, freedmen are ex slaves.

09:36
Of course, for then, they are my fellow diners, not Friedman.

09:41
That must cost you a lot.

09:44
On the contrary.

09:45
How was that?

09:47
Because my free men do not drink the sort of wine I do, but I drink theirs.

09:51
Believe me, if you restrain your greedy instincts, it is no strain on your finances to share with several others. The fair you have yourself.

10:00
So it's a humorous little conversation between plenty. Who's a governor and some other dinner guest.

10:09
He's just talking about how he didn't like the fact that this guy was feeding different food to different people, but we have actually several other pieces of evidence of this practice. Marshall writes about it. He says why don't I get the same dinner as?

10:24
You.

10:25
You take oysters fattened in the Luke Creme pool. I cut my mouth sucking a muscle.

10:31
You have mushrooms? I take pig fungi.

10:34
You said to with turbot. I. With bream. A golden turtle. Dove fills you up with its outsized rump. I am served with a magpie that died in its.

10:45
Cage.

10:46
Why do I dine with you? Why do I dine without you? Ponticus? When I'm dining with you, that's the green line, right? Why do I dine without you when I'm dining with you? Let the disappearance of the dole count for something. Let's eat the same meal.

11:01
So you know this is something that people like to complain about not getting the same food as the higher status people, Marshall says. In another place we drink from glass and in, in other words, clear glass. You from marinate glass. It's a special kind of glass that has, like, a texture. It's colored. Right. So we drink from clear.

11:21
Ask you from Merini ponticus for why a transparent cup would reveal 2 wines, so he he has a colored glass for himself, so you can't see that his wine is different than you.

11:34
The.

11:34
Line.

11:35
You see what he's saying there? That took too much explanation. I'm sorry. Onto juvenile who won't let us down. I assure you, he never does, he says. Observe the size of that lobster. It marks out a platter reserved for my Lord. Please note the asparagus garnish heaped high around it. The peacocking tail.

11:54
That looks down on the guests as it's brought in, borne aloft by some tall.

12:00
Here, but you get half an egg that's stuffed with a single prawn and served in a little saucer, like some funeral, offering himself drizzles his fish with the finest oil. But your colorless boiled cabbage. Poor you will have an aroma of the lamp. The stuff you're offered as a dressing came to town and some sharp, proud felucca.

12:22
Rub it on you and poisonous snakes will give you a wide berth.

12:27
So as with everything in Roman chorus, it came down once again to status.

12:34
What is your status? That's the kind of food you will be served at somebody's banquet.

12:41
So hosts were able to increase their status by showing off their generosity and guests were able to reaffirm their relative position over against the other guests based on where they were seated and what food they were served.

12:58
Let's switch gears for a moment and talk about houses. This is important for First Corinthians 11 because the church is meeting in a home.

13:07
Archaeologists in Corinth have found several Roman Villas, Roman style villas. There's a villa east of the theater. Then there's the villa near the Ciceronian gate. And then there's the analoga villa. I know those names don't mean anything to you, but.

13:24
Here, here's just a little bit about them. So the this villa next to the theater is in the entertainment district. Archaeologists have dug this up. They found the walls to the house and they said OK, here's a Roman villa.

13:37
It had a bigger courtyard, probably for people to come over and perform and have some guests over. For that, the villa near the Cyclonian Gate had a triclinium, which is something that archaeologists are fairly good at identifying is what we call a dining room. A triclinium is called the triclinium.

13:57
Because it has three couches.

14:00
So you have couches on 2 walls and then a third wall, and then the 4th wall is where you enter and exit the room, so you won't have a couch there. So imagine a U shape and then you have the table in the middle, and ancient people reclined when they ate. They did not eat like we do sitting upright in chairs. They were on their sides.

14:22
That's, I don't know why they ate that way, but that's just what they wanted to do. So if you're on your side, you don't.

14:28
Have a chair. You have a couch.

14:30
And you have a whole section of the couch to yourself so that you know you have the space you need to be relaxed as you eat. So the one house in particular of note is the Analoga villa, because this goes back to the 1st century, it's about 1/2 mile southwest of Corinth.

14:50
Downtown.

14:52
And it's a little bit more of a countryside estate, but it is very close to the city still in the dining room or the triclinium, the measurements of that room are 24 feet by 18 feet. This is a big room. It's a big dining room.

15:07
Then right next to it to the right is the atrium.

15:12
The atrium was 20 feet by 16 feet.

15:17
In the center of the atrium is what they call the impluvium. The Impluvium is depression in the ground that collects rainwater from the hole in the roof directly above it. Now, why do they put a hole in the roof?

15:33
So.

15:35
To let the rain in so you can collect the rain to drink the rain. OK, so that's one thing. Or at least use it to wash things. Right. And then the other purpose for having a hole in the roof on purpose in the middle of this, you know, roofed area. But so you're like kind of outside, but also inside at the same time, it's for sunlight.

15:53
So it's, you know, we call that a skylight. So the atrium space had that impluvium in its center, which reduced the number of people that you could fit in there by 1 ninth, because that was like the relative size of that space.

16:08
In this space of the dining room, you could fit between 9 and 15 people.

16:15
In the space of the atrium, which actually is a smaller space, but it doesn't have all those big couches you could fit maybe 30 people.

16:25
30 to 40 something like that. So at your absolute Max.

16:29
Minimum. You're looking at a gathering between these two two rooms in the Analoga villa, which is like, not necessarily a Christian space. It's just a house from the 1st century, so it's like worth comparing to 40 to 50 people maximum. And this is a nice house. This is a sumptuous.

16:50
Is what they call it right?

16:52
You know, nobody lived like this. Just just a few.

16:55
People at the.

16:56
Top would live in a space like this.

16:59
Now the floor plan explains why the church was having problems, and that's because.

17:05
High status guests would sit in the triclinium while everyone else sat in the atrium.

17:11
If you said to me, alright, so who was in the triclinium? Who was in?

17:14
The dining room.

17:16
Best guess?

17:17
Gaius, whose house it was because Paul says the whole church met at his house. So we're just gonna go ahead and say, guy says the homeowner, Christmas is so Sinise. We're the officials of the synagogue, which is probably because they had donated money to the synagogue. I had mentioned that to before. So Christmas associates, they're going to be there.

17:38
Probably Titius, Justice Stephanus and Erastus. If I had to pick 6, I would pick those six and then I would put Priscilla and Aquila because although they're low status because they're making tents, they're actually in the church high status because they're leaders in the church, so they're probably in that dining room as well.

17:59
And then if we add in everyone's spouses, hey, guess what? We got a.

18:03
Full dining room.

18:05
So I don't know for sure that that's exactly who was sitting or sitting where. OK, but my point is, the more you can get your head to imagine the space, imagine the setting. Think of the names, think of the realities of the situation, the better you're going to be able to read the Bible and understand it now higher quality.

18:25
Food and wine will be served in the dining room from the kitchen and then lower quality would be served in the atrium area.

18:33
How many were in the early Corinthian church?

18:37
Well.

18:38
We have a pretty good estimate.

18:41
In the book of Acts, we read all in Chapter 18 about Priscilla, the missionary Aquila, her husband, the tent maker, Titius Justice, who had the house next to the synagogues. While I thought he would be in the dining room.

18:53
Because he owns a house.

18:56
Christmas, the synagogue benefactor. So Sinise, the synagogue benefactor and then from First Corinthians we read about Gaius, the host of Paul. And.

19:05
The whole church.

19:06
We read about Stephanus, A householder and a delegate delegate as somebody that was sent to Paul with the letter from the Corinthian.

19:13
Fortunatus was a delegate. A caucus was a delegate, and then from the Book of Romans, Chapter 16, we learned about Lucius Jason Sopater Tertius describe Erastus, the city treasurer and quartets. You know all those names that you skip over when you're reading.

19:28
The Bible, and you're like.

19:29
Oh, who cares about those names? That's the these are the people. These are the people in the church.

19:34
So if we add it up, that's 5 + 4 + 6.

19:37
Which is 15.

19:39
15 people right there, assuming that the 13 singles mentioned. So I have 15 people but weren't 1 is a married couple. Priscilla and Aquila OK, so the other 13 are probably married. So now we got 28 people. If we add another three more for Gaius, Christmas and Stefanus to account for relatives.

19:59
Aggrieved men and slaves.

20:01
We get 37 add in some children, other unnamed people. We get a low end estimate of the church at Corinth of about 50 people and a high end maximum of about 100, somewhere between 50 and 100 people is what we're talking about, which means.

20:21
They could not meet at the same house.

20:25
Because even the Analoga villa could only accommodate 40.

20:30
Maybe 45 if you put the kids.

20:32
On your lap.

20:33
47 If you put some a couple of unlucky fellows in the rainwater middle of the room, right, so and and they're not gonna do that because these people care about etiquette. They care about comfort. So you have multiple meetings throughout the city of Corinth, probably.

20:54
234 house churches to accommodate 50 to 100 people. Now what if Phoebe comes and she brings her people from Ken Crea, which is just a couple miles away and she and she comes out with a delegation of I don't know, 5 people and she comes to church now you got +5.

21:12
Right. So you could just imagine the scenario here.

21:14
A little bit.

21:17
The church was becoming too big to meet in one person's house, which necessitated multiple house churches. First Corinthians 11/17 says now in the following instructions, I do not commend you because when you come together, it is not for the better, but for the worse. For to begin with, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions.

21:38
Among you and to some extent, I believe it. Indeed there have to be factions among you for only so will it become clear who among you are genuine factions typically develop when meeting separately.

21:52
So if you have these different meetings in different places, you could easily see how factions and divisiveness could arise. Now in first Corinthians 112 he mentions 4 factions.

22:03
Paul Apollus, Cephus and Christ.

22:07
I think that's probably rhetorical.

22:09
You know what I mean? Like, I think he's just kind of making his point about being divisive. I don't think these are legit. The names of the different factions.

22:17
I think there was a poll in apolis thing going on. I think that was real because he does spend a lot of time dealing with that, but there could have been four meeting locations in the city. Gaius could have been 1 Christmas and other. We know Tertius justice had his own place or maybe Erastus. I mean, we have options for who these different people.

22:39
Could have been.

22:41
Here's the thing, when you get high status people together in the same room, guess where they're all gonna go? The dining room? Because they know they're high status. So they're gonna go to the triclinium, and when they get there, they're going to be seated according to rank. And now you have two different.

23:01
Potter familias two different fathers of the household, and they're maybe like pretty roughly equal in rank. It's the host job to say, OK, you sit here and you sit there.

23:13
This causes problems. OK, this causes problems and there are these factions and divisiveness. Now if you're a high status person, if you're have some sort of means, you have more control over your time, which means you could show up early. You can show up early to the church service, and if you show up early, you probably get a better seat.

23:34
Now the poor folk, they got to work.

23:37
They gotta work long hours. We talked about this before, especially if you're a slave. Forget about it, right? I mean, slaves. Not getting out until everybody's done.

23:46
So now you're showing up. You're hungry.

23:49
You've been working all day. The house is already full, right? You can imagine the scene. Meanwhile, these other guys, they've been there since 3:00 in the afternoon. They were plied with wine and food for hours. They're burping. Some of them are drunk.

24:10
And now you've got these other people that are hungry, you could.

24:12
See the scene right.

24:14
Verse 20 when you come together, it's not really to eat the Lord's supper. That's just slap to the face just to be.

24:21
If somebody says to you about your communion service, you're not really eating the Lord's supper. This is salting.

24:29
Paul Paul is.

24:31
Saying something very strong here 1st 21 for when the time comes to eat each of you proceeds to eat your own supper and one goes hungry and another becomes drunk. What?

24:41
Do you not have households to eat and drink in?

24:44
I love that. What?

24:46
What are you crazy?

24:48
How?

24:48
Would say it. Or do you show contempt for the Church of God and humiliate those who have nothing?

24:54
What should I say to you? Should I commend you in this matter? I do not commend you.

25:00
What would humiliate those who have nothing?

25:03
Well, based on the floor plan of the Anaplasia Villa, a lot of these houses would have the kitchen set in such a way that you would carry the food.

25:14
I don't know if they carry the food like that. Like our waiters carry the food like that. So maybe they did. I don't know. You carry the food through the atrium to get to the triclinium. And once you're in the triclinium, then you give it to which means everybody in the atrium sees the food that is being brought.

25:29
In.

25:30
And they've got whatever the ancient equivalent of peanut butter and Jelly is.

25:35
Right. I don't think it was peanut butter and Jelly, but whatever that, whatever that was for them, they've got it there and and and then they see the lobster tail go by and they're like, right.

25:48
So that's one scenario that could be happening.

25:51
In a different scenario, it could be that the rich actually brought their own food. It was more like a potluck style, and Jerome Murphy O'Connor writes about that. He says the better off with their well furnished picnic baskets would not have wished to sit beside envious inferiors.

26:09
Whose body language, at least, would have been expressive.

26:13
And those with more leisure could have arranged to arrive early enough to secure the positions they preferred. It would be natural for them to congregate in one room.

26:24
1st Corinthians 1016 says the cup of blessing that we bless.

26:29
Is it not a sharing in the blood of Christ?

26:33
The bread that we break, is it not a sharing in the body of Christ?

26:38
Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread. Check out all these ones here. There is one bread.

26:50
We who are many are one body for we all partake of one bread. He's making a point about unity. This is from the previous chapter, Chapter 10. We've already read it before, but it's still valid. It's still an important point.

27:05
The function of communion, the Eucharist, is another way to say communion. The function of communion or the Lord's supper is to unify, and in Corinth is dividing.

27:17
This meal was to share in the blood of Christ. You see that share in the blood of Christ.

27:24
And share in the body of Christ. That's what the communion meal is for.

27:29
To share, not to divide, not to compete, not to look down on others. Be like ohh he's got peanut butter and Jelly. Haven't had that since I was a child.

27:42
That's not what you're supposed to be doing.

27:46
Back to first Corinthians 11, verse 20. When you come together, it is not really to eat the Lord's supper. Ohh man, it's just like a slap for when the time comes to eat. Each of you proceeds to eat your own supper and one goes hungry and another becomes drunk. Garrett Tyson writes about this. He says the idea of Eddie owned deep known.

28:07
One's own supper can first of all be defined in contrast with its opposite Kiriakou in deep.

28:13
The Lord's Supper, Edios and Kiriakos refer to questions of ownership, the words of institution have the added function of converting a private contribution into Community property for the words. This is my body for you, spoken over the contribution of bread has a practical meaning.

28:34
This bread is here for all of you. I want to point out a couple of things here.

28:38
On the slide.

28:40
He has this idea of ownership. OK, Kiriakou means the Lords.

28:46
That's ownership. OK. And then over here, you have this idea of converting a private contribution into Community property.

28:58
So somebody bought that bread.

29:01
Somebody bought the bread. Somebody bought the wine.

29:05
So it's that person's.

29:08
What Garrett Tyson is saying here is, OK, not once the words are spoken over it.

29:15
Once the words are spoken over it, it's not. Gaius is wine and Gaius is bread, even if it's his house and his servants went out to the forum and bought it. It is actually.

29:25
The Lord's.

29:28
It's a really important point. Who is the host of the meal?

29:34
Who's the high status person Paul saying?

29:38
It's Jesus.

29:41
Which changes everything.

29:44
But because of their behavior, they're not even eating the Lord's supper. It's gaius's supper. Or it's erastus's supper, or whoever. Whoever's house that, that's who's supper they're eating. They're not eating. The Lord's Supper, Councilman once said. The Corinthians destroy its character by their conduct.

30:05
James Walters says how would Paul's instructions have impacted the influence that hosts could exert through meals?

30:14
First, by sharply distinguishing the community meal from other meals, Paul is able to challenge the appropriateness of meal conventions that reinforce the host status and power in other settings. Second, by underscoring that Jesus himself is the host.

30:33
Of the community meal, Paul rhetorically supplants the Corinthian hosts who might use meals to supplant him.

30:43
So poll short circuiting the competition for status, he's pushing them to think of themselves as brothers and sisters.

30:52
By changing the thinking during the meal, he changes the rules of etiquette. It's now a different thing. It's not a typical banquet with all the reciprocity and expectations that you have for that. Now we're dealing with a new kind of thing, the Lords dinner, the Lord's meal, the Lord's Supper.

31:13
Once again, first Corinthians 11, we're going to start in verse 23, for I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took a loaf of bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said this is my body. That is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.

31:33
In the same way, he took the cup also after supper, saying this cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it and remember it's of me for as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.

31:50
Now what Paul starts with is to remind them that the Lord on the night when he was betrayed.

32:01
Paul is connecting the Lord's supper that the Corinthians are eating decades and decades later, after Jesus has already been crucified and resurrected. OK, maybe.

32:11
20 plus years later, maybe 30 years later, they're eating this meal and he's like, no, no, no. This meal is connected theologically, spiritually, to the Last Supper that Jesus had with his disciples. OK, that's an important move to you. That might be obvious, but it was fresh at the time. To think of it like that.

32:31
James Walters commenting on this says by connecting the meal with Jesus's Last Supper, Paul uses temporality to construct Ecclesia church space on top of Nokia house space.

32:47
Just to clarify that we're at somebody's house, we think the rules are the House rules that everybody understands in their culture and Paul is saying no, no, no. I know we're in a house, but we're actually in ecclesia space. We're in, we're in church space right now because we're doing a church service in the house. So we have our own rules that are different than the House rules.

33:09
We have our own way of thinking that is different than the House way of thinking.

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Walters goes on. Paul makes Jesus the host of the community meal. The very reason he calls it the Lord's Supper. Thus it is not only the codes that change when ecclesia space is constructed on top of orquia space, the host changes as well. Paul's exclamation.

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You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons. In chapter 10, verse 21 indicates whose table Christ followers gather around when they eat a meal and ecclesia space, regardless of which Orquia might be hosting the Gathering.

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Moreover, the phrase is drink the cup of the Lord and partake of the table of the Lord suggests that for Paul, whatever food and drink might have been provided by those with relatively greater resources for the poorer members of the community should not highlight their generosity but Christ.

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We need to recognize.

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This.

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What is happening here? This is revolutionary. He's changing all the rules of how you think about yourself throughout the letter of First Corinthians from those who are studying wisdom to those who are praying and prophesying to those who are participating in the dinner.

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Like he's going systematically through all the different, I don't know, aspects of life to show them the way of Christ and the way of Christ and the way of Roman Corinth are like this a lot of times they're in conflict.

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And one must give and Paul saying hey, take.

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The way of Christ.

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Moving on to verse 27, whoever therefore eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner.

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Probably people getting drunk right will be answerable for the body and blood of the Lord. Whoa. Did you see that? If you're drinking in an unworthy manner, you will be answerable for the body and blood of the Lord.

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Examine yourselves and only then eat of the bread and drink of the cup for all who eat and drink without discerning the body. Eat and drink judgment against themselves.

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For this reason, many of you are weak and ill and.

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Some have died.

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But if we judged ourselves, we would not be judged.

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But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world.

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What this says is you need to take the Lord's supper seriously. Like it's not a joke. It's not just like an empty ritual. It's something to be taken seriously, not in a cavalier or flippant manner without proper self examination in taking the Lord's supper, we should examine ourselves and see.

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If we are in the right place to take it and to see what it is we are taking.

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Stephen Nemesh writes the bread and the cup are a sharing in the body and blood of Jesus because they are the symbols of these.

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By accepting these items in the course of the Eucharistic meal, a Christian appropriates the person and work of Jesus to him or herself. The Christians who participate in this act together accomplish their unity through their declaration of loyalty and commitment to Jesus as a group.

36:46
Poop this meal also accomplishes a union between Jesus and the believer, but there is no reason to think that this union is anything more robust than that of mutual love. It is also noteworthy that the inappropriate or unworthy participation in the Eucharist can lead to harmful or even disastrous consequences.

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But this is not because the bread and wine of the meal really are the body and blood of Jesus. They are not magical items that harm those who misuse them, but rather they are the symbols by which the person and work of Jesus are represented.

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It is the prerogative of God to punish those who profane that work by their abuse of its symbols.

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So in other words, what Members is saying, and I agree with them, is that it's not that the bread actually is the physical flesh of Christ.

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But that it represents that.

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But that's no way to like duck. How serious the whole thing is, because if you don't treat the symbol with respect and dignity.

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Then you're still insulting the Lord.

37:55
Yeah.

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You could trash America, or you could take an American flag and trash it. The meaning is the same.

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So a symbol is actually still significant verse 33. Just closing down here. So then my brothers and sisters, when you come together to eat, wait for one another.

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There's an idea if you're hungry, eat at home so that when you come together, it will not be for your condemnation about the other things. I will give instructions when I come. Once again, Paul's instruction is to be considerate.

38:31
Wow, just mind blowing. What a what a what? A nice idea.

38:36
Well, look, in a world where that wasn't a dominant way of thinking and living, this was new. How did the world ever get this as an idea?

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You're reading it. This is it. This is the moment where it gets rolled out and people start saying, oh, well, maybe I should be considerate of somebody. I'm. I'm not saying nobody was ever considerate at all, but it was a very transactional and status heavy society. It wasn't an equality society like what we live in.

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Treat the lowly as family. That's what he's telling them.

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To do.

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You see this? He calls them brothers and sisters.

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Brothers and sisters treat that slave as your brother. Treat that freed person as your sister. What?

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Yeah.

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This is radical new stuff. Really cool.

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And if you don't, you're offending the host of the meal, which is Jesus Christ.

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And he says that's why many of you are sick and some of you have died.

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I mean, he's not pulling any punches here. This is strong stuff.

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Show familial care for everyone. Recognizing that all are united by participating and partaking of the Lord's Supper. All right, that's enough for the Lord's supper in our next session, we'll dip our toes into divine speech and inspiration.

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And that will put us in a good place to to really begin looking at chapters 1213 and 14, which is in some says some of the most exciting part of First Corinthians. My opinion at least. And we'll do that as we continue through our class, 1st Corinthians and context.

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Well, that brings this presentation to a close. What did you think? Come on over to restitutio.org and find episode 596 Communion in First Corinthians and leave your feedback. Well, we got a new review on Apple Podcasts.

40:39
Written by Doctor McFarland, entitled, This podcast is home. He writes after searching the Internet for different viewpoints on certain topics in the Bible. I landed on an interview with Sean Finnegan. From there I checked out the website and podcast and could honestly say it's amazing.

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God has used Shawn and his team to bring clarity to the word of God in a world where solid teaching is not usually sought for or found. Thanks again for all you do. I am really enjoying the Corinthians series. One God overall is also a must listen slash watch.

41:15
Well, thanks so much for writing that very kind and very generous review. I do have a website. I don't know if many people know that because a lot of people are listening on their podcast app or on YouTube these days. But I do have a website restitutio.org I mentioned at the end of every episode. But on the website, if you ever go there, I've got a whole bunch of articles.

41:37
Which you don't really talk about much, but if you are somebody looking for written resources, I have a whole bunch on there. I also have a number of shorter articles that might be helpful for different situations. Might be encouraging for you.

41:53
And there is the full archive and you can search the full archive very easily if you just click on the podcast tab or there's a red button that says podcast info, both go to the same place and it provides you a full list of all. Let's see. Right now this is 596 all 596 episodes.

42:14
Which you could just search in your browser. If you're on a PC, you just hit control F or I think most mobile browsers will allow you to search as well, so you can find stuff pretty easily, or just scroll through it and you'll see the different classes and series and so forth.

42:28
Also on the homepage of restitutio.org I have the Restorationist manifesto, which you should definitely take a look at if you haven't already written in 2017. This document lays out my approach, not just my but Restorationist approach in general to doctrine and understanding of what the Bible is and what.

42:48
Christianity is so take a look at that. There's a written version of it as well as a YouTube version of it, both embedded on the home page. So yeah, if you haven't messed around with it, check out the website restitutio.org. Also have recommended other podcasts on there if you are thinking to yourself man.

43:06
I only get one episode a week from Restitutio. I wish I had more. Well, there are all kinds of other podcasts I recommend I contribute regularly to another podcast called Living Hope Weekly Bible teachings, and that's just the sermons from my church. I preach roughly twice a month, typically the, but then there are also other teachers.

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Like my father, Jerry Wearwell, Joshua Smith and others. Then there are also plenty of other biblical Unitarian podcasts out there.

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Which you could take a look at as well as other recommended podcasts by preachers and thinkers of different types that I think are pretty worth your time. So take a look at that if you are curious about my recommendations or expanding your horizons a little bit to hear some other voices.

43:53
Well, we also got in an audio comment on speak pipe from Joni. Here's what she says.

43:59
Hi, Sean.

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And other podcast members, producers.

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I absolutely love this podcast, I.

44:08
Live for every new episode to come out.

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And everything else that LHIM does is so nutritive to my spirit and my mind.

44:22
I am.

44:23
Surprise is not the most popular church in Latham, NY.

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At any rate, I am leaving a message because there are two things I'd like to get answers to. I'm in no hurry.

44:40
But I would like it if someone could teach on either and Sunday service or the podcast. These two things. One, why do we pray in the name of Jesus in Jesus name or in the name of Jesus Christ?

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Is that a ritual, or is there a true meaningful reason for it? Why can't we just say thank you, father, and stop talking?

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Well, I fear the recording cut out before she got to her second point.

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Which I don't know really what to say about that, but hopefully Joni writes in or records a Part 2 so that we can find out what her second burning question is. But as far as her first question, she was asking about why should we pray in the name of Jesus Christ? And there are a few scriptures from the Last Supper.

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Discourse like in John 1413, Jesus says I will do whatever you ask in my name so that the father may be glorified in the son. If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it.

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John 1516 says you did not choose me, but I chose you and I appointed you to go and bear fruit. Fruit that will last so that the father will give you whatever you ask in my name. John 1623. On that day you will ask nothing of me very truly. I tell you, if you ask anything of the father in my name.

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He will give it to you. Until now, you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive so that your joy may be complete.

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8 And then John 1626, on that day you will ask in my name, I do not say to you that I will ask the father on your behalf, for the father himself loves you because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God. So as you can see, these scriptures are the biblical basis for this idea of praying.

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In the name of Jesus, we also have some theology in Ephesians Chapter 2 that I think is pretty helpful, especially for those of us who are gentiles.

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So yeah, Ephesians 211 says so then remember that at one time you Gentiles by birth called the uncircumcision by those who are called the circumcision circumcision, made in the flesh by human hands. Remember that you were at that time without Christ being aliens from the Commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of Promise having no hope.

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And without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus, you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

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For he is our peace in his flesh. He has made both into one and has broken down the dividing wall. That is the hostility between us abolishing the law with his commandments and ordinances that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace, and might reconcile.

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Both to God in one body, through the cross, thus putting to death the hostility through it. So he came and proclaimed peace to you, who were far off, and peace to those who were near for through him. Both of us have access in one spirit to the far.

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I realized that was a bit of a long reading, but the point here is that we, especially as Gentiles, were separated from God. We have no reason, no basis by which we can approach God and say, hey, listen to my prayer. So because of what Christ has done, breaking down this hostility, this dividing wall, the the requirements.

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Of the law.

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That this has brought the Gentiles near to God by making a new people that have access through Christ instead of through Torah. It's through Christ. And so this is something that we recognize when we pray in the name of Jesus Christ, we are not approaching God on our own basis. We are not approaching.

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God As for example, the Jewish people who had a covenantal relationship extending all the way back in time to their ancestor Abraham.

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I don't have that. I'm American, so I need access. I need a mediator like it says in first Timothy 2/5 for there is one God and there is also one mediator between God and humankind. Christ Jesus himself human.

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Recognizing the mediatorial role of Jesus in our prayer makes a lot of sense.

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Now, will God still hear our prayer if we don't end it with in the name of Jesus Christ? Amen.

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I yes, I believe so. I think God can hear everything regardless of if you end it in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen or not. So I think it's probably fine to have a, you know, especially if you're just talking about, like, a running dialogue where you're just talking to God. I think that's fine.

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But at the same time, if you are praying in some sort of official setting, I think it makes sense, especially to pray in the name of Jesus Christ, just to recognize that he is our mediator. He is the way we can get to the father.

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We don't have a basis without him and I think it's good for us to remember that. So my position on it would be that it's not essential, but it's a really great reminder and it does fit with the biblical statements, especially in John 1516 and John 1623 and 24 to pray to the father.

50:03
In the name of Jesus.

50:06
Well, hopefully that help. Johnny, if any of the rest of you have further insight into this subject or would like to share your thoughts, come on to restitutio.org and find Episode 596 on Communion and Corinthians and leave your feedback there. Well, that's going to be it for today. Thanks everybody for tuning in. If you'd like to support us, you can do that at the website.

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I'll catch you next week and remember, the truth has nothing to fear.