Bible in 90 Days

15 ^1-2 Even if we believe that it makes no difference to the Lord whether we do these things, still we cannot just go ahead and do them to please ourselves; for we must bear the “burden” of being considerate of the doubts and fears of others—of those who feel these things are wrong. Let’s please the other fellow, not ourselves, and do what is for his good and thus build him up in the Lord. ³ Christ didn’t please himself. As the Psalmist said, “He came for the very purpose of suffering under the insults of those who were against the Lord.” ⁴ These things that were written in the Scriptures so long ago are to teach us patience and to encourage us so that we will look forward expectantly to the time when God will conquer sin and death.

⁵ May God who gives patience, steadiness, and encouragement help you to live in complete harmony with each other—each with the attitude of Christ toward the other. ⁶ And then all of us can praise the Lord together with one voice, giving glory to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

⁷ So warmly welcome each other into the church, just as Christ has warmly welcomed you; then God will be glorified. ⁸ Remember that Jesus Christ came to show that God is true to his promises and to help the Jews. ⁹ And remember that he came also that the Gentiles might be saved and give glory to God for his mercies to them. That is what the psalmist meant when he wrote: “I will praise you among the Gentiles and sing to your name.”

¹⁰ And in another place, “Be glad, O you Gentiles, along with his people the Jews.”

¹¹ And yet again, “Praise the Lord, O you Gentiles; let everyone praise him.”

¹² And the prophet Isaiah said, “There shall be an Heir in the house of Jesse, and he will be King over the Gentiles; they will pin their hopes on him alone.”

¹³ So I pray for you Gentiles that God who gives you hope will keep you happy and full of peace as you believe in him. I pray that God will help you overflow with hope in him through the Holy Spirit’s power within you.

¹⁴ I know that you are wise and good, my brothers, and that you know these things so well that you are able to teach others all about them. ^15-16 But even so I have been bold enough to emphasize some of these points, knowing that all you need is this reminder from me; for I am, by God’s grace, a special messenger from Jesus Christ to you Gentiles, bringing you the Gospel and offering you up as a fragrant sacrifice to God; for you have been made pure and pleasing to him by the Holy Spirit. ¹⁷ So it is right for me to be a little proud of all Christ Jesus has done through me. ¹⁸ I dare not judge how effectively he has used others, but I know this: he has used me to win the Gentiles to God. ¹⁹ I have won them by my message and by the good way I have lived before them and by the miracles done through me as signs from God—all by the Holy Spirit’s power. In this way I have preached the full Gospel^[a] of Christ all the way from Jerusalem clear over into Illyricum.

²⁰ But all the while my ambition has been to go still farther, preaching where the name of Christ has never yet been heard, rather than where a church has already been started by someone else. ²¹ I have been following the plan spoken of in the Scriptures where Isaiah says that those who have never heard the name of Christ before will see and understand. ²² In fact, that is the very reason I have been so long in coming to visit you.

²³ But now at last I am through with my work here, and I am ready to come after all these long years of waiting. ²⁴ For I am planning to take a trip to Spain, and when I do, I will stop off there in Rome; and after we have had a good time together for a little while, you can send me on my way again.

²⁵ But before I come, I must go down to Jerusalem to take a gift to the Jewish Christians there. ²⁶ For you see, the Christians in Macedonia and Achaia have taken up an offering for those in Jerusalem who are going through such hard times. ²⁷ They were very glad to do this, for they feel that they owe a real debt to the Jerusalem Christians. Why? Because the news about Christ came to these Gentiles from the church in Jerusalem. And since they received this wonderful spiritual gift of the Gospel from there, they feel that the least they can do in return is to give some material aid.^{[b] 28} As soon as I have delivered this money and completed this good deed of theirs, I will come to see you on my way to Spain. ²⁹ And I am sure that when I come the Lord will give me a great blessing for you.

³⁰ Will you be my prayer partners? For the Lord Jesus Christ’s sake and because of your love for me—given to you by the Holy Spirit—pray much with me for my work. ³¹ Pray that I will be protected in Jerusalem from those who are not Christians. Pray also that the Christians there will be willing to accept the money I am bringing them. ³² Then I will be able to come to you with a happy heart by the will of God, and we can refresh each other.

³³ And now may our God, who gives peace, be with you all. Amen.

16 ^1-2 Phoebe, a dear Christian woman from the town of Cenchreae, will be coming to see you soon. She has worked hard in the church there. Receive her as your sister in the Lord, giving her a warm Christian welcome. Help her in every way you can, for she has helped many in their needs, including me. ³ Tell Priscilla and Aquila hello. They have been my fellow workers in the affairs of Christ Jesus. ⁴ In fact, they risked their lives for me, and I am not the only one who is thankful to them; so are all the Gentile churches.

⁵ Please give my greetings to all those who meet to worship in their home. Greet my good friend Epaenetus. He was the very first person to become a Christian in Asia. ⁶ Remember me to Mary, too, who has worked so hard to help us. ⁷ Then there are Andronicus and Junias, my relatives who were in prison with me. They are respected by the apostles and became Christians before I did. Please give them my greetings. ⁸ Say hello to Ampliatus, whom I love as one of God’s own children, ⁹ and Urbanus, our fellow worker, and beloved Stachys.

¹⁰ Then there is Apelles, a good man whom the Lord approves; greet him for me. And give my best regards to those working at the house of Aristobulus. ¹¹ Remember me to Herodion my relative. Remember me to the Christian slaves over at Narcissus House. ¹² Say hello to Tryphaena and Tryphosa, the Lord’s workers, and to dear Persis, who has worked so hard for the Lord. ¹³ Greet Rufus for me, whom the Lord picked out to be his very own; and also his dear mother who has been such a mother to me. ¹⁴ And please give my greetings to Asyncritus, Phlegon, Hermes, Patrobas, Hermas, and the other brothers who are with them. ¹⁵ Give my love to Philologus, Julia, Nereus and his sister, and to Olympas, and all the Christians who are with them. ¹⁶ Shake hands warmly with each other. All the churches here send you their greetings.

¹⁷ And now there is one more thing to say before I end this letter. Stay away from those who cause divisions and are upsetting people’s faith, teaching things about Christ that are contrary to what you have been taught. ¹⁸ Such teachers are not working for our Lord Jesus but only want gain for themselves. They are good speakers, and simple-minded people are often fooled by them. ¹⁹ But everyone knows that you stand loyal and true. This makes me very happy. I want you always to remain very clear about what is right and to stay innocent of any wrong. ²⁰ The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. The blessings from our Lord Jesus Christ be upon you.

²¹ Timothy my fellow worker, and Lucius and Jason and Sosipater, my relatives, send you their good wishes. ²² I, Tertius, the one who is writing this letter for Paul, send my greetings too, as a Christian brother. ²³ Gaius says to say hello to you for him. I am his guest, and the church meets here in his home. Erastus, the city treasurer, sends you his greetings and so does Quartus, a Christian brother. ²⁴ Good-bye. May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.

^25-27 I commit you to God, who is able to make you strong and steady in the Lord, just as the Gospel says, and just as I have told you. This is God’s plan of salvation for you Gentiles, kept secret from the beginning of time. But now as the prophets foretold and as God commands, this message is being preached everywhere, so that people all around the world will have faith in Christ and obey him. To God, who alone is wise, be the glory forever through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Sincerely, Paul

1 From: Paul, chosen by God to be Jesus Christ’s missionary, and from brother Sosthenes.

² To: The Christians in Corinth, invited by God to be his people and made acceptable to him by Christ Jesus.^[c] And to: All Christians everywhere—whoever calls upon the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and theirs.

³ May God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ give you all of his blessings, and great peace of heart and mind.

⁴ I can never stop thanking God for all the wonderful gifts he has given you, now that you are Christ’s: ⁵ he has enriched your whole life. He has helped you speak out for him and has given you a full understanding of the truth; ⁶ what I told you Christ could do for you has happened! ⁷ Now you have every grace and blessing; every spiritual gift and power for doing his will are yours during this time of waiting for the return of our Lord Jesus Christ. ⁸ And he guarantees right up to the end that you will be counted free from all sin and guilt on that day when he returns. ⁹ God will surely do this for you, for he always does just what he says, and he is the one who invited you into this wonderful friendship with his Son, even Christ our Lord.

¹⁰ But, dear brothers, I beg you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ to stop arguing among yourselves. Let there be real harmony so that there won’t be splits in the church. I plead with you to be of one mind, united in thought and purpose. ¹¹ For some of those who live at Chloe’s house have told me of your arguments and quarrels, dear brothers. ¹² Some of you are saying, “I am a follower of Paul”; and others say that they are for Apollos or for Peter; and some that they alone are the true followers of Christ. ¹³ And so, in effect, you have broken Christ into many pieces.

But did I, Paul, die for your sins? Were any of you baptized in my name? ¹⁴ I am so thankful now that I didn’t baptize any of you except Crispus and Gaius. ¹⁵ For now no one can think that I have been trying to start something new, beginning a “Church of Paul.” ¹⁶ Oh, yes, and I baptized the family of Stephanas. I don’t remember ever baptizing anyone else. ¹⁷ For Christ didn’t send me to baptize, but to preach the Gospel; and even my preaching sounds poor, for I do not fill my sermons with profound words and high-sounding ideas, for fear of diluting the mighty power there is in the simple message of the cross of Christ.

¹⁸ I know very well how foolish it sounds to those who are lost,^[d] when they hear that Jesus died to save them. But we who are saved recognize this message as the very power of God. ¹⁹ For God says, “I will destroy all human plans of salvation no matter how wise they seem to be, and ignore the best ideas of men, even the most brilliant of them.”

²⁰ So what about these wise men, these scholars, these brilliant debaters of this world’s great affairs? God has made them all look foolish and shown their wisdom to be useless nonsense. ²¹ For God in his wisdom saw to it that the world would never find God through human brilliance, and then he stepped in and saved all those who believed his message, which the world calls foolish and silly. ²² It seems foolish to the Jews because they want a sign from heaven as proof that what is preached is true; and it is foolish to the Gentiles because they believe only what agrees with their philosophy and seems wise to them. ²³ So when we preach about Christ dying to save them, the Jews are offended and the Gentiles say it’s all nonsense. ²⁴ But God has opened the eyes of those called to salvation, both Jews and Gentiles, to see that Christ is the mighty power of God to save them; Christ himself is the center of God’s wise plan for their salvation. ²⁵ This so-called “foolish” plan of God is far wiser than the wisest plan of the wisest man, and God in his weakness—Christ dying on the cross—is far stronger than any man.

²⁶ Notice among yourselves, dear brothers, that few of you who follow Christ have big names or power or wealth. ²⁷ Instead, God has deliberately chosen to use ideas the world considers foolish and of little worth in order to shame those people considered by the world as wise and great. ²⁸ He has chosen a plan despised by the world, counted as nothing at all, and used it to bring down to nothing those the world considers great, ²⁹ so that no one anywhere can ever brag in the presence of God.

³⁰ For it is from God alone that you have your life through Christ Jesus. He showed us God’s plan of salvation; he was the one who made us acceptable to God; he made us pure and holy^[e] and gave himself to purchase our salvation. ³¹ As it says in the Scriptures, “If anyone is going to boast, let him boast only of what the Lord has done.”

2 Dear brothers, even when I first came to you I didn’t use lofty words and brilliant ideas to tell you God’s message. ² For I decided that I would speak only of Jesus Christ and his death on the cross. ³ I came to you in weakness—timid and trembling. ⁴ And my preaching was very plain, not with a lot of oratory and human wisdom, but the Holy Spirit’s power was in my words, proving to those who heard them that the message was from God. ⁵ I did this because I wanted your faith to stand firmly upon God, not on man’s great ideas.

⁶ Yet when I am among mature Christians I do speak with words of great wisdom, but not the kind that comes from here on earth, and not the kind that appeals to the great men of this world, who are doomed to fall. ⁷ Our words are wise because they are from God, telling of God’s wise plan to bring us into the glories of heaven. This plan was hidden in former times, though it was made for our benefit before the world began. ⁸ But the great men of the world have not understood it; if they had, they never would have crucified the Lord of Glory.

⁹ That is what is meant by the Scriptures which say that no mere man has ever seen, heard, or even imagined what wonderful things God has ready for those who love the Lord. ¹⁰ But we know about these things because God has sent his Spirit to tell us, and his Spirit searches out and shows us all of God’s deepest secrets. ¹¹ No one can really know what anyone else is thinking or what he is really like except that person himself. And no one can know God’s thoughts except God’s own Spirit. ¹² And God has actually given us his Spirit (not the world’s spirit) to tell us about the wonderful free gifts of grace and blessing that God has given us. ¹³ In telling you about these gifts we have even used the very words given to us by the Holy Spirit, not words that we as men might choose. So we use the Holy Spirit’s words to explain the Holy Spirit’s facts.^{[f] 14} But the man who isn’t a Christian can’t understand and can’t accept these thoughts from God, which the Holy Spirit teaches us. They sound foolish to him because only those who have the Holy Spirit within them can understand what the Holy Spirit means. Others just can’t take it in. ¹⁵ But the spiritual man has insight into everything, and that bothers and baffles the man of the world, who can’t understand him at all. ¹⁶ How could he? For certainly he has never been one to know the Lord’s thoughts, or to discuss them with him, or to move the hands of God by prayer.^[g] But, strange as it seems, we Christians actually do have within us a portion of the very thoughts and mind of Christ.

3 Dear brothers, I have been talking to you as though you were still just babies in the Christian life who are not following the Lord but your own desires; I cannot talk to you as I would to healthy Christians who are filled with the Spirit. ² I have had to feed you with milk and not with solid food because you couldn’t digest anything stronger. And even now you still have to be fed on milk. ³ For you are still only baby Christians, controlled by your own desires, not God’s. When you are jealous of one another and divide up into quarreling groups, doesn’t that prove you are still babies, wanting your own way? In fact, you are acting like people who don’t belong to the Lord at all. ⁴ There you are, quarreling about whether I am greater than Apollos, and dividing the church. Doesn’t this show how little you have grown in the Lord?^[h]

⁵ Who am I, and who is Apollos, that we should be the cause of a quarrel? Why, we’re just God’s servants, each of us with certain special abilities, and with our help you believed. ⁶ My work was to plant the seed in your hearts, and Apollos’ work was to water it, but it was God, not we, who made the garden grow in your hearts. ⁷ The person who does the planting or watering isn’t very important, but God is important because he is the one who makes things grow. ⁸ Apollos and I are working as a team, with the same aim, though each of us will be rewarded for his own hard work. ⁹ We are only God’s coworkers. You are God’s garden, not ours; you are God’s building, not ours.

¹⁰ God, in his kindness, has taught me how to be an expert builder. I have laid the foundation and Apollos has built on it. But he who builds on the foundation must be very careful. ¹¹ And no one can ever lay any other real foundation than that one we already have—Jesus Christ. ¹² But there are various kinds of materials that can be used to build on that foundation. Some use gold and silver and jewels; and some build with sticks and hay or even straw! ¹³ There is going to come a time of testing at Christ’s Judgment Day to see what kind of material each builder has used. Everyone’s work will be put through the fire so that all can see whether or not it keeps its value, and what was really accomplished. ¹⁴ Then every workman who has built on the foundation with the right materials, and whose work still stands, will get his pay. ¹⁵ But if the house he has built burns up, he will have a great loss. He himself will be saved, but like a man escaping through a wall of flames.

¹⁶ Don’t you realize that all of you together are the house of God, and that the Spirit of God lives among you in his house? ¹⁷ If anyone defiles and spoils God’s home, God will destroy him. For God’s home is holy and clean, and you are that home.

¹⁸ Stop fooling yourselves. If you count yourself above average in intelligence, as judged by this world’s standards, you had better put this all aside and be a fool rather than let it hold you back from the true wisdom from above. ¹⁹ For the wisdom of this world is foolishness to God. As it says in the book of Job, God uses man’s own brilliance to trap him; he stumbles over his own “wisdom” and falls. ²⁰ And again, in the book of Psalms, we are told that the Lord knows full well how the human mind reasons and how foolish and futile it is.

²¹ So don’t be proud of following the wise men of this world.^[i] For God has already given you everything you need. ²² He has given you Paul and Apollos and Peter as your helpers. He has given you the whole world to use, and life and even death are your servants. He has given you all of the present and all of the future. All are yours, ²³ and you belong to Christ, and Christ is God’s.

4 So Apollos and I should be looked upon as Christ’s servants who distribute God’s blessings by explaining God’s secrets. ² Now the most important thing about a servant is that he does just what his master tells him to. ³ What about me? Have I been a good servant? Well, I don’t worry over what you think about this or what anyone else thinks. I don’t even trust my own judgment on this point. ⁴ My conscience is clear, but even that isn’t final proof. It is the Lord himself who must examine me and decide.

⁵ So be careful not to jump to conclusions before the Lord returns as to whether someone is a good servant or not. When the Lord comes, he will turn on the light so that everyone can see exactly what each one of us is really like, deep down in our hearts. Then everyone will know why we have been doing the Lord’s work. At that time God will give to each one whatever praise is coming to him.

⁶ I have used Apollos and myself as examples to illustrate what I have been saying: that you must not have favorites. You must not be proud of one of God’s teachers more than another. ⁷ What are you so puffed up about? What do you have that God hasn’t given you? And if all you have is from God, why act as though you are so great, and as though you have accomplished something on your own?

⁸ You seem to think you already have all the spiritual food you need. You are full and spiritually contented, rich kings on your thrones, leaving us far behind! I wish you really were already on your thrones, for when that time comes you can be sure that we will be there, too, reigning with you. ⁹ Sometimes I think God has put us apostles at the very end of the line, like prisoners soon to be killed, put on display at the end of a victor’s parade, to be stared at by men and angels alike.

¹⁰ Religion has made us foolish, you say, but of course you are all such wise and sensible Christians! We are weak, but not you! You are well thought of, while we are laughed at. ¹¹ To this very hour we have gone hungry and thirsty, without even enough clothes to keep us warm. We have been kicked around without homes of our own. ¹² We have worked wearily with our hands to earn our living. We have blessed those who cursed us. We have been patient with those who injured us. ¹³ We have replied quietly when evil things have been said about us. Yet right up to the present moment we are like dirt underfoot, like garbage.

¹⁴ I am not writing about these things to make you ashamed, but to warn and counsel you as beloved children. ¹⁵ For although you may have ten thousand others to teach you about Christ, remember that you have only me as your father. For I was the one who brought you to Christ when I preached the Gospel to you. ¹⁶ So I beg you to follow my example and do as I do.

¹⁷ That is the very reason why I am sending Timothy—to help you do this. For he is one of those I won to Christ, a beloved and trustworthy child in the Lord. He will remind you of what I teach in all the churches wherever I go.

¹⁸ I know that some of you will have become proud, thinking that I am afraid to come to deal with you. ¹⁹ But I will come, and soon, if the Lord will let me, and then I’ll find out whether these proud men are just big talkers or whether they really have God’s power. ²⁰ The Kingdom of God is not just talking; it is living by God’s power. ²¹ Which do you choose? Shall I come with punishment and scolding, or shall I come with quiet love and gentleness?

5 Everyone is talking about the terrible thing that has happened there among you, something so evil that even the heathen don’t do it: you have a man in your church who is living in sin with his father’s wife.^{[j] 2} And are you still so conceited, so “spiritual”? Why aren’t you mourning in sorrow and shame and seeing to it that this man is removed from your membership?

^3-4 Although I am not there with you, I have been thinking a lot about this, and in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ I have already decided what to do, just as though I were there. You are to call a meeting of the church—and the power of the Lord Jesus will be with you as you meet, and I will be there in spirit— ⁵ and cast out this man from the fellowship of the church and into Satan’s hands, to punish him, in the hope that his soul will be saved when our Lord Jesus Christ returns.

⁶ What a terrible thing it is that you are boasting about your purity and yet you let this sort of thing go on. Don’t you realize that if even one person is allowed to go on sinning, soon all will be affected? ⁷ Remove this evil cancer—this wicked person—from among you, so that you can stay pure. Christ, God’s Lamb, has been slain for us. ⁸ So let us feast upon him and grow strong in the Christian life, leaving entirely behind us the cancerous old life with all its hatreds and wickedness. Let us feast instead upon the pure bread of honor and sincerity and truth.

⁹ When I wrote to you before I said not to mix with evil people. ¹⁰ But when I said that I wasn’t talking about unbelievers who live in sexual sin or are greedy cheats and thieves and idol worshipers. For you can’t live in this world without being with people like that. ¹¹ What I meant was that you are not to keep company with anyone who claims to be a brother Christian but indulges in sexual sins, or is greedy, or is a swindler, or worships idols, or is a drunkard, or abusive. Don’t even eat lunch with such a person.

¹² It isn’t our job to judge outsiders. But it certainly is our job to judge and deal strongly with those who are members of the church and who are sinning in these ways. ¹³ God alone is the Judge of those on the outside. But you yourselves must deal with this man and put him out of your church.

6 How is it that when you have something against another Christian, you “go to law” and ask a heathen court to decide the matter instead of taking it to other Christians to decide which of you is right? ² Don’t you know that someday we Christians are going to judge and govern the world? So why can’t you decide even these little things among yourselves? ³ Don’t you realize that we Christians will judge and reward the very angels in heaven? So you should be able to decide your problems down here on earth easily enough. ⁴ Why then go to outside judges who are not even Christians?^{[k] 5} I am trying to make you ashamed. Isn’t there anyone in all the church who is wise enough to decide these arguments? ⁶ But, instead, one Christian sues another and accuses his Christian brother in front of unbelievers.

⁷ To have such lawsuits at all is a real defeat for you as Christians. Why not just accept mistreatment and leave it at that? It would be far more honoring to the Lord to let yourselves be cheated. ⁸ But, instead, you yourselves are the ones who do wrong, cheating others, even your own brothers.

^9-10 Don’t you know that those doing such things have no share in the Kingdom of God? Don’t fool yourselves. Those who live immoral lives, who are idol worshipers, adulterers or homosexuals—will have no share in his Kingdom. Neither will thieves or greedy people, drunkards, slanderers, or robbers. ¹¹ There was a time when some of you were just like that but now your sins are washed away, and you are set apart for God; and he has accepted you because of what the Lord Jesus Christ and the Spirit of our God have done for you.

¹² I can do anything I want to if Christ has not said no,^[l] but some of these things aren’t good for me. Even if I am allowed to do them, I’ll refuse to if I think they might get such a grip on me that I can’t easily stop when I want to. ¹³ For instance, take the matter of eating. God has given us an appetite for food and stomachs to digest it. But that doesn’t mean we should eat more than we need. Don’t think of eating as important because someday God will do away with both stomachs and food.

But sexual sin is never right: our bodies were not made for that but for the Lord, and the Lord wants to fill our bodies with himself. ¹⁴ And God is going to raise our bodies from the dead by his power just as he raised up the Lord Jesus Christ. ¹⁵ Don’t you realize that your bodies are actually parts and members of Christ? So should I take part of Christ and join him to a prostitute? Never! ¹⁶ And don’t you know that if a man joins himself to a prostitute she becomes a part of him and he becomes a part of her? For God tells us in the Scripture that in his sight the two become one person. ¹⁷ But if you give yourself to the Lord, you and Christ are joined together as one person.

¹⁸ That is why I say to run from sex sin. No other sin affects the body as this one does. When you sin this sin it is against your own body. ¹⁹ Haven’t you yet learned that your body is the home of the Holy Spirit God gave you, and that he lives within you? Your own body does not belong to you. ²⁰ For God has bought you with a great price. So use every part of your body to give glory back to God because he owns it.

7 Now about those questions you asked in your last letter: my answer is that if you do not marry, it is good. ² But usually it is best to be married, each man having his own wife, and each woman having her own husband, because otherwise you might fall back into sin.

³ The man should give his wife all that is her right as a married woman, and the wife should do the same for her husband: ⁴ for a girl who marries no longer has full right to her own body, for her husband then has his rights to it, too; and in the same way the husband no longer has full right to his own body, for it belongs also to his wife. ⁵ So do not refuse these rights to each other. The only exception to this rule would be the agreement of both husband and wife to refrain from the rights of marriage for a limited time, so that they can give themselves more completely to prayer. Afterwards, they should come together again so that Satan won’t be able to tempt them because of their lack of self-control.

⁶ I’m not saying you must marry, but you certainly may if you wish. ⁷ I wish everyone could get along without marrying, just as I do. But we are not all the same. God gives some the gift of a husband or wife, and others he gives the gift of being able to stay happily unmarried. ⁸ So I say to those who aren’t married and to widows—better to stay unmarried if you can, just as I am. ⁹ But if you can’t control yourselves, go ahead and marry. It is better to marry than to burn with lust.

¹⁰ Now, for those who are married I have a command, not just a suggestion. And it is not a command from me, for this is what the Lord himself has said: A wife must not leave her husband. ¹¹ But if she is separated from him, let her remain single or else go back to him. And the husband must not divorce his wife.

¹² Here I want to add some suggestions of my own. These are not direct commands from the Lord, but they seem right to me: If a Christian has a wife who is not a Christian, but she wants to stay with him anyway, he must not leave her or divorce her. ¹³ And if a Christian woman has a husband who isn’t a Christian, and he wants her to stay with him, she must not leave him. ¹⁴ For perhaps the husband who isn’t a Christian may become a Christian with the help of his Christian wife. And the wife who isn’t a Christian may become a Christian with the help of her Christian husband. Otherwise, if the family separates, the children might never come to know the Lord; whereas a united family may, in God’s plan, result in the children’s salvation.

¹⁵ But if the husband or wife who isn’t a Christian is eager to leave, it is permitted. In such cases the Christian husband or wife should not insist that the other stay, for God wants his children to live in peace and harmony. ¹⁶ For, after all, there is no assurance to you wives that your husbands will be converted if they stay; and the same may be said to you husbands concerning your wives.

¹⁷ But be sure in deciding these matters that you are living as God intended, marrying or not marrying in accordance with God’s direction and help, and accepting whatever situation God has put you into. This is my rule for all the churches.

¹⁸ For instance, a man who already has gone through the Jewish ceremony of circumcision before he became a Christian shouldn’t worry about it; and if he hasn’t been circumcised, he shouldn’t do it now. ¹⁹ For it doesn’t make any difference at all whether a Christian has gone through this ceremony or not. But it makes a lot of difference whether he is pleasing God and keeping God’s commandments. That is the important thing.

²⁰ Usually a person should keep on with the work he was doing when God called him. ²¹ Are you a slave? Don’t let that worry you—but of course, if you get a chance to be free, take it. ²² If the Lord calls you, and you are a slave, remember that Christ has set you free from the awful power of sin; and if he has called you and you are free, remember that you are now a slave of Christ. ²³ You have been bought and paid for by Christ, so you belong to him—be free now from all these earthly prides and fears.^{[m] 24} So, dear brothers, whatever situation a person is in when he becomes a Christian, let him stay there, for now the Lord is there to help him.

²⁵ Now I will try to answer your other question. What about girls who are not yet married? Should they be permitted to do so? In answer to this question, I have no special command for them from the Lord. But the Lord in his kindness has given me wisdom that can be trusted, and I will be glad to tell you what I think.

²⁶ Here is the problem: We Christians are facing great dangers to our lives at present. In times like these I think it is best for a person to remain unmarried. ²⁷ Of course, if you already are married, don’t separate because of this. But if you aren’t, don’t rush into it at this time. ²⁸ But if you men decide to go ahead anyway and get married now, it is all right; and if a girl gets married in times like these, it is no sin. However, marriage will bring extra problems that I wish you didn’t have to face right now.

²⁹ The important thing to remember is that our remaining time is very short, and so are our opportunities for doing the Lord’s work.^[n] For that reason those who have wives should stay as free as possible for the Lord; ³⁰ happiness or sadness or wealth should not keep anyone from doing God’s work. ³¹ Those in frequent contact with the exciting things the world offers should make good use of their opportunities without stopping to enjoy them; for the world in its present form will soon be gone.

³² In all you do, I want you to be free from worry. An unmarried man can spend his time doing the Lord’s work and thinking how to please him. ³³ But a married man can’t do that so well; he has to think about his earthly responsibilities and how to please his wife. ³⁴ His interests are divided. It is the same with a girl who marries. She faces the same problem. A girl who is not married is anxious to please the Lord in all she is and does.^[o] But a married woman must consider other things such as housekeeping and the likes and dislikes of her husband.

³⁵ I am saying this to help you, not to try to keep you from marrying. I want you to do whatever will help you serve the Lord best, with as few other things as possible to distract your attention from him.

³⁶ But if anyone feels he ought to marry because he has trouble controlling his passions, it is all right; it is not a sin; let him marry. ³⁷ But if a man has the willpower not to marry and decides that he doesn’t need to and won’t, he has made a wise decision. ³⁸ So the person who marries does well, and the person who doesn’t marry does even better.

³⁹ The wife is part of her husband as long as he lives; if her husband dies, then she may marry again, but only if she marries a Christian. ⁴⁰ But in my opinion she will be happier if she doesn’t marry again; and I think I am giving you counsel from God’s Spirit when I say this.

8 Next is your question about eating food that has been sacrificed to idols. On this question everyone feels that only his answer is the right one! But although being a “know-it-all” makes us feel important, what is really needed to build the church is love. ² If anyone thinks he knows all the answers, he is just showing his ignorance. ³ But the person who truly loves God is the one who is open to God’s knowledge.

⁴ So now, what about it? Should we eat meat that has been sacrificed to idols? Well, we all know that an idol is not really a god, and that there is only one God, and no other. ⁵ According to some people, there are a great many gods, both in heaven and on earth. ⁶ But we know that there is only one God, the Father, who created all things^[p] and made us to be his own; and one Lord Jesus Christ, who made everything and gives us life.

⁷ However, some Christians don’t realize this. All their lives they have been used to thinking of idols as alive, and have believed that food offered to the idols is really being offered to actual gods. So when they eat such food it bothers them and hurts their tender consciences. ⁸ Just remember that God doesn’t care whether we eat it or not. We are no worse off if we don’t eat it, and no better off if we do. ⁹ But be careful not to use your freedom to eat it, lest you cause some Christian brother to sin whose conscience^[q] is weaker than yours.

¹⁰ You see, this is what may happen: Someone who thinks it is wrong to eat this food will see you eating at a temple restaurant, for you know there is no harm in it. Then he will become bold enough to do it too, although all the time he still feels it is wrong. ¹¹ So because you “know it is all right to do it,” you will be responsible for causing great spiritual damage to a brother with a tender conscience for whom Christ died. ¹² And it is a sin against Christ to sin against your brother by encouraging him to do something he thinks is wrong. ¹³ So if eating meat offered to idols is going to make my brother sin, I’ll not eat any of it as long as I live because I don’t want to do this to him.

9 I am an apostle, God’s messenger, responsible to no mere man. I am one who has actually seen Jesus our Lord with my own eyes. And your changed lives are the result of my hard work for him. ² If in the opinion of others, I am not an apostle, I certainly am to you, for you have been won to Christ through me. ³ This is my answer to those who question my rights.

⁴ Or don’t I have any rights at all? Can’t I claim the same privilege the other apostles have of being a guest in your homes? ⁵ If I had a wife, and if she were a believer,^[r] couldn’t I bring her along on these trips just as the other disciples do, and as the Lord’s brothers do, and as Peter does? ⁶ And must Barnabas and I alone keep working for our living while you supply these others? ⁷ What soldier in the army has to pay his own expenses? And have you ever heard of a farmer who harvests his crop and doesn’t have the right to eat some of it? What shepherd takes care of a flock of sheep and goats and isn’t allowed to drink some of the milk? ⁸ And I’m not merely quoting the opinions of men as to what is right. I’m telling you what God’s law says. ⁹ For in the law God gave to Moses he said that you must not put a muzzle on an ox to keep it from eating when it is treading out the wheat. Do you suppose God was thinking only about oxen when he said this? ¹⁰ Wasn’t he also thinking about us? Of course he was. He said this to show us that Christian workers should be paid by those they help. Those who do the plowing and threshing should expect some share of the harvest.

¹¹ We have planted good spiritual seed in your souls. Is it too much to ask, in return, for mere food and clothing? ¹² You give them to others who preach to you, and you should. But shouldn’t we have an even greater right to them? Yet we have never used this right but supply our own needs without your help. We have never demanded payment of any kind for fear that, if we did, you might be less interested in our message to you from Christ.

¹³ Don’t you realize that God told those working in his temple to take for their own needs some of the food brought there as gifts to him? And those who work at the altar of God get a share of the food that is brought by those offering it to the Lord. ¹⁴ In the same way the Lord has given orders that those who preach the Gospel should be supported by those who accept it.

¹⁵ Yet I have never asked you for one penny. And I am not writing this to hint that I would like to start now. In fact, I would rather die of hunger than lose the satisfaction I get from preaching to you without charge. ¹⁶ For just preaching the Gospel isn’t any special credit to me—I couldn’t keep from preaching it if I wanted to. I would be utterly miserable. Woe unto me if I don’t.

¹⁷ If I were volunteering my services of my own free will, then the Lord would give me a special reward; but that is not the situation, for God has picked me out and given me this sacred trust, and I have no choice. ¹⁸ Under this circumstance, what is my pay? It is the special joy I get from preaching the Good News without expense to anyone, never demanding my rights.

¹⁹ And this has a real advantage: I am not bound to obey anyone just because he pays my salary; yet I have freely and happily become a servant of any and all so that I can win them to Christ. ²⁰ When I am with the Jews I seem as one of them so that they will listen to the Gospel and I can win them to Christ. When I am with Gentiles who follow Jewish customs and ceremonies I don’t argue, even though I don’t agree, because I want to help them. ²¹ When with the heathen I agree with them as much as I can, except of course that I must always do what is right as a Christian. And so, by agreeing, I can win their confidence^[s] and help them too.

²² When I am with those whose consciences bother them easily, I don’t act as though I know it all and don’t say they are foolish; the result is that they are willing to let me help them. Yes, whatever a person is like, I try to find common ground with him so that he will let me tell him about Christ and let Christ save him. ²³ I do this to get the Gospel to them and also for the blessing I myself receive when I see them come to Christ.

²⁴ In a race everyone runs, but only one person gets first prize. So run your race to win. ²⁵ To win the contest you must deny yourselves many things that would keep you from doing your best. An athlete goes to all this trouble just to win a blue ribbon or a silver cup,^[t] but we do it for a heavenly reward that never disappears. ²⁶ So I run straight to the goal with purpose in every step. I fight to win. I’m not just shadow-boxing or playing around. ²⁷ Like an athlete I punish my body, treating it roughly, training it to do what it should, not what it wants to. Otherwise I fear that after enlisting others for the race, I myself might be declared unfit and ordered to stand aside.

10 For we must never forget, dear brothers, what happened to our people in the wilderness long ago. God guided them by sending a cloud that moved along ahead of them; and he brought them all safely through the waters of the Red Sea. ² This might be called their “baptism”—baptized both in sea and cloud!—as followers of Moses—their commitment to him as their leader. ^3-4 And by a miracle God sent them food to eat and water to drink^[u] there in the desert; they drank the water that Christ gave them. He was there with them as a mighty Rock of spiritual refreshment. ⁵ Yet after all this most of them did not obey God, and he destroyed them in the wilderness.

⁶ From this lesson we are warned that we must not desire evil things as they did, ⁷ nor worship idols as they did. (The Scriptures tell us, “The people sat down to eat and drink and then got up to dance” in worship of the golden calf.)

⁸ Another lesson for us is what happened when some of them sinned with other men’s wives, and 23,000 fell dead in one day. ⁹ And don’t try the Lord’s patience—they did and died from snake bites. ¹⁰ And don’t murmur against God and his dealings with you as some of them did, for that is why God sent his Angel to destroy them.

¹¹ All these things happened to them as examples—as object lessons to us—to warn us against doing the same things; they were written down so that we could read about them and learn from them in these last days as the world nears its end.

¹² So be careful. If you are thinking, “Oh, I would never behave like that”—let this be a warning to you. For you too may fall into sin. ¹³ But remember this—the wrong desires that come into your life aren’t anything new and different. Many others have faced exactly the same problems before you. And no temptation is irresistible. You can trust God to keep the temptation from becoming so strong that you can’t stand up against it, for he has promised this and will do what he says. He will show you how to escape temptation’s power so that you can bear up patiently against it.

¹⁴ So, dear friends, carefully avoid idol worship of every kind.

¹⁵ You are intelligent people. Look now and see for yourselves whether what I am about to say is true. ¹⁶ When we ask the Lord’s blessing upon our drinking from the cup of wine at the Lord’s Table, this means, doesn’t it, that all who drink it are sharing together the blessing of Christ’s blood? And when we break off pieces of the bread from the loaf to eat there together, this shows that we are sharing together in the benefits of his body. ¹⁷ No matter how many of us there are, we all eat from the same loaf, showing that we are all parts of the one body of Christ. ¹⁸ And the Jewish people, all who eat the sacrifices, are united by that act.

¹⁹ What am I trying to say? Am I saying that the idols to whom the heathen bring sacrifices are really alive and are real gods, and that these sacrifices are of some value? No, not at all. ²⁰ What I am saying is that those who offer food to these idols are united together in sacrificing to demons, certainly not to God. And I don’t want any of you to be partners with demons when you eat the same food, along with the heathen, that has been offered to these idols. ²¹ You cannot drink from the cup at the Lord’s Table and at Satan’s table, too. You cannot eat bread both at the Lord’s Table and at Satan’s table.

²² What? Are you tempting the Lord to be angry with you? Are you stronger than he is?

²³ You are certainly free to eat food offered to idols if you want to; it’s not against God’s laws to eat such meat, but that doesn’t mean that you should go ahead and do it. It may be perfectly legal, but it may not be best and helpful. ²⁴ Don’t think only of yourself. Try to think of the other fellow, too, and what is best for him.

²⁵ Here’s what you should do. Take any meat you want that is sold at the market. Don’t ask whether or not it was offered to idols, lest the answer hurt your conscience. ²⁶ For the earth and every good thing in it belongs to the Lord and is yours to enjoy.

²⁷ If someone who isn’t a Christian asks you out to dinner, go ahead; accept the invitation if you want to. Eat whatever is on the table and don’t ask any questions about it. Then you won’t know whether or not it has been used as a sacrifice to idols, and you won’t risk having a bad conscience over eating it. ²⁸ But if someone warns you that this meat has been offered to idols, then don’t eat it for the sake of the man who told you, and of his conscience. ²⁹ In this case his feeling about it is the important thing, not yours.

But why, you may ask, must I be guided and limited by what someone else thinks? ³⁰ If I can thank God for the food and enjoy it, why let someone spoil everything just because he thinks I am wrong? ³¹ Well, I’ll tell you why. It is because you must do everything for the glory of God, even your eating and drinking. ³² So don’t be a stumbling block to anyone, whether they are Jews or Gentiles or Christians. ³³ That is the plan I follow, too. I try to please everyone in everything I do, not doing what I like or what is best for me but what is best for them, so that they may be saved.

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.^{[v] 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.^[w]

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.^{[x] 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,^[y] 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^[z] 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.

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:

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!

13 If I had the gift of being able to speak in other languages without learning them and could speak in every language there is in all of heaven and earth, but didn’t love others, I would only be making noise. ² If I had the gift of prophecy and knew all about what is going to happen in the future, knew everything about everything, but didn’t love others, what good would it do? Even if I had the gift of faith so that I could speak to a mountain and make it move, I would still be worth nothing at all without love. ³ If I gave everything I have to poor people, and if I were burned alive for preaching the Gospel but didn’t love others, it would be of no value whatever.

⁴ Love is very patient and kind, never jealous or envious, never boastful or proud, ⁵ never haughty or selfish or rude. Love does not demand its own way. It is not irritable or touchy. It does not hold grudges and will hardly even notice when others do it wrong. ⁶ It is never glad about injustice, but rejoices whenever truth wins out. ⁷ If you love someone, you will be loyal to him no matter what the cost. You will always believe in him, always expect the best of him, and always stand your ground in defending him.

⁸ All the special gifts and powers from God will someday come to an end, but love goes on forever. Someday prophecy and speaking in unknown languages and special knowledge—these gifts will disappear. ⁹ Now we know so little, even with our special gifts, and the preaching of those most gifted is still so poor. ¹⁰ But when we have been made perfect and complete, then the need for these inadequate special gifts will come to an end, and they will disappear.

¹¹ It’s like this: when I was a child I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child does. But when I became a man my thoughts grew far beyond those of my childhood, and now I have put away the childish things. ¹² In the same way, we can see and understand only a little about God now, as if we were peering at his reflection in a poor mirror; but someday we are going to see him in his completeness, face-to-face. Now all that I know is hazy and blurred, but then I will see everything clearly, just as clearly as God sees into my heart right now.

¹³ There are three things that remain—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.

14 Let love be your greatest aim; nevertheless, ask also for the special abilities the Holy Spirit gives, and especially the gift of prophecy, being able to preach the messages of God.

² But if your gift is that of being able to “speak in tongues,” that is, to speak in languages you haven’t learned, you will be talking to God but not to others, since they won’t be able to understand you. You will be speaking by the power of the Spirit, but it will all be a secret. ³ But one who prophesies, preaching the messages of God, is helping others grow in the Lord, encouraging and comforting them. ⁴ So a person “speaking in tongues” helps himself grow spiritually, but one who prophesies, preaching messages from God, helps the entire church grow in holiness and happiness.

⁵ I wish you all had the gift of “speaking in tongues,” but even more I wish you were all able to prophesy, preaching God’s messages, for that is a greater and more useful power than to speak in unknown languages—unless, of course, you can tell everyone afterwards what you were saying, so that they can get some good out of it too.

⁶ Dear friends, even if I myself should come to you talking in some language you don’t understand, how would that help you? But if I speak plainly what God has revealed to me, and tell you the things I know, and what is going to happen, and the great truths of God’s Word—that is what you need; that is what will help you. ⁷ Even musical instruments—the flute, for instance, or the harp—are examples of the need for speaking in plain, simple English^[aa] rather than in unknown languages. For no one will recognize the tune the flute is playing unless each note is sounded clearly. ⁸ And if the army bugler doesn’t play the right notes, how will the soldiers know that they are being called to battle? ⁹ In the same way, if you talk to a person in some language he doesn’t understand, how will he know what you mean? You might as well be talking to an empty room.

¹⁰ I suppose that there are hundreds of different languages in the world, and all are excellent for those who understand them, ¹¹ but to me they mean nothing. A person talking to me in one of these languages will be a stranger to me and I will be a stranger to him. ¹² Since you are so anxious to have special gifts from the Holy Spirit, ask him for the very best, for those that will be of real help to the whole church.

¹³ If someone is given the gift of speaking in unknown tongues, he should pray also for the gift of knowing what he has said, so that he can tell people afterwards plainly. ¹⁴ For if I pray in a language I don’t understand, my spirit is praying, but I don’t know what I am saying.

¹⁵ Well, then, what shall I do? I will do both. I will pray in unknown tongues and also in ordinary language that everyone understands. I will sing in unknown tongues and also in ordinary language so that I can understand the praise I am giving; ¹⁶ for if you praise and thank God with the spirit alone, speaking in another language, how can those who don’t understand you be praising God along with you? How can they join you in giving thanks when they don’t know what you are saying? ¹⁷ You will be giving thanks very nicely, no doubt, but the other people present won’t be helped.

¹⁸ I thank God that I “speak in tongues” privately^[ab] more than any of the rest of you. ¹⁹ But in public worship I would much rather speak five words that people can understand and be helped by than ten thousand words while “speaking in tongues” in an unknown language.

²⁰ Dear brothers, don’t be childish in your understanding of these things. Be innocent babies when it comes to planning evil, but be men of intelligence in understanding matters of this kind. ²¹ We are told in the ancient Scriptures that God would send men from other lands to speak in foreign languages to his people, but even then they would not listen. ²² So you see that being able to “speak in tongues” is not a sign to God’s children concerning his power, but is a sign to the unsaved. However, prophecy (preaching the deep truths of God) is what the Christians need, and unbelievers aren’t yet ready for it. ²³ Even so, if an unsaved person, or someone who doesn’t have these gifts, comes to church and hears you all talking in other languages, he is likely to think you are crazy. ²⁴ But if you prophesy, preaching God’s Word, even though such preaching is mostly for believers,^[ac] and an unsaved person or a new Christian comes in who does not understand about these things, all these sermons will convince him of the fact that he is a sinner, and his conscience will be pricked by everything he hears. ²⁵ As he listens, his secret thoughts will be laid bare, and he will fall down on his knees and worship God, declaring that God is really there among you.

²⁶ Well, my brothers, let’s add up what I am saying. When you meet together some will sing, another will teach, or tell some special information God has given him, or speak in an unknown language, or tell what someone else is saying who is speaking in the unknown language, but everything that is done must be useful to all, and build them up in the Lord. ²⁷ No more than two or three should speak in an unknown language, and they must speak one at a time, and someone must be ready to interpret what they are saying. ²⁸ But if no one is present who can interpret, they must not speak out loud. They must talk silently to themselves and to God in the unknown language but not publicly.

^29-30 Two or three may prophesy, one at a time, if they have the gift, while all the others listen. But if, while someone is prophesying, someone else receives a message or idea from the Lord, the one who is speaking should stop. ³¹ In this way all who have the gift of prophecy can speak, one after the other, and everyone will learn and be encouraged and helped. ³² Remember that a person who has a message from God has the power to stop himself or wait his turn.^{[ad] 33} God is not one who likes things to be disorderly and upset. He likes harmony, and he finds it in all the other churches.

³⁴ Women should be silent during the church meetings. They are not to take part in the discussion, for they are subordinate to men^[ae] as the Scriptures also declare. ³⁵ If they have any questions to ask, let them ask their husbands at home, for it is improper for women to express their opinions in church meetings.

³⁶ You disagree? And do you think that the knowledge of God’s will begins and ends with you Corinthians? Well, you are mistaken! ³⁷ You who claim to have the gift of prophecy or any other special ability from the Holy Spirit should be the first to realize that what I am saying is a commandment from the Lord himself. ³⁸ But if anyone still disagrees—well, we will leave him in his ignorance.^[af]

³⁹ So, my fellow believers, long to be prophets so that you can preach God’s message plainly; and never say it is wrong to “speak in tongues”; ⁴⁰ however, be sure that everything is done properly in a good and orderly way.