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THE GREAT TEXTS OF THE BIBLE
EDITED BY THE REV.
JAMES HASTINGS, D.D.
EDITOR OF "THE EXPOSITORY TIMES" "THE DICTIONARY OF THE BIBLE'
"THE DICTIONARY OF CHRIST AND THE GOSPELS" AND
"THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RELIGION AND ETHICS "
I CORINTHIANS
NEW YORK
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS EDINBURGH : T. & T. CLARK
1912
CONTENTS
TOPICS.
h The Power and the Wisdom of God Q}, The Sum op Saving Knowledge
Things Prepared for Love
God's Fellow-Workers .
The Teacher's Great Text
Yet Possessing All Things .
Our Three Judges
Judging Prematurely
For the Feast .
The Body for God
Spiritual Detachment
Adaptability
For the Crown .
Trust in God and Do the Right Qo . Man's Chief End
Proclaiming the Lord's Death
The One Thing Needful
The Partial and the Perfect
These Three ^3 • The Resurrection from the Dead Y> The Christian Knight .
PAGK
1
. 25
. 45
. 67
. 89
. Ill
. 141
. 159
. 173
. 191
. 207
. 235
. 263
. 281
. 303
. 319
. 345
. 365
. 391
. 453
. 483
VI
CONTENTS
TEXTS. 1 Corinthians.
I. 22-24
II. 2 .
II. 9 .
III. 9 .
III. 11-13
III. 21-23
IV. 3, 4 .
IV. 5 .
V. 7, 8 .
VI. 19,20
VII. 29, 31
IX. 22 .
IX. 25 .
X. 13 .
X. 31 .
XI. 26 .
XIII. 1 .
XIII. 12 .
XIII. 13 .
XV. 20 .
XVI. 13, 14
3
27 47 69 91 113 143 161 175 193 209 237 265 283 305 321 347 367 393 455 485
The Power and the Wisdom of God.
I COR.
Literature.
Alford (H.), Sermons on Christian Doctrine, 210.
Burrell (D. J.), Christ and Progress, 111.
Bushnell (H.), The New Life, 239.
Candlish (J.), The Gospel of Forgiveness, 301.
Church (R. W.), Village Sermons, iii. 101.
Conn (J.), The Fulness of Time, 71.
Cunningham (W.), Sermons, 120, 134.
Denney (J.), The Wag Everlasting, 13.
Dykes (J. 0.), Sermons, 34.
Edger (S.), Sermons preached at Auckland, N.Z., ii. 40.
Fairbairn (A. M.), Christ in the Centuries, 23.
Foster (J. E.), Pain, 102.
Holland (H. S.), Creed and Character, 191.
Hopkins (E. H.), The Law of Liberty in the Spiritual Life, 141.
Ingram (A. F. W.), The Gospel in Action, 54.
Jowett (J. H.), Apostolic Optimism, 68.
Macleod (A.), A Man's Gift, 23.
„ (D.), The Sunday Home Service, 262. Magee (W.), The Gospel and the Age, 3.
Miller (J.), Sermons Literary and Scientific, ii. 174.
Mills (B. R. V.), The Marks of the Church, 94.
Potts (A. W.), School Sermons, 117.
Sclater (J. R. P.), The Enterprise of Life, 244.
Stubbs (W.), in The Anglican Pulpit of To-day, 49.
Taylor (W. M.), Contrary Winds, 116.
Thomas (J.), Sermons : Myrtle Street Pulpit, iii. 99.
Watt (L. M.), The Communion Table, 322.
Winterbotham (R.), Sermons, 156.
British Weekly, Feb. 22, 1912 (Berry).
Christian World Pulpit, xiii. 92 (Beecher) ; xviii. 246 (Stevenson) ; xxxiv. 219 (Spurgeon); xxxix. 369 (Fairbairn); xlii. 146 (Snell) ; lvii. 273 (Jowett); lxii. 151 (Pickett); lxxix. 312 (Fox); lxxx. 296 (Brown).
Cliurch of England Pulpii, xxx. 13 (Panter) ; lxii. 381 (Payne), 662 (Straton) ; xliii. 230 (Maturin).
Contemporary Pulpit, ii. 144 (Scott).
The Power and the Wisdom of God.
Jews ask for signs, and Greeks seek after wisdom : but we preach Christ crucified, unto Jews a stumblingblock, and unto Gentiles foolishness ; but unto them that are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God. — i Cor. i. 22-24.
This chapter is full of the tragic pathos of the Apostle's life. We can read, as it were between the lines, the emotions, the hopes, the despairs, the fears, the loves, amid which he preached in Corinth, confronted by the hate of the Jew and the scorn of the Greek, and beset by the jealousies, the divisions, the misunderstandings, of his heathen and Hebrew converts.
St. Paul when he arrived in Corinth was not new to the work and the troubles of the missionary. Behind him were years of labour and sorrow. The man of Macedonia who appeared in a vision had cried, " Come over and help us " ; and to St. Paul to hear was to obey. He landed at Philippi, bringing westward and into Europe the gospel of Christ. But love did not leap to answer his love, or faith rise to salute his coming. Instead, he was beaten, smitten with stripes, set in the stocks, made fast in the inner prison, till the virtue of his Eoman citizenship opened the door of his prison, and he passed on to Thessalonica. There " lewd fellows of the baser sort " set the city in an uproar, and he was forced to depart for Beroea. In Beroea he found men nobler than those of Thessalonica ; for they searched the Scrip- tures to discover whether his words were true. But enmity followed and drove him to Athens, where he felt the wondrous charm of the city and the wondrous indifference of the men. Images of gods were everywhere, but nowhere was the living God or godly peace of soul. The men wanted news, not of the kind he preached, but of the sort that was curious rather than true. So they set him on Mars' kill, and as he unrolled his