The church at Corinth had a lot of problems! The Christian Bible doesn’t sugarcoat anything. Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians is a prime example of the blunt truth, often detailed in the pages of the Bible.
Corinth was a church set up by the Apostle Paul himself, with help from his closest friends. Paul stayed with the Corinthians for at least a year and a half. You can read a brief description of Paul’s exploits in Corinth in Acts 18, verses 1–18. First Corinthians is one of three letters we know of that Paul wrote to the Corinthians. Although we only have the letters known as 1 and 2 Corinthians included in the Bible. We don’t actually have the other letter, but Paul references it in, 1 Corinthians 5:9 KJV :
“I wrote unto you in an epistle not to company with fornicators:”
For the record, a few scholars believe there may have been a fourth epistle. This is because of Paul’s reference in 2 Corinthians 7:8, to a letter he wrote that made them all sorrow.
However, most people believe this is a reference to 1 Corinthians. In all probability, he wrote them many letters, but providence has determined that 1 and 2 Corinthians are inspired.
During the Apostle Paul’s lifetime Corinth was a prominent city in Greece. Corinth was a very rich worldly city with many vices, in particular it was noted for fornication. So much so that, the Greek phrase “to play the Corinthian” was coined to describe a Corinthian prostitute.
In case you haven’t figured it out yet, fornication is an old English word for sexual sin between unmarried people. Like I said, the Bible is very blunt and so was Paul. We will be as respectful as possible in this series of articles about 1 Corinthians to follow, but no less blunt.
Does Paul’s condemning letter to the Corinthian church apply to the church today? Absolutely, because many churches today have the exact same problems as the Corinthians did, nearly 2,000 years ago.
For the next several articles, we are going to examine what Paul said to the Corinthians. Our hope is that the testimony of Christ be confirmed in you.
1 Corinthians 1:5-6 KJV: [5] That in every thing ye are enriched by him, in all utterance, and in all knowledge; [6] Even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you: