What do you think of when I ask you what 1 Corinthians is about? You might think of a church with a lot of problems. The other thing you might think about is that the majority of the book seems to be dealing with answering the questions that the Corinthian Christians sent to the apostle Paul. Many of the chapters begin by saying, “Now concerning the matters about which you wrote” or the simple phrase, “Now concerning” (cf. 7:1; 7:25; 8:1; 12:1; 16:1; 16:12). But it is really easy to miss the purpose statements and key themes that are found in the New Testament. Books like 1 & 2 Corinthians are often avoided because we fail to recognize what the letter’s purpose is. When we do not know what the purpose is, then we will fail to read the letter in the proper light. For example, 1 John was written so that you may know you have eternal life (1 John 5:13). In the same way, the apostle Paul is writing to a messed up church that has a lot of problems and a lot of questions. How does a church get messed up like this? What is the key problem that has led to the troubles in the church? What is Paul going to teach them so that they can solve these difficulties? The answer to these questions is the theme of the book…
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