Reading Someone Else's Mail

 

This morning for our "Bible time," as my wife calls morning devotions, I goofed a little and had us read the wrong passage. We were supposed to read 1 Corinthians 2:1-16. We actually read 2 Corinthians 2:1-16. As our previous pastor, Jeremy Wester, pointed out in a sermon about Philemon, reading the Epistles is reading other people's mail. We're hopping into the middle of a conversation, which can be more than a little baffling when it's also a difficult conversation. Paul's dialog with the church at Corinth tended to be that way. Hopping into the middle of the middle, as we did this morning, can be really baffling!
 
This is not the part where I tell the world I had some moment of clarity and revelation and now know exactly what Paul meant and how it applies to our circumstances today. Not even a little. I didn't know what to do with it this morning. I still don't. 
 
This is where I say it's okay to start reading a passage of Scripture, not know what to do with it, get all the way to the end, and still not know what to do with it. Sometimes the meaning of a passage of Scripture seems to be pretty clear. Sometimes not. Sometimes we can know what all the words mean individually, but still end the reading baffled by what they mean together. Again, that's okay. You can come back to it later, read around it, and ask for help. Praying about a passage you have trouble understanding is always a good idea. In the case of 2 Corinthians 2, I'd also start by reading in context. Paul's particular point in this passage would certainly make a lot more sense if I had read the whole letter recently. It can also help to break a longer passage into shorter sections. Make sense of each segment individually, then put them all together.
 

 
 

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