But I urge you all, brothers, for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ, to agree in what you say, and not to allow factions among you, but to be perfectly united in mind and judgment.

And I did baptize the members of the household of Stephanas too; I do not know whether I baptized anyone else besides.

For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the good news??ut not with fine language, or the cross of Christ might seem an empty thing.

Where now is your philosopher? Your scribe? Your reasoner of today? Has not God made a fool of the world's wisdom?

For since in God's providence the world with all its wisdom did not come to know God, God chose, through the folly of the gospel message, to save those who had faith in him.

For consider, brothers, what happened when God called you. Not many of you were what men call wise, not many of you were influential, not many were of high birth.

So when I came to you, brothers, I did not come and tell you the secret purpose of God in superior, philosophical language,

and my teaching and message were not put in plausible, philosophical language, but they were attended with convincing spiritual power,

so that your faith might rest, not on human philosophy, but on the power of God.

Yet there is a wisdom that we impart when we are with people who have a mature faith, but it is not what this world calls wisdom, nor what the authorities of this world, doomed as they are to pass away, would call so.

But the Spirit we have received is not that of the world, but the Spirit that comes from God, which we have to make us realize the blessings God has given us.

These disclosures we impart, not in the set phrases of human philosophy, but in words the Spirit teaches, giving spiritual truth a spiritual form.

A material man will not accept what the Spirit of God offers. It seems mere folly to him, and he cannot understand it, because it takes spiritual insight to see its true value.

So, for my part, brothers, I could not treat you as spiritual persons; I had to treat you just as creatures of flesh and blood, as babies in Christian living.

I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. Why, you are not ready for it now,

for you are still worldly. For when there are still jealousy and quarrels among you, are you not worldly and living on a merely human level?

For when one man says, "I am a follower of Paul," and another, "I am a follower of Apollos," are you not simply human?

I for my part care very little about being examined by you or by any human court. I do not even offer myself for investigation.

For while my conscience does not trouble me at all, that does not prove that I am innocent. It is the Lord who must examine me.

Do not form any premature judgments, therefore, but wait until the Lord comes back. For he will light up the darkness that now hides things and show what the motives in people's minds are, and then everyone will get from God the praise he deserves.

For who sees anything special in you? And what have you got that you have not been given? But if it has been given you, why do you boast as though it had not been?

I do not write this to you to make you ashamed, but for your instruction as my dear children.

For no matter how many guides you may have in the Christian life, you will not have many fathers; for in this matter of union with Christ, I became your father, through preaching the good news to you.

Some of you seem to think that I am not coming to visit you, and are putting on airs about it.

But I am coming very soon to see you, if the Lord is willing, and then I will find out, not what these conceited people have to say, but what they can actually do.

For the reign of God is not a matter of words but of power.

Certainly this is nothing for you to boast of. Do you not know that a little yeast will affect all the dough?

So let us keep the festival, not with old yeast nor with the yeast of vice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of purity and truth.

I wrote you in my letter not to associate with immoral people??10 not that you are to have nothing whatever to do with the immoral people of the world, any more than with its greedy and grasping people or idolaters, for then you would have to leave the world altogether.

What I meant was that you are not to associate with anyone who is supposed to be a Christian brother, and yet is immoral or greedy or idolatrous or abusive or drunken or grasping??ith such a person you must not even eat.

For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not your part to judge those who are inside the church,

Do you not know that the Christians are to be the judges of the world? And if the world is to come before you for judgment, are you unfit to decide the most trivial cases?

Do you not know that we are to be the judges of angels, to say nothing of ordinary matters?

I ask it to shame you. Has it come to this, that there is not a single wise man among you who could settle a disagreement between one brother and another,

Having lawsuits with one another at all means your utter failure, to begin with. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be robbed?

Do you not know that wrongdoers will not have any share in God's kingdom? Do not let anyone mislead you. People who are immoral or idolaters or adulterers or sensual or given to unnatural vice

or thieves or greedy??runkards, abusive people, robbers??ill not have any share in God's kingdom.

I may do anything I please, but not everything I may do is good for me. I may do anything I please; but I am not going to let anything master me.

It is true, food is meant for the stomach, and the stomach for the food, but God will put an end to both of them. But the body is not meant for immorality, but for the service of the Lord, and the Lord is for the body to serve.

Do you not know that your bodies are parts of Christ's body? Am I then to take away from Christ parts of his body, and make them parts of a prostitute's? Never!

Or do you not know that a man who has to do with a prostitute makes one body with her? For "The two," says the Scripture, "shall become physically one."

Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the holy Spirit that is within you, which you have received from God? Besides, you are not your own;

You must not refuse each other what is due, unless you agree to do so for a while, to devote yourselves to prayer, and then to come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you through your lack of self-control.

But I mean this as a concession, not a command.

To those already married my instructions are??nd they are not mine, but the Lord's??hat a wife is not to separate from her husband.

If she does separate, she must remain single or else become reconciled to him. And a husband must not divorce his wife.

To other people I would say, though not as Christ's command, if a Christian has a wife who is not a believer, and she is willing to live with him, he must not divorce her,

and a woman who has a husband who is not a believer, but is willing to live with her, must not divorce her husband.

For the husband who is not a believer is consecrated through union with his wife, and the woman who is not a believer is consecrated through union with her Christian husband, for otherwise your children would be unblessed, but, as it is, they are consecrated.

But if the one who is not a believer wishes to separate, let the separation take place. In such cases the brother or sister is not a slave; God has called you to live in peace.

If a man was circumcised when he was called, he must not try to alter it. If a man was uncircumcised when he was called, he must not have himself circumcised.

Being circumcised or being uncircumcised does not make any difference; all that matters is keeping God's commands.

You have been bought and paid for; you must not let yourselves become slaves to men.

If you are united to a wife, do not seek to be released. If you are not, do not seek a wife.

and those who mourn as though they did not mourn, and those who are glad as though they were not glad, and those who buy anything as though they did not own it,

and those who mix in the world, as though they were not absorbed in it. For the present shape of the world is passing away.

It is for your benefit that I say this, not to put a halter on you, but to promote good order, and to secure your undivided devotion to the Lord.

But if a man thinks he is not acting properly toward the girl to whom he is engaged, if his passions are too strong, and that is what ought to be done, let him do as he pleases; it is no sin; let them be married.

If a man thinks he has acquired some knowledge, he does not yet know it as well as he ought to know it.

For supposing there are so-called gods in heaven or on earth??nd indeed there are plenty of such gods and lords??6 yet for us there is just one God, the Father, who is the source of all things, and for whom we live, and just one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom everything was made and through whom we live.

But it is not everyone that has this knowledge; for some, through being long accustomed to idols, still eat meat that has been sacrificed to them as really offered to an idol, and their consciences, being oversensitive, are troubled.

But food is not going to affect our standing with God. We are none the worse if we do not eat it, and none the better if we do.

But you must take care that this right of yours does not prove a hindrance to the overscrupulous.

For if somebody sees you, who are intelligent about this matter, attending a dinner in an idol's temple, will not he, with his sensitive conscience, be led to eat meat that is offered to idols?

Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you not the product of my work in the Lord's service?

If I am not an apostle to other people, I certainly am one to you, for you yourselves, in your relation to the Lord, are the certificate of my apostleship.

Have we not a right to our food and drink?

Have we not a right to take a Christian wife about with us, like the rest of the apostles and the Lord's brothers and Cephas?

What soldier ever pays his expenses out of his own pay? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat any of the grapes? Who tends a flock and does not get any of the milk?

Am I saying only what men say? Does not the Law say so too?

For in the Law of Moses it reads, "You shall not muzzle an ox that is treading out the grain." Is it about the oxen that God is concerned?

Is he not clearly speaking in our interests? Of course this law was written in our interests, because the plowman ought to plow, and the thresher to thresh, in the expectation of sharing in the crop.

If others enjoy such rights over you, have we not a still better claim? But, you say, we have never availed ourselves of this right. No, we will stand anything rather than put any hindrance in the way of the good news of the Christ.

Do you not know that those who do the work about the Temple get their living from the Temple, and those who attend to the altar divide the sacrifices with the altar?

But I have not availed myself of any of these rights. And I am not writing this now so that I may become an illustration of this; I had rather die than do that. No one shall deprive me of this boast of mine.

As far as preaching the good news is concerned, that is nothing for me to boast of, for I cannot help doing it. For I am ruined if I do not preach.

What pay then do I get? Why, that in my preaching I can offer the good news without cost, and so not take full advantage of my rights as a preacher.

To the Jews I have become like a Jew, to win Jews over; to men under the Law I have become like a man under the Law, though I am not myself under the Law, so as to win over those who are under the Law.

To those who have no law I have become like a man without any law??hough I am not without the law of God, but under the law of Christ??o as to win over those who are without any law.

Do you not know that in a race the runners all compete, but only one wins the prize? That is the way you must run, so as to win.

So that is the way I run, unswervingly. That is the way I fight, not punching the air.

But I beat and bruise my body and make it my slave, so that after I have called others to the contest I may not be disqualified myself.

For I would not have you forget, brothers, that though our forefathers were all protected by the cloud, and all passed safely through the sea,

Now these things happened to warn us, so that we should not long for what is evil as they did.

You must not become idolaters, like some of them, for the Scripture says, "The people sat down to eat and drink and got up to dance."

Let us not practice immorality, like some of them, twenty-three thousand of whom fell dead in one day,

Let us not try the Lord's patience too far, as some of them did, for they were killed for it by the snakes.

You must not grumble, as some of them did, for they were destroyed for it by the destroying angel.

It is no superhuman temptation that you have had. And God can be depended on, not to let you be tried beyond your strength, but when temptation comes, to give you a way out of it, so that you can withstand it.

Does not the consecrated cup which we bless mean that in drinking it we share in the blood of Christ? Does not the bread that we break mean that in eating it we share in the body of Christ?

Think of the Israelites' practices. Do not those who eat what is sacrificed have divine fellowship at the sacrificial altar?

No, but that what the heathen sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God, and I do not want you to have fellowship with demons.

We are free to do anything, but not everything is good for us. We are free to do anything, but not everything builds up character.

his scruples, I say, not yours. For why should my liberty of action be limited by another's scruples?

You must not be hindrances to Jews or Greeks or to the church of God either,

just as I for my part try to please everyone in all I do, not aiming at my own advantage, but at that of people generally, in order that they may be saved.

For if a woman will not wear a veil, let her cut off her hair too. But if it is a disgrace for a woman to have her hair cut off or her head shaved, let her wear a veil.

For a man ought not to wear anything on his head, for he is the image of God and reflects his glory; while woman is the reflection of man's glory.

For man was not made from woman, but woman from man,

and man was not created for woman, but woman was for man.