1 Corinthians 11
11
1So you have to try to live the way I live, and do the same sorts of things that I do, just like I try to live the way that Jesus Christ lived.#1 Corinthians 4:16; Philippians 3:17
Men and women in Christian meetings
2There is another thing I want to talk to you about now. I know that you always remember me, and you do the things I taught you. That makes me very happy. 3But I also want you to know this. Jesus Christ is the leader of every man, like he is the head one. And men are the leaders of women, like they are the head ones. And God is the head one of Jesus Christ.
4So think about that when you meet together, and think about what other people might reckon when they see what you do. If a man prays, or if he tells a message from God in your meeting, he can’t cover his head. If he covers his head, other people will reckon that he isn’t following his leader, and that will shame his leader, Jesus. 5But for women it is different. If a woman prays in your meeting, or if she tells a message from God, that woman has to cover her head. If she doesn’t cover her head, other people will reckon she isn’t following her leader, her husband, and that will shame him. You know, if somebody cuts off all the hair from a woman’s head, that will shame her. And like that, if a woman doesn’t cover her head in your meetings, she shames her husband. 6If she will not cover her head, maybe she has to cut off all her hair, right? No. If she does that, then she will shame herself. She can’t do that. And she can’t shame her husband either. So she has to cover her head in your meetings.
7You see, God made the man like himself, to show everyone that God is great and good. So a man can’t cover his head. He has to show that he respects God. And a man looks after his wife, and she shows how good her husband is, so she has to cover her head to show that she respects him.#Genesis 1:26-27 8Remember that God made the man first, then he made the woman. He took a part of that first man to make the first woman. God didn’t take a part of that first woman to make the man. 9And God didn’t make the first man to help the woman, but he made the first woman to help the man.#Genesis 2:18-23 10So a woman has to cover her head to show that she respects her husband as her leader. And, you know, God’s angel messengers can see everything we do.
11You see, we all belong to our leader Jesus. And in his family the women need the men, and the men need the women. 12It’s like this, God made the first woman by taking a part of the first man, but after that, every man was born from a woman. But really, everything comes from God.
13So if a woman in your meeting doesn’t cover her head when she prays to God, do you reckon that’s all right? You work it out for yourselves. 14It is usually like this. If a man has long hair, people will rubbish him. 15But if a woman has long hair, it is beautiful, and people will say she looks good. God gave her long hair to cover her.
16I know some people might want to argue with me about all of this, but I’m telling you that we always do it that way. It is our custom. All of God’s churches do it that way when they meet together.
The food we eat to remember that Jesus died for us
17There is something else now that I have to talk to you about. I’m not happy about what happens at your meetings. They are not good, they are bad. 18You see, some people told me what happens at your church meetings. They say that there are different groups among you, and each group argues with the other groups when you meet together. And I believe that some of that is true. 19Look, I know some of you will split up into groups, but when you do, you have to let God show you who is right.
20And when you meet together, you reckon you eat food together to remember that Jesus died for us. But you don’t really do that. You don’t even share your food with each other at that dinner, so you are not respecting Jesus. 21You bring your own food and drink, but nobody shares their food with anybody else. And none of you waits for anyone else. So some of you go hungry, while others get drunk. 22Listen. Each of you have your own home where you can eat and drink. But there are poor people that haven’t got any food at your meetings, and if you don’t share your food with them, you shame them. That is bad. You are rubbishing God’s people, his church. I’m not happy with you when you do that. I can’t say anything good about you.
23Listen. Our leader Jesus gave me this message, and I taught it to you. It is this.
One night our leader, Jesus, had dinner with his special workers, and on that same night, one of those followers turned against him and went to help Jesus’s enemies grab him. At that dinner, Jesus picked up some flat damper 24and thanked God for it. Then he broke it into bits and said, “This damper is my body. You see, I will let bad people break my body. I will do that for you. So whenever you eat this special meal, remember what I did for you.”
25And Jesus did something like that at the end of the dinner too. He picked up a cup of wine and said, “Drink from this cup. God has agreed to save people, and I will die so he can do that. My blood will come out, and it is like I’m using my blood to sign God’s new agreement with people, to say that they are not guilty of the bad things they did. So every time you have this special dinner and drink from this cup, remember that my blood came out, and that I died for you.”#Exodus 24:6-8; Jeremiah 31:31-34 That’s what Jesus said that night.
26You see, every time you eat that damper and drink from that cup you are saying that Jesus died for you. And you will keep on doing that until he comes back again.
27You see, you want to remember that Jesus died for you, so you eat that damper and you drink from that cup together. But if you do it in a bad way that doesn’t respect Jesus, you are guilty. You are just as guilty as those people that hurt Jesus’s body and made his blood come out.
28So, when you eat this meal together, first of all, you each have to think very carefully about yourselves, and the way you live your lives. Then, after you do that, you can eat that damper and you can drink from that cup. 29You see, if you don’t respect the body of Jesus when you eat that damper and drink from that cup, you are doing wrong, and God will judge you and punish you. 30That is the reason why a lot of you are weak and sick now, and some of your mob have died. 31But if we think carefully about ourselves and how we live, and if we are sorry for the wrong things we did, God will not punish us. 32But if God does punish us, he does it to teach us to do good things. So later, when God judges everyone in the world and punishes all the bad people, he will not punish us too.
33So, my Christian friends, this is what I’m telling you. Whenever you meet together to eat, to remember that Jesus died for you, you have to wait for each other to be ready. 34And don’t come to that meeting hungry. If you are hungry, eat something at home before you come to the meeting, so when you meet together, you will not do something wrong, and God will not punish you.
That’s all I want to say about this matter right now. There are some other things that I want to talk to you about, but I will wait until I come and visit you, and then we can sort them out.
Currently Selected:
1 Corinthians 11: PEV
Highlight
Share
Copy
Want to have your highlights saved across all your devices? Sign up or sign in
© 2021, Wycliffe Bible Translators, Inc. All rights reserved.
1 Corinthians 11
11
To Honor God
1-2It pleases me that you continue to remember and honor me by keeping up the traditions of the faith I taught you. All actual authority stems from Christ.
3-9In a marriage relationship, there is authority from Christ to husband, and from husband to wife. The authority of Christ is the authority of God. Any man who speaks with God or about God in a way that shows a lack of respect for the authority of Christ, dishonors Christ. In the same way, a wife who speaks with God in a way that shows a lack of respect for the authority of her husband, dishonors her husband. Worse, she dishonors herself—an ugly sight, like a woman with her head shaved. This is basically the origin of these customs we have of women wearing head coverings in worship, while men take their hats off. By these symbolic acts, men and women, who far too often butt heads with each other, submit their “heads” to the Head: God.
10-12Don’t, by the way, read too much into the differences here between men and women. Neither man nor woman can go it alone or claim priority. Man was created first, as a beautiful shining reflection of God—that is true. But the head on a woman’s body clearly outshines in beauty the head of her “head,” her husband. The first woman came from man, true—but ever since then, every man comes from a woman! And since virtually everything comes from God anyway, let’s quit going through these “who’s first” routines.
13-16Don’t you agree there is something naturally powerful in the symbolism—a woman, her beautiful hair reminiscent of angels, praying in adoration; a man, his head bared in reverence, praying in submission? I hope you’re not going to be argumentative about this. All God’s churches see it this way; I don’t want you standing out as an exception.
17-19Regarding this next item, I’m not at all pleased. I am getting the picture that when you meet together it brings out your worst side instead of your best! First, I get this report on your divisiveness, competing with and criticizing each other. I’m reluctant to believe it, but there it is. The best that can be said for it is that the testing process will bring truth into the open and confirm it.
20-22And then I find that you bring your divisions to worship—you come together, and instead of eating the Lord’s Supper, you bring in a lot of food from the outside and make pigs of yourselves. Some are left out, and go home hungry. Others have to be carried out, too drunk to walk. I can’t believe it! Don’t you have your own homes to eat and drink in? Why would you stoop to desecrating God’s church? Why would you actually shame God’s poor? I never would have believed you would stoop to this. And I’m not going to stand by and say nothing.
23-26Let me go over with you again exactly what goes on in the Lord’s Supper and why it is so centrally important. I received my instructions from the Master himself and passed them on to you. The Master, Jesus, on the night of his betrayal, took bread. Having given thanks, he broke it and said,
This is my body, broken for you.
Do this to remember me.
After supper, he did the same thing with the cup:
This cup is my blood, my new covenant with you.
Each time you drink this cup, remember me.
What you must solemnly realize is that every time you eat this bread and every time you drink this cup, you reenact in your words and actions the death of the Master. You will be drawn back to this meal again and again until the Master returns. You must never let familiarity breed contempt.
27-28Anyone who eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Master irreverently is like part of the crowd that jeered and spit on him at his death. Is that the kind of “remembrance” you want to be part of? Examine your motives, test your heart, come to this meal in holy awe.
29-32If you give no thought (or worse, don’t care) about the broken body of the Master when you eat and drink, you’re running the risk of serious consequences. That’s why so many of you even now are listless and sick, and others have gone to an early grave. If we get this straight now, we won’t have to be straightened out later on. Better to be confronted by the Master now than to face a fiery confrontation later.
33-34So, my friends, when you come together to the Lord’s Table, be reverent and courteous with one another. If you’re so hungry that you can’t wait to be served, go home and get a sandwich. But by no means risk turning this Meal into an eating and drinking binge or a family squabble. It is a spiritual meal—a love feast.
The other things you asked about, I’ll respond to in person when I make my next visit.
Currently Selected:
:
Highlight
Share
Copy
Want to have your highlights saved across all your devices? Sign up or sign in
THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved. Used by permission of NavPress. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers.