Photo by James Wheeler on Unsplash
Karen Hollis | February 4, 2024
Epiphany 5
I’m aware that Paul is a challenging read for many of us. Personally, I try not to take sides about Paul, rather I try to breathe into the crunchy bits, keep learning so that I can be fair to him and his context. So when we find ourselves feeling a bit defended or resistant or judgemental at Paul telling us how it is . . . I invite us into curiosity. Let us pray.
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be reflections of your word to us today, in Christ’s name we pray. Amen
Let’s remember first off that Paul is not writing to us; he’s writing to the church in Corinth in the middle of the 1st Century. He would be quite surprised to know that 2000 years later, halfway around the world, we are inviting the Holy Spirit to speak to us through his words. So, let’s first get curious about why he is saying these things. What is context of the church in Corinth? What’s going on with the community there? Why does Paul feel the need to write to them about these particular things?
For instance, Paul says to them “I may make the gospel free of charge, so as not to make full use of my rights in the gospel. For though I am free with respect to all, I have made myself a slave to all.”
As Paul walks into Corinth, he is entering a context that is different from the other communities he visits, because it is a Roman colony. The Corinthians understand themselves to be free for several reasons, but first and foremost, because they are Roman citizens and enjoy all the corresponding privileges. When travelling across the empire, safety was said to be guaranteed to anyone who declared, "civis Romanus sum." I am a Roman citizen. Not only was their safety guaranteed, those with the highest order of citizenship could marry, own property, vote, and hold office. Secondly, according to “popular philosophies of the day, people who [have] true knowledge and wisdom (as they [think] they [have]) [have] discovered true human freedom.” Furthermore, because they are now Christian, those who had previously been ‘under’ the Jewish law are now free from it.1 So we have all these layers of understanding about what it is to be free.
Through his continued teaching about the gospel, Paul invites them to go deeper, in this case, by using himself as an example. The freedom he enjoys is not freedom from rather freedom for. Freedom for the gospel. Through the dramatic transformation he experienced on the road to Damascus, Christ removed all the obstacles to him serving God and the gospel. Paul’s letters to the Corinthians tell us that this lesson is very challenging for them and takes some time for them to learn.
Serving in a Roman colony posed additional challenges for Paul’s ability to offer the gospel freely. Roman patronage, along with Roman imperial theology – a belief that Roman leaders are divine figures and enact the will of God on earth2 – was firmly established in that place. With Roman influence so entrenched, he is careful not to be bought. He does not accept patronage from the people there, and instead lives on the generosity of people from other places in his ministry.3 By keeping his relationships in Corinth focused exclusively on the gospel, he is able to freely teach and accompany those he’s called to serve.
Paul’s understanding of his calling goes beyond choice, deeper than obligation, to an experience of communion with God love that he discovered when Jesus saved him from his bitter life.4 In Christ he emptied himself so that in his words, he can be all things to all people. As lovely as this sounds, this language just doesn’t read well in our modern context. Trying to be all things to all people is a good way to burn out and make oneself crazy trying to meet everyone’s expectations . . . especially in ministry. However, if we dig down for the essence of what he is doing here, we find a man who is committed to prayerfully emptying himself of all barriers so that he can truly meet people where they are with the love of God. This is called kenosis.
Kenosis isn’t a word we use often . . . it refers to a self-emptying or self-limiting for the good of others. We can use our breath to think about kenosis: breathing out and breathing in . . . breathing out our own agendas . . . and breathing in spaciousness that makes room for others; breathing out our egos (which are not bad, but often overstep) and breathing in the light of Christ. It is the practice of emptying ourselves to make more room for Christ’s light, who helps us meet people where they are with the love of God, expecting nothing in return.
Paul made a life out of kenosis. He prayerfully limited himself so that Christ could increase in him and guide him with the young church of Corinth and many others. It seems his relationship with Christ in this way was the essential ingredient he needed to serve the way of Jesus for the remainder of his life.
As I wrote my sermon this week, I couldn’t help but see Lent in the distance . . . it’s not actually so far off – only a week and a half, but unless you’ve been planning liturgies and “Shrove Pancake” dinners, you might not have seen it coming. Kenosis can be a beautiful Lenten practice, using the breath to explore drawing the self back and making room within. More generally, I invite you to begin thinking about what would make Lent meaningful for you – is it putting down something that stations itself between you and God? Is it bringing in beauty? How will you shape your season of Lent this year? We all have a bit of time to think about it. Thanks be to God.
1 NT Wright. Paul for Everyone: 1 Corinthians p. 114.
2 https://carmichaeldigitalprojects.org/hist447/exhibits/show/roman-imperial-theology--a-stu/the-ideological-glue-of-roman- Feb 3/24
3 Crossan and Reed. In Search of Paul. p. 333.
4 NT Wright. p. 111.