Paul concludes his contentious letter to the Corinthians by writing them about his plans and about the people whose friendship they hold in common.

First of all, his plans. Paul intends to visit the Corinthians, although he can’t tell them exactly when he will arrive. He will come to them, he says, “after I go through Macedonia.” The important thing is not the timing of the visit, however, but its duration. “I do not want to see you now and make only a passing visit; I hope to spend some time with you, if the Lord permits.”

I have often noticed, in emails and instant messages over the internet, how difficult it is to convey my feelings through only the written word. Sorrow, sarcasm, wry humor – all these things require a tone of voice, an arched eyebrow, a sly smile. They all require, in other words, personal presence. It is through our nonverbal communication that we express what the words of our verbal communications really mean.

Paul’s letter to the Corinthians has often said some harsh things to and unflattering things about them. No doubt Paul wanted to spend extensive time with them to let them know the depth of his personal feelings for them, how much he loved them as his children. He was angry with them, yes, but with a parental anger. If he was with them personally, they would understand how quickly his anger could turn into joy and love and pride of spiritual paternity.

For Paul was indeed proud of them and glad for their conversion, and he loved them deeply and richly. They were, after all, his people, his spiritual family and nation. Throughout today’s Scripture Reading, Paul mentions many names: Timothy, Apollos, Priscilla and Aquila, Stephanas, Fortunatus, and Achaicus. Some of these people were known by the Corinthians. The first four in my list, for instance, were instrumental in bringing the Corinthians to faith and in nurturing them spiritually. The final three were themselves members of the Corinthian congregation. What united them were a common faith in God, a common belief in Christ, and a common experience of the Holy Spirit. Though now separated from one another by long distances, they had more in common with one another than with their current neighbors.

To be a Christian is to live in constant fellowship with other Christians, both at home and abroad. Often, in my travels, I have had the opportunity to spend time with Christians in other countries. We are separated by ethnicity, language, and geography – all three, powerful forces. But we are united by a force more powerful: “the grace of the Lord Jesus.” It is ultimately this bond, this commonality, that Paul appeals to in his many arguments with the Corinthians. Because we are united by Christ, we should not be divided by any other thing.

And so we conclude Paul’s letter to the Corinthians. We have learned about the supremacy of Christ, the priority of his cross, and the finality of his resurrection. We have seen that we should act in love toward our friends in all things – from how we eat to how we speak. We have learned, in a nutshell, to keep first things first.

St. Augustine once said that in essential matters, Christians should have unity; in nonessential matters, they should have liberty; but in all matters, they should have charity – that is, love. “My love to all of you in Christ Jesus. Amen.”

An abrupt transition occurs in 1 Corinthians 16:1-4. Heretofore, Paul has been speaking in lofty theological terms about lofty theological themes. Now, however, he offers four verses of advice on the nuts-and-bolts mechanics of giving. The transition is, if you think about it, a marvelous comment on the Christian life, for the life of faith includes everything from the sublime to the mundane. No aspect of life is untouched by God’s grace. Our ideas must change, and so must our habits – even our spending habits.

“Now about the collection for God’s people….”

In the early church, a dispute arose as to whether a person must become a Jew in order to become a Christian. Christianity is, of course, Jewish. Our Old Testament is the Hebrew Bible. Jesus himself was a fully observant Jew, as were all the writers of the New Testament, except Luke, who was a Gentile. Although the early church dispute is not a live issue for us today, in the first century, it nearly drove the church apart. As you can read in Acts 15, a church council met in Jerusalem and decided that Gentile converts were not required to under circumcision, eat a kosher diet, or in any way observe the Jewish ceremonial law.

Reflecting on this council, Paul writes of the division of missionary labor that resulted from the Jerusalem Council: “James, Peter and John, those reputed to be pillars, gave me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship when they recognized the grace given to me. They agreed that we should go to the Gentiles, and they to the Jews. All they asked was that we should continue to remember the poor, the very thing I was eager to do” (Galatians 2:9-10).

The collection for God’s people – especially the poor Christians in Jerusalem – was Paul’s way of keeping his promise. Not only did this collection demonstrate Christian concern for the social well-being of the poor, but it also demonstrated the love of Gentile Christians for Jewish Christians. The offering was a way of supplying needs and bringing people together. In a first-century world where ethnic and religious differences were sharp and strong, and in a church that was still trying to figure out how to be united in spite of these differences, a generous offering for the Jewish poor from Gentile converts would go a long way toward uniting the church.

And, we might add, toward facilitating exuberant worship. “This service that you perform is not only supplying the needs of God’s people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God. Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, men will praise God for the obedience that accompanies your confession of the gospel of Christ, and for your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone else. And in their prayers for you their hearts will go out to you, because of the surpassing grace God has given you. Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!” (2 Corinthians 9:12-15).

As I already wrote, the Jewish-Gentile division in the early church is no longer a live issue for us today, but there are still poor people in our church and in our community. We are, let’s face it, a comparatively wealthy church, and our affluence sometimes makes the poor or the homeless or the otherwise “different” uncomfortable in our presence. What better way to supply their needs, welcome them into our community, and inspire them to worship God than by blessing them materially?

Many years ago, Rocky Aoki – the founder and owner of Benihana Restaurants – remarked, “Life is a one-hundred yard dash with a brick wall at the finish line.” With these words, he expressed a sentiment many have when they have no hope beyond this life. “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die,” is how Rocky Aoki might have put it if he had lived in Paul’s day.

All of us must vote in what Bruce Thornton calls “the bleak democracy of death.” That is a fact which we cannot change. But we need not all vote for Rocky Aoki’s candidate. Paul, you see, offered a hopeful alternative. Christ rose again, and so can we if we put our faith in him.

Paul believed, as do all Christians, that death is not the brick wall at the end of life’s race. Rather, it is the thin tape stretched across the finish line that we must run through if we are to participate in the victory celebration. To switch metaphors, Paul believed that death is a nap, a short sleep from which we will awake when Christ comes to judge the living and the dead.

And when Christ returns, “we will all be changed.” Here is another metaphor for death and resurrection. It is a change of garments – “For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.”

All of these metaphors point to a single truth: Death is a fact of life, but not the only fact of life. The great fact of life is that “Death has been swallowed up in victory” by Christ’s resurrection from the dead. Death, therefore, is not to be feared by those who have put their hope in Christ for a better life.

In the seventeenth century, John Donne wrote a marvelous “holy sonnet” addressed to death. Donne, the dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, lived and ministered during the horrible years when three waves of bubonic plague devastated the population of London. Rather than flee to the countryside for safety, Donne remained in London, preaching the comforting gospel to those in imminent peril of plague. In his “holy sonnet,” he wrote:

 Death be not proud, though some have called thee

Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so,

For, those, whom thou think’st, thou dost overthrow,

Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me;

From rest and sleep, which by thy pictures be,

Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,

And soonest our best men with thee do go,

Rest of their bones and soul’s delivery.

Thou art slave to Fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,

And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,

And poppy, or charms can make us sleep as well,

And better than thy stroke, why swell’st thou then?

One short sleep past, we wake eternally,

And death shall be no more, Death thou shalt die.

For those who have put their faith in Christ, all that separates this life from the next is a comma, a brief pause to catch a breath. We live, we die, we rise again. In Christ, death is not so much to be feared as pitied, for in the end, death will die, but we will awake to the glorious morning of resurrection.