9 For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. 11 Whether, then, it is I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed.
This portion of the chapter speaks to Paul's humble-ness, and his ability to "big-picture" think about his place. He has a keen awareness of what his life means in total. I think part of the reason he works so hard for Christ, is that he has so much in his past that he doesn't like. Not that its a scorecard mentality, but a gratefulness for what Christ has done for him.
His mentality should be what we all strive for.
The other thing I REALLY like in this chapter is how he points directly at witnesses that saw Christ after his resurrection. Then, he states how most of them are still alive. That's HUGE! It's really saying, "go talk to em. they saw it for themselves. they can give you a first-hand, eye witness account."
tp
6 After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep.
ReplyDeleteThis part I liked as you noted. It is a good illustration of the fact that this resurrection is not just being written about by a few but has been observed by many and can be corroborated as fact. He's telling them to feel free to check, I speak the truth. The words he wrote live on all these years later but a little statement like that is helpful for someone like me in 2017.
knut