...there are times when a critic truly risks something, and that is in the discovery and defense of the new. The world is often unkind to new talents, new creations. The new needs friends.
--Anton Ego, Ratatouille.
I read this verse probably 4 times before I thought to look up the definition of apostle (the 2nd one listed). It's not easy to be an early adopter (to borrow from techie parlance) of anything. Karen generally forbids me to buy the first generation of any new trinket. Remembering that Paul is writing here as one of the first Christians, made the entire passage a bit more understandable.
It's easy for a shall we say, "less-diligent" Christians like myself to forget that there was no precedence for Paul and the other apostles who were the first to do some of the very radical things they did for the sake of the gospel. They didn't just defend and champion the despised and lowest in society, they joined them. And, in his own words, "When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered, we speak kindly." Who did that? Who does that now? Darwin would have nosebleeds.
It's unlikely anyone up until then was doing this kind of thing. And if they were, it's even more unlikely they were doing it for an express purpose like bringing this type of good news: that God sent his son, in human form, to Earth to live, teach and ultimately suffer persecution, betrayal, humiliation and torture for no good Earthly reason, but to atone for the sin that prevents you or I from having the God-intended relationship with Him!
From the outside looking in, it's pretty easy to understand how it must've looked like "a spectacle" performed by "fools" This doesn't even account for "foolishness" like voluntarily-upside down crucifixion.
But all that is not for chest-thumping. In verse 16, Paul urges us "to be imitators of me" As crazy as it may look on the outside, it is good and correct for us to obey, suffer gladly, to be cast among the least of us, and to bless our persecutors for Jesus' sake...
Neither here nor there, but I found it kind of humanizing to see that, Paul felt the costs of his early discipleship as he writes in verse 12, "...we grow weary from the work of our own hands."
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