Verse 2
Unto the church of God which is at Corinth, even them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all that call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ in every place, their Lord and ours.
The church of God ... The church did not belong to the Corinthians but to God, unto whom they were set apart (sanctified) to serve God by reason of the fact that they were "in Christ."
In Christ ... denotes the status of all Christians, a relationship brought about through an obedient faith when they were baptized "into" him (Galatians 3:27; 1 Corinthians 12:13; and Romans 6:3). The epic importance of this phrase appears in the fact that it is used no less than 169 times in Paul's epistles.[1]
Called to be saints ... Again, "to be" is an unnecessary additive to the text. The Corinthian Christians were not merely candidates for sainthood but were in fact already entitled to this designation by virtue of their being in the spiritual body of Christ, "in him," and therefore possessing a complete identity with the Saviour.
With all that call upon the name ... makes this epistle applicable to the saints of all ages in every place and circumstance.
Lord Jesus Christ ... This use of the compound name JESUS CHRIST by Paul, and by the whole church, barely a quarter of a century after the crucifixion of Christ in A.D. 30 declares the historical accuracy of John's Gospel, which recorded the first usage of it by the Saviour himself in the great prayer of John 17, making it certain that "in Christ Jesus" is equivalent to "in thy name" of John 17:3,11,26.
Lord ... Likewise, this title of Jesus was not a development in the last first-century church but was firmly established by the time of Paul's writing here, having been used by Paul in his very first encounter with Jesus (Acts 9:5).
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