Darian R. Lockett, Letters for the Church: Reading James, 1-2 Peter, 1-3 John, and Jude as Canon

Corinthians as “babes in Christ,” and himself as the “least of the apostles,” rhetorically deflating the hubris and attitudes of those in Corinth, who would elevate themselves above others and the least. Paul describes his own ministry in ways that identify with the least: “a slave to all, an orphan, a premature infant, impoverished, indebted, a laborer, hungry, naked, and thirsty” (p. 11). Paul’s work also witnesses the self-lowering of God in Christ who identifies with “the least.” This central feature of Paul’s Christology makes possible the church’s concern for the least because it is a church grounded in God’s very self-identification with the least. Thus, a proclamation of Pauline theology apart from concern for “the least,” is to engage in an abstraction alien to Paul’s own theology. Paul’s ministry of proclamation of Christ’s death and resurrection is the occasion to rightly attend to Paul’s exhortation for his communities to care for the least, marginal, and poor in their midst. Following the crucified and resurrected Christ is to be attentive to the needs of “the least” in our midst. It is to be possessed by a vision of God’s world, engaging in collections for care, remembering the poor and least, and bearing each other’s burdens. It is to be that redeemed community of believers, called the church, rooted in a set of narrative convictions about who God is in Jesus that makes possible such concern for the good of the least.