Brethren, even a covenant made by a man –to borrow an illustration from daily life– when once formally sanctioned is not liable to be set aside or added to.
And I desire you to know, brethren, that I have many a time intended to come to you –though until now I have been disappointed– in order that among you also I might gather some fruit from my labours, as I have already done among the rest of the Gentile nations.
But if our unrighteousness sets God's righteousness in a clearer light, what shall we say? (Is God unrighteous –I speak in our everyday language– when He inflicts punishment?
your human infirmity leads me to employ these familiar figures–and just as you once surrendered your faculties into bondage to Impurity and ever-increasing disregard of Law, so you must now surrender them into bondage to Righteousness ever advancing towards perfect holiness.
If from merely human motives I have fought with wild beasts in Ephesus, what profit is it to me? If the dead do not rise, let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we are to die.