The comforting words in our Bible verse today are the very last words that the Apostle Paul wrote in his letter to the people in Corinth, a city in Greece. Paul visited the people of Corinth, called “Corinthians”, and lived with them for over a year as part of a missionary journey. Because of his extended stay with them, he knew the Corinthians very well. He saw their struggle against immorality and sin and knew how desperately they needed to see their wrong-doing and hear comfort of God’s Word.

In this verse we see the unfathomable complexity of God: one God but three persons. We refer to this as the Trinity. Paul uses just one word to show us the work that each part of the Trinity does.

Jesus, who is fully God and fully man, was born into the world on Christmas Day. The word that Paul uses to describe Jesus is “grace.” Grace is love that is undeserved. The work of Jesus Christ was to live a perfect life in our place, and then suffer and die on the cross in our place, and then give us, though undeserved, the gift of heaven that HE earned! We do not deserve the gift of heaven, but have been given life because of Jesus’ amazing grace.
The word that Paul chose for God the Father is “love.” Oh, what love God has for us—that he gave up his only Son, Jesus, to die in our place! Despite all of our sins, God still loves us and wants us to come home to him in heaven.

God the Holy Spirit, who came to the disciples on that first Pentecost, lives in our hearts and prepares us to serve God by serving others. The word to summarize the work of the Holy Spirit is “fellowship.” When we think of “fellowship,” we think of people coming together. But in this case, the Holy Spirit “brings us together” with Jesus first. We are first brought to fellowship with Jesus Christ, and then, by the continued work of the Holy Spirit, we also have fellowship with other believers.

We are just like the long-ago people of Corinth! We daily struggle against our sins, and we daily need the power of God’s forgiveness in Christ. God is holy and just. Through his perfection we are given the gift of eternal life in heaven. May we find comfort in these words! Through the Word we are daily reminded that we have been freely given grace, love, fellowship, and eternal life. May we gladly share these gifts that our God gave us with everyone.