1 Corinthians 11:22 Meaning: Do You Despise God's Assembly?

Three words carry the weight here. First, church (ekklesia). It means the assembly of people called out by God. Not a building, the people themselves. When Paul says “the church of God,” he is reminding them that this gathering belongs to God, not to them. Second, despise (kataphroneo). It means to think down on something, to treat it as worthless. That is what they were doing to God’s assembly by turning it into a dinner party. Third, shame (kataischuno) means to disgrace or humiliate publicly. The poor were being put on display, their lack exposed for everyone to see. Paul is saying: you are not just rude. You are dishonoring people whom God has chosen and calling the gathering of His family worthless.

Christians across traditions have heard this verse as a sharp warning. The Reformed commentator Calvin saw it as a rebuke against using a sacred assembly for purposes foreign to its nature, like eating and drinking. Barnes, a Protestant voice, focused on the contempt for the church itself: their conduct treated the whole body of Christ with dishonor. The Methodist scholar Adam Clarke emphasized the shame put on the poor, those who could not contribute to the feast. He read Paul as defending the dignity of the congregation and the sacredness of the place of worship. Each tradition underscores the same truth: how we treat one another in worship reveals what we think of God’s assembly.

Some think Paul is simply forbidding eating food in church. But the issue is not the food itself. It is the contempt for the poor and the disregard for the sacred nature of the gathering. In fact, the deeper sin is that the wealthy Corinthians used the Lord’s Supper as a chance to eat and drink selfishly, humiliating those who had nothing. Paul’s solution is not “no food in church” but “share with those who have less.”

Look around your own church this week. Is there someone who stands alone? Someone who cannot afford the lunch after service or the coffee shop gathering? Paul’s question still echoes: do you have a home to eat in? Then why not use it to welcome somebody? The Lord’s Table is not a reward for the comfortable. It is the family meal of a people called out by God, where the last are as welcome as the first. This week, eat with someone who cannot pay you back. Let the church look more like God’s assembly and less like a private club.