What Does 1 Corinthians 12:5 Mean?
There are portions of service, but the same Lord.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord.THE KEY
The same Lord holds the differences together because each difference is a form of service.
THE MEANING
Your service takes different forms, and the same Lord holds those forms together. The word translated “administrations” is διακονία (diakonia), meaning service; its word family also names a servant and the act of serving. The difference is in how service takes shape, not in who the Lord is.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Different ways of serving do not mean you belong to a different Lord or that your service must look like someone else’s to belong.
THE ROOT
διακονιῶν
diakoniōn
GROWS FROM
διακον-
diakon-
Service or serving.
The Greek word-family joins service, servant, and serving: διακονία (diakonia), διάκονος (diakonos), and διακονέω (diakoneō). So the verse’s differences are distinct forms of service held under the same Lord.
ALSO GROWS
diakonos: Servant; one who serves.
διάκονος
The servant belongs to the same word-family as the different services named here.
diakoneō: To serve or minister.
διακονέω
This verb names service in action, showing that the varied administrations are ways of serving.
THE PATTERN
Different capacities and forms of service can come from one source and belong to one shared purpose.
And I, behold, I have given with him Aholiab, the son of Ahisamach, of the staff of Dan. And in the heart of all the wise of heart I have set wisdom, that they may make all that I have commanded you.We have gifts that differ according to the favor given to us. If prophecy, let us prophesy in proportion to trust.As each has received a gift, serve it to one another as good stewards of the many-colored favor of God.THE THREAD
For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his living soul as a ransom for many.The Greek verb translated “minister” belongs to the same διακον- (diakon-) family as “administrations” here. Mark places the Son of Man’s own work within that service-family, opening the many services of this verse as expressions of a pattern already present in the Lord.
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