Paul’s Letters Bible Trivia Questions

Easy New Testament — Paul’s Letters

According to Ephesians 1:4–5, before the foundation of the world God chose believers to be what?

1. AHoly and blameless before him, having predestined them for adoption as sons.Correct
2. BWitnesses to the nations who would spread the gospel.
3. CServants of the law until the fullness of time came.
4. DJustified by their faith foreseen from eternity.

Answer: Holy and blameless before him, having predestined them for adoption as sons.

Ephesians 1:4–5 · ESV

Paul stacks the terms deliberately. The choosing happens in Christ before the foundation of the world, the goal is holiness and blamelessness, and the predestining is unto adoption as sons. He then names the standard by which the whole thing was decided, the purpose of God's will, and the end for which it was done, the praise of his glorious grace.

Ephesians 1:4–6.

Why not this one. This is the view that God elected those he saw in advance would believe, and it can seem to relieve the difficulty of the passage. Paul locates the reason elsewhere: according to the purpose of his will, in verse 5, and to the praise of his grace in verse 6, with nothing foreseen in the believer as the ground.

Medium New Testament — Paul’s Letters

In Romans 16:1–2, Paul commends Phoebe, a servant of the church in which place?

1. ACenchreaeCorrect
2. BCorinth
3. CEphesus
4. DPhilippi

Answer: Cenchreae

Romans 16:1–2 · ESV

Paul commends Phoebe warmly, calls her a servant of her congregation and a patron of many including himself, and asks the Roman believers to welcome her and help her in whatever she may need. She is honored plainly for genuine service to the churches.

Romans 16:1–2, opening the long list of greetings that closes the letter and names more than two dozen believers at Rome.

Why not this one. Cenchreae was the eastern harbor town serving Corinth, and Paul wrote Romans from that region, but he names the smaller port rather than the city itself as the church Phoebe served.

Hard New Testament — Paul’s Letters

Which letter was written in part to steady a young church grieving over members who had died before Christ returned?

1. A1 ThessaloniansCorrect
2. BPhilippians
3. C1 Corinthians
4. DTitus

Answer: 1 Thessalonians

1 Thessalonians 4:13–18 · ESV

The Thessalonians feared that believers who had already died would somehow miss the coming of the Lord. Paul answers that the dead in Christ will rise first, that they will not be at any disadvantage, and he tells the church to encourage one another with these words.

1 Thessalonians 4:13–18, written so that these believers would not mourn in the manner of those who have no hope at all.

Why not this one. Paul does weigh living against dying in Philippians, but as his own prospect while in chains awaiting a verdict. That letter answers no congregational grief over members who had died.

Easy New Testament — Paul’s Letters

In Romans 13:1, on what ground does Paul tell every person to be subject to the governing authorities?

1. AThere is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by GodCorrect
2. BThe churches had been granted legal protection under the laws of Rome
3. CBelievers remain bound to the civil statutes given through Moses
4. DThe magistrates of that day were furthering the spread of the gospel

Answer: There is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God

Romans 13:1 · ESV

Submission to civil rulers rests on God’s ordering of the world, not on whether a given ruler is agreeable. Paul goes on to call the magistrate God’s servant for good, one who bears the sword to punish the wrongdoer, and on that basis requires taxes, respect and honor.

Romans 13:1–7, written to Christians living under an emperor who was no friend of the church.

Why not this one. Paul makes no appeal to legal privilege or favorable treatment. His ground is theological, which is exactly why the command still holds where the state is indifferent or hostile.

Medium New Testament — Paul’s Letters

What are the “Pastoral Epistles”?

1. A1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, and Titus.Correct
2. B1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, and Philemon.
3. C1 Timothy, Titus, and Philemon.
4. D2 Timothy, Titus, and Philemon.

Answer: 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, and Titus.

The three earn the title because they deal with how a church is ordered rather than with a congregation's particular crisis: who may hold office, how widows and elders are handled, what sound doctrine is and who is to guard it. Timothy is left at Ephesus and Titus in Crete, each with instructions to appoint qualified men. The label itself is not ancient; it came into common use in the eighteenth century.

1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, and Titus; see 1 Timothy 1:3 and Titus 1:5.

Why not this one. Philemon is the other letter Paul sends to a named individual, so it groups naturally with the two to Timothy. It says nothing about qualifications, appointment or church order, however; it is a personal appeal about one runaway slave.

Hard New Testament — Paul’s Letters

According to 2 Thessalonians 2:1–4, what must happen before the day of the Lord, which some had wrongly told the church had already come?

1. AThe rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealedCorrect
2. BThe dead in Christ are raised and the living caught up to meet him
3. CThe temple at Jerusalem is rebuilt and its sacrifices restored
4. DThe full number of the Gentiles comes in and all Israel is saved

Answer: The rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed

2 Thessalonians 2:1–4 · ESV

The church had been shaken by a report, perhaps by a letter forged in Paul’s name, that the day of the Lord had already arrived. Paul steadies them by naming what has plainly not yet happened: the apostasy, and the unveiling of the man of lawlessness who exalts himself against God.

2 Thessalonians 2:1–4, followed by Paul’s reminder that he had told them these things while he was still with them.

Why not this one. That is a real event Paul describes, in 1 Thessalonians 4:16–17, but he never lists it here as the sign that must precede the day. His stated precondition is the rebellion and the lawless one.

Easy New Testament — Paul’s Letters

In Galatians 2:16, Paul insists a person is justified by what?

1. AFaith in Jesus Christ, not by works of the law.Correct
2. BSincere repentance combined with baptism.
3. CWorks of the law performed in the right spirit.
4. DObservance of the Jewish festivals and Sabbath.

Answer: Faith in Jesus Christ, not by works of the law.

Galatians 2:16 · ESV

The setting is a confrontation. Peter had eaten freely with Gentile believers at Antioch and then drew back when men came from James, and Paul says he opposed him to his face because he was not walking in step with the gospel. Verse 16 is what Paul said to him, and he repeats the denial of works of the law three times in one sentence.

Galatians 2:16, following the Antioch incident in 2:11–14.

Why not this one. This is the sophisticated version of the error, and it can sound like a fair-minded correction of legalism. Paul's negative is absolute, though: it is not the wrong attitude toward the law's works that fails to justify but the works themselves, whatever the spirit behind them.

Medium New Testament — Paul’s Letters

In Romans 16:7, how does Paul describe Andronicus and Junia?

1. AAs his kinsmen and fellow prisoners, who were in Christ before himCorrect
2. BAs fellow workers who risked their own necks for his life
3. CAs the first convert in Asia to belong to Christ
4. DAs workers in the Lord who had labored much among the Gentiles

Answer: As his kinsmen and fellow prisoners, who were in Christ before him

Romans 16:7 · ESV

Paul greets this pair as relatives who had shared imprisonment with him and who had come to Christ before he did. It is a warm and specific commendation of long service and real suffering for the gospel, given without stint in a public letter.

Romans 16:7, among the greetings closing the letter, where Paul names both men and women who had served the churches.

Why not this one. That description belongs to Prisca and Aquila four verses earlier. Andronicus and Junia are commended on different grounds: kinship, shared chains, and priority in Christ.

Hard New Testament — Paul’s Letters

In 2 Corinthians, what ironic title does Paul give the rival teachers who had impressed the Corinthians and disparaged his ministry?

1. ASuper-apostlesCorrect
2. BThe circumcision party
3. CThose who mutilate the flesh
4. DSavage wolves

Answer: Super-apostles

2 Corinthians 11:5; 12:11 · ESV

Paul twice says he is not in the least inferior to these men, and the title drips with irony. Their letters of recommendation and imposing speech had won the Corinthians, so Paul answers not by matching them but by boasting in his weaknesses, his beatings and his imprisonments.

2 Corinthians 11:5 and 12:11, within the so-called fool’s boast that runs through chapters 10–12.

Why not this one. That is a real group Paul names, at Galatians 2:12 and Titus 1:10. But it is not the label he attaches to the rivals at Corinth, whose challenge was to his apostolic standing rather than a demand for circumcision.

Easy New Testament — Paul’s Letters

In Galatians 1:8–9, what does Paul say should happen to anyone who preaches a gospel contrary to the one the Galatians received?

1. ALet him be accursedCorrect
2. BLet him be silenced before the whole congregation
3. CLet him be handed over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh
4. DLet him be put out of the synagogue

Answer: Let him be accursed

Galatians 1:8–9 · ESV

Paul pronounces a curse and then repeats it, and he includes even himself or an angel from heaven in the condition. A false gospel is not a lesser version of the true one; it damns those who preach it, which is why Paul opens this letter without his usual thanksgiving.

Galatians 1:6–9, the opening salvo against the teachers troubling the Galatian churches by adding law-keeping to faith in Christ.

Why not this one. That is real Pauline language, from 1 Corinthians 5:5 and 1 Timothy 1:20, but it concerns the discipline of a sinning church member, not the sentence on those who corrupt the gospel itself.

Medium New Testament — Paul’s Letters

According to Romans 10:9, what two things does Paul say are necessary for salvation?

1. AConfessing with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believing in your heart that God raised him from the dead.Correct
2. BRepenting of all known sins and receiving the sacrament of baptism.
3. CBelieving in the virgin birth and submitting to the authority of the church.
4. DTrusting in Christ’s death and keeping the commandments of the new covenant.

Answer: Confessing with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believing in your heart that God raised him from the dead.

Romans 10:9 · ESV

Mouth and heart are not two separate requirements but one faith with an inward and an outward side, and Paul draws the pairing from Deuteronomy 30:14, which he has just quoted about the word being near, in the mouth and in the heart. The content is specific: Jesus is Lord, and God raised him. He explains the order in the next verse, where belief comes with righteousness and confession with salvation.

Romans 10:8–10, citing Deuteronomy 30:14.

Why not this one. It begins correctly and then adds obedience as a second requirement for salvation, which is exactly the move Paul has spent chapters 3 and 4 dismantling. Verse 9 names confession and belief, both directed at Christ's lordship and resurrection, with nothing about commandment-keeping as a condition.

Hard New Testament — Paul’s Letters

In 1 Corinthians 5, what sin was the church tolerating, and even remaining arrogant while it went on?

1. AA man was living with his father’s wifeCorrect
2. BMembers were taking one another to law before pagan judges
3. CSome were getting drunk at the church’s common meal
4. DSome were eating in an idol’s temple in full view of weaker brothers

Answer: A man was living with his father’s wife

1 Corinthians 5:1–2 · ESV

The offense was of a kind not even tolerated among the pagans, and worse than the sin itself was the congregation’s pride while it continued. Paul commands them to mourn instead, to remove the man from their midst, and to purge the old leaven from the lump.

1 Corinthians 5:1–13, the New Testament’s clearest instance of church discipline commanded by an apostle.

Why not this one. That is a genuine Corinthian failure and Paul rebukes it sharply, but in the following chapter at 6:1–8. It is not the sin the church was boasting about here.