1 Corinthians 3:1-4 (HCSB) 1 Brothers, I was not able to speak to you as spiritual people but as people of the flesh, as babies in Christ. 2 I gave you milk to drink, not solid food, because you were not yet ready for it. In fact, you are still not ready, 3 because you are still fleshly. For since there is envy and strife among you, are you not fleshly and living like unbelievers? 4 For whenever someone says, “I’m with Paul,” and another, “I’m with Apollos,” are you not unspiritual people? So, then, their carnality is decried (1 Cor. 3:1-3). Now it is described: For while one saith, I am of Paul; and another, I am of Apollos; are ye not carnal? (3:4). That was the proof that there was jealousy and strife at work in the Corinthian church. It was also proof that they were unspiritual. We have grown up with denominationalism and more or less accept it as normal and necessary. Paul had a horror of it and of the spirit that produced it. The Lord prayed that all His people might be one in the same bond of oneness He and His Father enjoyed (John 17:21-23). It has been part of Satans master strategy against the church to divide it. Yet within the mystical body of Christ there is a oneness that the Father sees, which we occasionally glimpse, and which will be displayed to the universe in eternity. Satan cannot destroy that. In one of the grand old worship hymns we sang when I was a boy, one stanza went thus: We would remember we are one With every saint that loves Thy Name; United to Thee on the throne, Our life, our hope, our Lord the same. Having, then, discussed the fact of their carnality, Paul turns to the folly of their carnality (1 Cor. 3:5-8). He confronts the Corinthians, first, with the question of reality: Who then, he demands, is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed, even as the Lord gave to every man? Who were these men, even Paul himself? Just servants of the Lord! The Corinthians preferred one above the other. Paul says God simply used them as His instruments to bring about their conversion. They had different gifts but the same grace (Rom. 12:6). What would heaven be like, indeed, if this Corinthian contentiousness were to be carried over to there? Here would be one set of believers boosting D. L. Moody, another group singing the praises of Martin Luther, another bragging about John Calvin or John Wesley or General William Booth! The very idea is ludicrous! Paul urges the Corinthians to face the facts. Men, even the most illustrious of men, are only men even though they brought a great deal of background, variety, and gift with them into the ministry. John Phillips Commentary Series, The - The John Phillips Commentary Series – Exploring 1 Corinthians: An Expository Commentary.
Posted on: Wed, 12 Nov 2014 11:38:16 +0000
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