1 Corinthians 3:1-9 (NRSV)
On Divisions in the Corinthian Church
1And so, brothers and sisters, I could not speak to you as
spiritual people, but rather as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. 2I fed you with milk, not
solid food, for you were not ready for solid food. Even now you are still not
ready, 3for you are still of the flesh. For as long as there is jealousy
and quarrelling among you, are you not of the flesh, and behaving according to
human inclinations? 4For when one says, ‘I belong to Paul’, and another, ‘I belong to
Apollos’, are you not merely human?
5 What then is Apollos? What is
Paul? Servants through whom you came to believe, as the Lord assigned to each. 6I planted, Apollos watered,
but God gave the growth. 7So neither the one who plants nor the
one who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth.8The one who plants and the
one who waters have a common purpose, and each will receive wages according to
the labour of each. 9For we are God’s servants, working together; you are God’s
field, God’s building.
Paul could not
speak to the people of Corinth as spiritual people, but only as those who had
not yet moved beyond being mere human beings – as mere babies in Christ. They
could not digest the solid food of good, sound teaching, because they were
still under human passions and were dominated by them. Paul could be so clear
about this because it was evident in their behaviour – where there was
jealousy, and quarrelling and serious divisions. All humans can do with regard
to the Christian faith is plant and water (to use Paul’s metaphor) because it
is the work of God to make a person grow in the faith.
Paul makes the
important point that, as Christians we need to work on a different level in all
things – the realm of the spiritual – for God is Spirit. Our interests need to
more beyond the mere physical – there is more to life than what we earn or own
or our status or position. The Corinthians were still too fleshly and indeed
allowed themselves to be dominated by their fleshly side. Paul takes it
further, suggesting that ‘flesh’ is not only a reference to the physical, it
also refers to human nature - apart
from God – body and mind that can be dominated by sin. In effect, he is saying
that the Corinthians had allowed themselves to be dominated by their lower
selves. William Barclay suggests that Paul is in effect saying: “You can tell
what a person’s relationship with God is like, by their relationships with
other people.” If we have a good relationship with God, we will show this by
the way we live in harmony with others. Barclay continues: “Their relationship
will be marked by love and unity and concord ... If a man loves God he will
also love his fellow men.” If one glorifies human leaders and becomes involved
in factional disputes – especially within the Church, it is a sign of sin.
God uses us to
bring His message of his truth and his love to others, but it is God alone who
awakens faith, “... as he alone created the heart, so he alone can recreate it
...”
Jerome Murphy
O’Conner adds ...
Paul’s point in
verses 1-4 is very simple: “True Christian perfection or maturity manifests
itself, not in intellectual speculation, but in behaviour modelled on that of
Christ.” When the Corinthians were judged by this criteria, they came across as
only ‘children’ capable of assimilating nothing stronger than ‘milk’ not adult
food. This was clearly evident in the jealousy and strife and factions that
were part of their experience, and what they seemed to think were just a normal
part of being Christians, because it was only natural. Jesus has revealed the
standard by which human behaviour was to be judged, and the Christians in
Corinth were far from it!
Paul needed to
address their leaders as well; especially the preachers. Preachers are not
‘masters’ in their own right, but servants; not initiators but instruments;
their function is to mediate faith which is God’s gift. This means that he
(Paul) and Apollos were one working toward the same goal – they only did
different things at different times – Paul sowed and Apollos nourished what
Paul had done. Their two roles were complimentary, so it was plainly ridiculous
that the Corinthians had tried to set them in opposition to each other.
In fact God
does not need human cooperation. He chose otherwise uses human intermediaries
who need empowering to achieve their goal. It is only because of this that
preachers are essential to the plan of salvation, because we are co-workers
with God – as Paul explains in verse 9. O’Conner concludes:
“Having dignified humanity by involving it in the
execution of his plan of salvation, God will not be untrue to himself by
by-passing the instruments he had chosen. If they fail, the divine power is
rendered ineffective.”
Jerome Murphy
O’Conner published a second volume in the Bible
Reading Fellowship: The People’s Bible Commentary series and it is to this
volume that I turn to guide our reflections.
The people of Corinth
preferred thought to action: to them religion was about thinking about God, but
for Paul it was all about loving your neighbour. O’Conner writes: “For
intellectuals, new religion implied a change of mind, for Paul it meant a new
world.”
The intellectuals
thought of themselves as adults because of their superior knowledge, and they
considered those who were not at their level as children if they couldn’t
handle the new intellectual discourse. But Paul sees the intellectuals as
children because they reveal their lack of true wisdom by the factions that
existed in their fellowship. The intellectuals thought that jealousy, strife
and party factions were just part of the fabric of human life – all societies
have these characteristics so this is just the way of human nature – “It is
only human!”
These
Corinthian Christians probably condemned Paul for his unsophisticated approach
to religion; but they failed to realise that acceptance of Christ should result
in social transformation. But this transformation is not automatic. Coming to
faith is the beginning of a journey. New Christians need to become critical of
what they had previously taken for granted and they need to reject all the
behaviour that is incompatible with following Christ. They need to put themselves
on a new course and in the process develop an appropriate lifestyle; they need
to devise new social institutions and structures that make real the values of
the Gospel. In short, we as Christians need constantly to use our intellect to
re-think the practical outworking of our faith in present reality, in effect
act it out, in our daily lives, revealing in our lives, the selfless love that
Christ has made real for us. And when we do, we see that there is no place for
jealousy, strife and party factions.
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