1 Corinthians 3

Divisions in the Church: 1 Corinthians 3✞

Passage

Back in Chapter 1 Paul addressed divisions in the church at Corinth, whereby different members of the church were “following” different spiritual leaders. That led Paul to spend the last couple of passages talking about wisdom, before coming back to the main topic again in this passage. But he’s going to go even deeper now, because even when it comes to the wisdom of God, there is “grownup wisdom” and “childish wisdom” – and the Corinthians are still in childish mode:

¹ But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. ² I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready, ³ for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way?

Paul would have liked to have talked to the Corinthians as “spiritual” people, but they were acting more like “infants in Christ” – so immature, in fact, that they resembled people of the flesh more than they resembled spiritual people!

Now, Paul has made it clear in this letter that he believes the Corinthians are real, true Christians, he’s not doubting their faith. So this is an exaggeration; he’s not saying that they aren’t really spiritual, only “of the flesh”—a common metaphor he uses to talk about Christians vs. non-Christians—but he is definitely shaming them. They should be learning and growing as Christians, but they’re stuck on the basics. To extend the metaphor further, they should be on solid food by now but they’re still feeding on milk. (And remember that this is before the days of baby formula or buying cow’s milk at the grocery story; he’s not talking about toddlers walking around with a bottle of milk, he’s talking about nursing infants!)

All in all, harsh words for the Corinthians. And why is he so harsh on them? What’s his proof that they’re still babies of the faith instead of mature? Exactly the point he made before:

For when one says, “I follow Paul,” and another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not being merely human?

This is an example where reading a book of the Bible in one sitting, rather than section-by-section (the way I blog through it) is helpful. If we were reading this all in one go, this would all make sense; when we go through it section we have to remind ourselves that this is all part of the same topic. But it is; Paul is saying that following one leader or another is… actually, based on what he said above, it’s infantile!

Why? Because different leaders in the church have different functions and gifts – but what they all have in common is that they are workers in God’s service:

⁵ What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. ⁶ I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. ⁷ So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. ⁸ He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. ⁹ For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building.

Paul had some work to do, and so did Apollos, but any work that anyone was doing was on behalf of God, to whom the thanks and glory should go. Paul likens the Corinthians to a field of plants, as well as to a building.

As should be obvious, it’s critically important how people build on the foundation Paul laid for that “building:”

¹⁰ According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it. ¹¹ For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. ¹² Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw— ¹³ each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. ¹⁴ If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. ¹⁵ If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.

For the most part, this is a straightforward (if somber) message: God will judge our work. If a leader in the church tries to add something of value—if a preacher preaches the Word faithfully, for example—then that work will last; if a leader strays from the foundation (which is Jesus Christ) then that work won’t last.

Interestingly, though, Paul doesn’t think it’s his place to condemn teachers or church leaders who stray from the foundation. You can be a “bad” preacher but still be saved; you can be a “bad” Sunday School teacher but still be saved. Teaching bad theology in the church is a sin like any other sin: it was accounted for by Christ on the cross!

However… what about those who aren’t saved? Who are maliciously trying to bring down God’s Church? They have a different answer:

¹⁶ Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? ¹⁷ If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.

Now, let me freely state that I’m making a differentiation between saved leaders of the church who mistakenly spread bad doctrine (verse 15) from those who are unsaved and malicious (verses 16–17), and I’m doing that in an attempt to make sense of the two things Paul says. But that’s not the point of what he’s saying; he’s encouraging the people of Corinth that they are God’s temple, in which God’s Spirit dwells. They are holy. So if anyone tries to bring them down, those people are dealing with God! That’s the point that Paul is making here.

Having said this, he comes back to the topic of wisdom. Because, as stated before, the wisdom of God is foolishness to men, the Corinthians should follow Paul’s example: they should become fools!

¹⁸ Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise. ¹⁹ For the wisdom of this world is folly with God. For it is written, “He catches the wise in their craftiness,” ²⁰ and again, “The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are futile.”

This is very similar to Jesus telling His disciples to be like children – despite the fact that Paul is chastising the Corinthians for still acting like spiritual babies!

Paul ends this passage in a strange way (except it’s not so strange in context):

²¹ So let no one boast in men. For all things are yours, ²² whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, ²³ and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.

Why is he talking about boasting? Because that’s exactly what the Corinthians were doing! Saying “I follow Paul” or “I follow Apollos” or “I follow Peter” wasn’t a statement of fact, it was a boast. They were saying, “I’m a better Christian than you because I follow my teacher but you only follow your lesser teacher.” According to the wisdom of God, that’s foolish talk! Where does it matter where you got your teaching from, when all of that teaching is only supposed to lead you to Christ anyway?

Thoughts

Context is very important in the Bible. There are so many metaphors that it’s important to remember the context of how any given metaphor is being used. As an example, there are a couple of metaphors being used in this passage, but that have overlaps with metaphors elsewhere:

	Elsewhere	Paul’s Letter to the Corinthians
Being Like a Child	Jesus tells his disciples that they should be like children, meaning that they should be willing to accept his teachings, rather than trying to filter everything through the lens of teachings they’ve already accepted.	Paul chastises his readers for still being like children when they should be more like adults – they are still on milk when they should be on solid food!
The Wisdom of God	There are innumerable passages in the Bible about seeking out wisdom, the value and importance of wisdom, how precious wisdom is, etc. The book of Proverbs is an entire book devoted to the topic, but it’s not the only place in the Bible telling us to be wise.	Paul tells his readers that they should become like fools instead of being wise

So should we be like children or not? Yes, in the sense that Jesus is mentioning, but we should strive to be more than just children in the sense that Paul is discussing.

And should we strive for wisdom or not? No when it comes to the wisdom of the world, but yes when it comes to the wisdom of God – but of course the Bible doesn’t usually specify, it just talks about wisdom, and it’s up to us to assume the Bible is referring to the wisdom of God.