Having abundantly justified his method of preaching to the Corinthians, and having shown why he contented himself with the simple presentation of the cross of Christ, Paul now resumes his direct rebuke of the divisions and factions that existed among them. He tells them that they are, as yet, unfit to bear the wisdom which he taught in some other churches; and the very proof of their im-maturity is to be found in their obsession with following one spiritual teacher over another. The teachers by whose names they were proud to be known were not founders of schools, nor were they seekers of recognition and supremacy; they were simply Gospel-ministers who were used by their common Lord and Savior to arouse faith – not in themselves, but in Him! Each one of these men had his own gifts and his own task. “I have planted,” declares Paul; for to him, the Lord gave the responsibility of establishing the church at Corinth. Then Apollos came after him and helped this young church-plant to grow. But it was God Himself Who gave the vital influence that was needed to make the work of both men efficacious. Apollos and Paul were only instruments in God’s hand – just as the man who sets the sails and the man who holds the helm are both instruments used by the master of the ship, or as the stonemason who chisels and the laborer who sets the stones in their places are both instruments for the carrying out of the master-builder’s design. Throughout this chapter, it is this thought that Paul dwells upon: the Church is not built and maintained by men, but by God Himself. Teachers are only His tools that He uses; and yet, being human instruments, they each have their own responsibility and their own part of the one great work.
The chief inference which Paul draws from the truth that the Church is God’s building is the grave responsibility of those who labor for God in this work. As for Paul’s own part in the work – the laying of the foundation – he says that it was comparatively easy. There was no chance of his making a mistake there; for “other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.” If anyone proceeds to lay another foundation than Christ, it is not a Christian Church that he is meaning to build. He who does not proceed upon the facts of Christ’s life and death, and he whose instruction does not presuppose Christ as its foundation, may be useful for some purposes of life – but not as a builder of the spiritual Temple of the Lord. He who uses the Christian pulpit for the propagation of political or social ideas may be a sound and useful teacher; but his proper place is the public auditorium or the Senate Chamber or some other similar institution, and not the Christian Church. And the question at present, says Paul, is not what other institutions you may profitably establish in the world; but rather, how this institution of the Church, which is already established, is to be completed. Any other foundation except Christ cannot be laid; but upon this foundation, many various and questionable materials are being built – in some instances, gold and silver and gemstones; and in others, wood and hay and stubble.
The picture in Paul’s mind is the Church rising with a strange mixture of design and material. The foundation, he knows, is the same; but on the solid marble is reared a crazy structure of second-hand and ill-adapted material – here a wall propped up with rotten planking; there a hole stopped with straw; on one side, a richly decorated gateway, with gold and silver profusely worked into its design; on the other side, a clay partition or loose boarding. It grieves him to see the incongruous structure! He sees the teachers bringing – with great appearance of diligence – the worst rubbish, wood, hay, and stubble; and they are apparently unconscious of the incongruity of their material with the foundation they build upon. He sees them taken up with every passing fancy – the lifeless stubble that has lost its living seed of truth, the mud of the common highway, and the quickest thoughts that come to hand – and setting these in the Temple wall.
The soundness of the material which has been built upon the foundation of Christ will, like all other things, be tested. “The day shall declare it” – that light of Christ’s presence and dominance over all things, and that light which shall penetrate all human things – that shall declare the true worth of it. Paul, with his unfailing discernment, accepts it as a very possible contingency that a Christian may indeed do poor work. In that case, Paul says, the man will be saved as if by fire; his work shall be burned, but he himself shall be saved. He shall be in the position of a man whose house has been caught fire; the man is saved, but his property – all that he has slowly gathered around him and valued as the fruit of his labor – is gone. To many Christians, it seems to be enough that they are doing something. If they are only decently active, it concerns them very little that their work is really effecting no good – as if they were active merely for the sake of keeping themselves warm in a chilling atmosphere, rather than for accomplishing any really good purpose. Work that we do for our employer or for the advancement of the world must be able to stand inspection and actually do the thing required. Is it right, then, that our Christian work should be carelessly done?
We are responsible, as well as our teachers and preachers, for the appearance which we present in God’s spiritual Temple. The stone that is to occupy a permanent place in a building is carefully squared and beaten into its place, and its level is adjusted with the utmost precision. Alas! So many Christians seem to think it enough to have attained a place in the building; and after spending a little thought and trouble on entering the Christian life, they take no step on-wards during the whole remainder of their lives. Would it not make a very obvi-ous change in the appearance and in the strength of the Church if every member of it would take pains to make himself absolutely true to Jesus?
The folly of religious sectarianism is exhibited in the words of verses 21 and 22: “Let no man glory in men. For all things are yours, whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas…” The person who followed Paul exclusively and refused to learn anything from Apollos or Peter was defrauding himself of his rights. It has been the weakness of Christians in all ages – and never more than in our own – to see good in only one aspect of truth, and to listen to no form of teaching except one. The High Churchman despises the Evangelical, and the Evangelical crosses to the other side of the street when he is approached by a High Churchman. Calvinists and Arminians stand at swords’ points. Each person confines himself to his own fortress, which he thinks he can defend; and he starves himself on siege-rations while the fields wave with white grain outside! The human eye is designed in such a way as to sweep around a wide range of vision, but many men put on blinkers and decline to even look at anything which does not lie directly in the line of sight. We know that to confine ourselves to only one form of food induces poverty of nutrition and disease, and yet we seem to imagine that a healthy spiritual life can be maintained by confining ourselves to our own chosen denomination and its doctrines. To despise or neglect any form of Christian teaching is to impoverish our souls. “All things are yours,” says Paul – not only this teacher, in whom we glory; or that teacher, whom we claim as our favorite.
“All things are yours!” How these words lift and animate our souls! “All things are yours.” Even the catastrophes of life that seem to blot out hope, and all things that naturally discourage and compel us to feel our weakness – yes, all these things serve our highest good, and bring us on toward our eternal joy, more certainly than the things which we cherish as our own. We are free persons, supreme over all created things; for “ye are Christ’s.” We belong to Him Who rules all, and Who loves us as His own; and above Christ and His rule, there is no adverse will that can rob us of any good. For just as we are Christ’s, and cherished by Him; so also is Christ God’s – and the supreme Will that governs all does so in the interests of Christ.
Lord, we repent of times when we have been guilty of bringing wood and hay and stubble of our own to lay upon the foundation of Jesus Christ, instead of the gold and silver and precious stones of His doctrines. Amen.
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