When Paul mentions the divisions and disagreements in the Corinthian church, he connects them with the absence of true wisdom and with the fact that its members are “fleshly.” He is evidently speaking of human nature, which in this case determines a person's whole life. Yet nature can take different forms, judging by the fact that...
When Paul mentions the divisions and disagreements in the Corinthian church, he connects them with the absence of true wisdom and with the fact that its members are “fleshly.” He is evidently speaking of human nature, which in this case determines a person's whole life. Yet nature can take different forms, judging by the fact that the apostle often calls people who live a natural life not “fleshly” but “natural.”
Indeed, the corresponding Greek words might better be conveyed by such concepts as “bodily” (“fleshly”) and “natural” (“psychical”). Nature is broader than bodily existence, but in any case it is not “breath” (“spirit”), whether “human breath” (which evidently means the “breath of life” that God “breathes” into every person at creation) or God's “breath,” experienced when the power of God acts within a person.
Spirit is not nature, even when we speak of the human spirit. Yet the stream of our life (called the “soul” in biblical language) has both a spiritual and a natural component. If the spiritual predominates, a person may be called “spiritual.” But in a fallen human being, nature usually predominates, and then we must speak of a “natural” person, who may nevertheless be far from alien to intellectual, aesthetic, and even religious experiences and the corresponding experience. The problem is that even in such experience, often called “spiritual” in everyday usage, it is in fact nature rather than spirit that predominates.
A person who does not understand his own spiritual life very well—or indeed his own life in general—can easily mistake manifestations of his higher nature (psychic in the modern sense of the word) for manifestations of the spirit. Yet as soon as he has to defend his experience, whether intellectual, aesthetic, or especially religious, human nature reveals itself in all its power and displays itself in all its glory.
At that point, lofty ideas, profound aesthetic experiences, and the most refined religiosity quickly give way to the most primitive, almost animal, “bodily” emotions. A person will often throw himself upon an ideological opponent as upon an enemy threatening his life and well-being. In many respects this is indeed so, for the life and well-being of the natural person are bound up with the inviolability of the experience he is defending.
Of course, if a person truly lived a spiritual life, if his life and well-being were connected with the spirit within him rather than with his nature, he would not rush so furiously to defend his convictions and views, nor would he make an absolute of his intellectual, aesthetic, or even religious experience. If something of this kind does happen, then there can be no question of spiritual life, which is precisely what Paul writes in his letter to the Christians of Corinth.
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3:1 And I, brethren - He spoke before, Co1 2:1, of his entrance, now of his progress, among them.Could not speak to you as unto spiritual - Adult, experienced Christians. But as unto men who were still in great measure carnal, as unto babes in Christ - Still weak in grace, though eminent in gifts, Co1 1:5.
3:2 I fed you, as babes, with milk - The first and plainest truths of the gospel. So should every preacher suit his doctrine to his hearers.
3:3 For while there is among you emulation in your hearts, strife in your words, and actual divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk according to men - As mere men; not as Christians, according to God.
3:4 I am of Apollos - St. Paul named himself and Apollos, to show that he would condemn any division among them, even though it were in favour of himself, or the dearest friend he had in the world. Are ye not carnal - For the Spirit of God allows no party zeal.
3:5 Ministers - Or servants. By whom ye believed, as the Lord, the Master of those servants, gave to every man.
3:7 God that giveth the increase - Is all in all: without him neither planting nor watering avails.
3:8 But he that planteth and he that watereth are one - Which is another argument against division. Though theirlabours are different. they are all employed in one general work, - the saving souls. Hence he takes occasion to speak of the reward of them that labour faithfully, and the awful account to be given by all. Every man shall receive his own peculiar reward according to his own peculiar labour - Not according to his success; but he who labours much, though with small success, shall have a great reward.
Has not all this reasoning the same force still? Theministers are still surely instruments in God's hand, and depend as entirely as ever on his blessing, to give the increase to their labours. Without this, they are nothing: with it, their part is so small, that they hardly deserve to be mentioned. May their hearts and hands be more united; and, retaining a due sense of the honour God doeth them in employing them, may they faithfully labour, not as for themselves, but for the great Proprietor of all, till the day come when he will reward them in full proportion to their fidelity and diligence!
3:9 For we are all fellowlabourers - God's labourers, and fellowlabourers with each other. Ye are God's husbandry - This is the sum of what went before: it is a comprehensive word, taking in both a field, a garden, and a vineyard. Ye are God's building - This is the sum of what follows.
3:10 According to the grace of God given to me - This he premises, lest he should seem to ascribe it to himself. Let every one take heed how he buildeth thereon - That all his doctrines may be consistent with the foundation.
3:11 For other foundation - On which the whole church: and all its doctrines, duties, and blessings may be built. Can no man lay than what is laid - In the counsels of divine wisdom, in the promises and prophecies of the Old Testament, in the preaching of the apostles, St. Paul in particular. Which is Jesus Christ - Who, in his person and offices, is the firm, immovable Rock of Ages, every way sufficient to bear all the weight that God himself, or the sinner, when he believes, can lay upon him.
3:12 If any one build gold, silver, costly stones - Three sorts of materials which will bear the fire; true and solid doctrines. Wood, hay, stubble - Three which will not bear the fire. Such are all doctrines, ceremonies, and forms of human invention; all but the substantial, vital truths of Christianity.
3:13 The time is coming when every one's work shall be made manifest: for the day of the Lord, that great and final day, shall declare it - To all the world. For it is revealed - What faith beholds as so certain and so near is spoken of asalready present. By fire; yea, the fire shall try every one's work, of what sort it is - The strict process of that day will try every man's doctrines, whether they come up to the scripture standard or not. Here is a plain allusion to the flaming light and consuming heat of the general conflagration.But the expression, when applied to the trying of doctrines, and consuming those that are wrong, is evidently figurative; because no material fire can have such an effect on what is of a moral nature. And therefore it is added, he who builds wood, hay, or stubble, shall be saved as through the fire - Or, as narrowly as a man escapes through the fire, when hishouse is all in flames about him.
This text, then, is so far from establishing the Romishpurgatory, that it utterly overthrows it. For the fire here mentioned does not exist till the day of judgment: therefore, if this be the fire of purgatory, it follows that purgatory does not exist before the day of judgment.
3:14 He shall receive a reward - A peculiar degree of glory. Some degree even the other will receive, seeing he held the foundation; though through ignorance he built thereon what would not abide the fire.
3:15 He shall suffer loss - The loss of that peculiar degree of glory.