Reading—R. Hale
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1St Corinthians 3.
First Corinthians chapter 3.
And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes. In Christ I have fed you with milk, and not with me, for hitherto you were not able to bear it, neither yet now are you able, for ye are yet carnal. For whereas there is among you, and vain, and strife and divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men.
For a while, one saith I am of Paul, another I am of Apollo's, are yelling carnal, Who the?
And who is Apollo's but ministers by whom he believes? Even as the Lord gave to every man I have planted A polished water. But God gave the increase. So then neither is he that planteth anything, neither he that watereth but God that giveth the increase. Now he that planeth, and he that waters are one and every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labor. For we are laborers together with God.
Year God's Husbandry. Year God's building according to the grace of God, which is given unto me as the wise Master Builder.
I have laid the foundation, and another bill that they're on, but let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon.
For other foundation to no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.
Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones.
Wood, hay, stubble, Every man's work shall be made manifest, for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire, and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is.
If any man's work abide which he has built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss.
But he himself shall be saved yet so as by fire. Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? If any man defile the temple of God, whom shall God destroy? For the temple of God is holy. Which temple ye are. Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise.
For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God, for it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness. And again the Lord knoweth the thoughts of the wise, that they are vain. Therefore let no man glory in men, for all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life or death, or things present, or things to come, all are yours, and ye are Christ.
And Christ is God's.
There's a contrast in the between the first part of the chapter and the latter part of the chapter, and a sign of carnality is that we get taken up with persons.
And the latter part of the chapter. It's a discerning of the character of a work.
And when we get carnal, we start to say, well brother so and so. He's an esteemed brother and he says this and so we follow that brother and we tend to follow those as that perhaps we have a personal liking to and matters of importance are turned into personal matters. And so he is really dealing with that. In the first part it was evidence that they were carnal and in the latter part of the chapter he shows that God is going to judge, not the persons that was taken care of at the cross.
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But the work is going to be judged.
And that's if we're spiritual will regard a thing as to the character of the work and what the word of God has to say about it, and not judge things based on personalities and who it is, who said something, or or whether we like that particular person. But but what is done is whether it's according to the word of God, whether it's wood, hay and stubble.
What is very interesting is that in chapter one Paul says that I thank God in verse 4.
Always on your behalf for the grace of God, which is given you by Christ Jesus, that in everything ye are enriched by him in all utterance and in all knowledge. Yet he refers to them here in this chapter as babes.
So I.
Their worldly principles and attitudes.
Apparently, in spite of the fact that they had much gift, had stunted them in their growth and they had not matured. In Hebrews chapter 5 and the first part of chapter six we have pretty well the same thing that they had not grown, and in that case it was their clinging to the types and shadow.
Buddhism. So whether it is work, the attitudes and principles, or whether it is Judaism, Jewish principles introduced into the Christian profession that will hinder spiritual growth and development.
Now that is good for us to consider. Hopefully the Lord, if there's any danger for us in one or the other direction, that he will deliver us from that so that we can grow and mature.
So that we are no longer looked at as base.
Isn't it true that?
Philosophy or Man's Views?
Will hinder growth and it's interesting, isn't it, to know that?
When you come to the word of God, don't come with your own views and your own thoughts.
We have to set them aside and hear what God has to say. And I believe there's a key there because it says here he said you're. I'd rather I could not speak as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes. I fed you with milk and not with meat. They couldn't take the deeper things of God. And isn't it true that if we come to the Lord, come to the Bible with our own views, we're always in confusion? Because that's man's philosophy. He likes to bring it to the word of God.
But God wants us to hear what he has to say. So I come to the word of God.
And I say, Lord, help me, give me thy word, give me decision in these things, and we get it in the word of God.
Probably important to notice that.
Difference here between milk?
Here and then, Peter.
And Peter is the natural substance for growth, isn't it? Here the thought is that they were not ready for more mature teaching. And so it's not, as you say, well, isn't that good that they wanted milk, you know?
Peter says it's sincere desire, the sincere milk of the Word, that you may grow thereby.
Don't confuse the two places because they're two different thoughts right there. This is a question of maturity here, isn't it? They only could have the elementary things and they weren't able to get on with things, and that was the result of their carnality.
And it was not just that they looked to men they were envying. Also they were jealous of what others had, and they themselves would like to have it. So this is a danger that there is envying instead of being thankful for whatever the Lord has given anybody that can help the Saints and none.
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Has everything, and it's a good thing I've sometimes said that the Lord doesn't expect me to do everything.
That there are others that are able to do what I cannot do. And so we need each other, and we ought not to envy and be thankful for whatever God gives.
And.
Accept the help that he provides.
Through others.
There is a difference between jealousy and envy. Jealousy is wanting to earnestly hang on to what God has given to you.
God is a jealous God. Envy is wanting what God has given to somebody else.
I think that's good to realize that that if the Lord is God is a jealous God. And sometimes brethren say, Oh well, look at this. I feel so sorry that this is being given up and but there's not a real jealousy when they see the truth being attacked or carried off. Well, God's a jealous God.
A husband should be jealous of his wife's affection. That's not wrong. But envying is when you want with somebody else's God.
And that's the fruit of the flesh.
Barnabas in X is very encouraging example.
Remember when they went on their missionary journey in Acts 13? It was Barnabas and Saul. But then there is a change of leadership.
In that same chapter, Paul and his company, his name changed.
And one of us did not cause any problems. He readily accepted that change.
He was the one that introduced him to the Saints in Jerusalem and brought him also to Antioch.
Yet when?
It became evident that there was the Spirit of God working more mightily through Paul, and there was a change of leadership as a result.
Barnabas did not cause any problems. He readily accepted it.
That's a very commendable thing. We ought to really desire that if we have in any way been helpful to somebody, that that person might grow and perhaps be even more used than we have been used. That would be the spirit of Christ in the believer.
Perhaps someone can help me find it, but I've been looking for something where Paul says I have transferred these things and their application to abolish 4646 Chapter 4, verse 6.
Yes.
It seems to me reading that.
That Paul is saying that I'm going to use us as the example, but that we're not really the ones that are. They're talking about. In other words, that they were not really.
Forming parties around fall in the policy rather than.
Transfers the application to themselves and takes it on himself, you might say.
I don't know how that appeals to those who have looked into it, more perhaps than I have, but it seems to me that it's a.
Using themselves as an example, but that they were not really leaders of any kind of a I think that's what Brother Chuck said yesterday.
I think I was out for a while, but it isn't bad to have it repeated.
It isn't bad to have it repeated. That is why he's forced in the second epistle, when they become obedient, to really take up and to speak as a fool.
And to defend his apostles if he didn't want to do that because they were really giving a place to those that would have.
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Did really desired a place? Who really whose names he could have put here? Had he wanted to be a little less charitable that there were those the Corinthians fell victim to those that came and wanted a place, and so he transfers it to himself. And then in the second epistle, when they were to become obedient, then he speaks as a fool, and he defends his own apostleship. Because that was jealousy. It wasn't envy.
That God had made him an apostle, so to speak, and he had something to say to them, and as an apostle they ought to receive it.
Isn't one of the solemn things in this chapter the fact that these Corinthians could be spoken of, and quite properly in the first few verses of the first chapter, as being enriched in all utterance and all knowledge and coming behind in no gift? And yet in this chapter the apostle still has to categorize them as babes and not able to eat mature food.
The voice to each one of our own hearts, if I may suggest it, because there can be a good deal of knowledge, you might say, of the word of God. Not, perhaps in the right way, but knowledge. There can be a good deal of gift. And yet in that sense.
I am not really maturing in the things of God, and the apostle gives the reason here for the Corinthians. I don't say it's the only reason, but it was the envying and strife and the party making the things that were causing problems that he identifies more than anything else. Now we don't want to make light of the immorality that was going on there or other things that subsequently are addressed in this epistle.
But isn't it significant that he lays such strong emphasis on those things in this chapter as being one of the primary hindrances to their growth? Should be a voice to our heart, shouldn't it?
The very word that he uses to describe them as carnal.
Sometimes has its meaning as to the material out of that which something is made. Actually there are two very similar words used here. But when he says are you not carnal, it has a moral impact as to the state of their soul. And so where the moral state is such that they cannot receive the truth because this is the way the truth is received, then they are ******** in their progress by their state of soul.
You see this in Eli that Eli refused to rebuke his own sons.
They were going on in a drunken way with the flesh hooks, taking of the sacrifice and so on.
And then here comes this woman who was really of a broken heart and really desired the Lord Hannah. And she was praying. And what does he accuse her of? Being a drunkard. And you see that in Corinth. Is that Corinth, They were going on, they were wealthy and they were having these love feasts. He says, I don't praise you, I praise you not. They came together not for the good, but for for bad, he said. Don't think I'm going to praise you for your love feast, because some are actually going hungry and yet they were praising themselves for their love fees.
And then also they were they were blind to the very serious sin there, and there was divisions and strife, and it really was a manifestation. You see that with Eli, and you see that in Corinth.
Another thing that characterized them, he says. They were walking according to men. We had brought before us yesterday the headship of the Lord Jesus Christ and the possibility and difficulty at colossae of not holding the head. So if philosophy and vain deceit becomes the principles by which we are operating in the assembly, we are operating according to man and not according to God.
And that constitutes A moral state that hinders the progress of divine growth in the soul.
Notice what he says in the 4th chapter, verse 8. Now ye are full, Now ye are rich. He have reigned as kings without us, and I would to God he did reign, that we also might reign with you. For I think that God has set forth us, the apostles last, as it were appointed to death. For we are made a spectacle under the world, and to angels and to men. We are fools, for Christ's sake, but ye are wise.
In Christ we are weak, but ye are strong, ye are honorable, but we are despised. Even under this present hour we both hunger and thirst and are naked and are buffeted and have no certain dwelling place in labor. Working with our own hands. Being reviled, we blessed. Being persecuted, we suffer it. Being defamed, we entreat, we are made as the filth of the world and are the off scarring of all things under this day. All the time they were reigning as kings. What a contrast, he says. I write not these things to shame you.
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But as my beloved sons, I warn you so you can have a lot of knowledge and still be carnal.
Knowledge puffers up.
But knowledge in itself is not wrong. In the Old Testament, the prophet, the Lord laments, my people are destroyed because of lack of knowledge, you know, And we find that even in the New Testament we know.
So so knowledge in itself isn't bad, but if it is used.
To promote cell.
That bad and I believe.
If we realize that we clearly see from scripture that various gifts and things are needed for the Saints to be nourished and fed, we will not just push our line of things, so to speak, and we will be happy for what others can contribute.
Paul was sowing the seed, Apollos was watering, and so on.
We have to recognize that that the Lord gives different things to different ones and different services, and they all are needed in order that the Saints prosper spiritually, and we can pray for that. I'm afraid, beloved Saints of God, that there are too many individuals and gifts are laying dormant because people are so occupied with all kinds of other things.
And they are not contributing what they could contribute. If they would really have their priorities straight, then they want to be used of the Lord, whether it be the gospel, whether it be in ministry, and so on. And don't ever belittle gospel work. You know, there was a man among us. He's no longer with us. Very capable teacher. He was belittling gospel work.
I said to him, you better be careful. If the Evangelist wouldn't do his job, you won't have anybody to teach you know well. In other words, we need all these various gifts that the Lord has given. And the Shepherd care is probably one of the most needed gifts amongst the Saints everywhere, not just the teacher, you know? So we have to recognize that.
There has to be a complementing each other, you know. That's what we learned from the body.
You know, if you would all be a hand, if you would all be just one part, what would that mean? That isn't really the body. So, and let's remember that brethren, every one of us is a member in the body of Christ. And we recently, several years ago, received a young man. And when we talked with him, he wanted to remember the Lord, we said to him, Conrad, remember you're being received as a member of the body of Christ.
That means a functioning member of the body of Christ. It might not be at this point.