1 Corinthians 3:6 Komentář

In this chapter the apostle, I. Blames the Corinthians for their carnality and divisions (Co1 3:1-4). II. He instructs them how what was amiss among them might be rectified, by remembering, 1. That their ministers were no more than ministers (Co1 3:5). 2. That they were unanimous, and carried on the same design (Co1 3:6-10). 3. That they built on one and the same foundation (Co1 3:11-15). III. He exhorts them to give due honour to their bodies, by keeping them pure (Co1 3:16, Co1 3:17), and to humility and self-diffidence (Co1 3:18-21). IV. And dehorts them from glorying in particular ministers, because of the equal interest they had in all (Co1 3:22 to the end).

INTRODUCTION TO 1 CORINTHIANS 3 In this chapter the apostle returns to the charge of schisms and contentions upon the Corinthians, which were the occasion of the epistle; and reproves them for their divisions, which were about their ministers; and gives them their just and due character, and who, though they were useful and commendable in their places, were not to be gloried in; and especially it was a great piece of weakness and folly, to set up one against another, when they had an equal interest in them all. Having, in the latter part of the preceding chapter, made mention of the spiritual man, the apostle tells the Corinthians, to whom he writes, that he could not address them as spiritual, but as carnal; and not as perfect men, among whom he spake the wisdom of God, but as babes in Christ, Co1 3:1 and this rudeness and ignorance of theirs account for his conduct towards them, in delivering the plain and easy, and not the sublime doctrines of the Gospel to them, because they were not able to bear them; nor were they yet able, notwithstanding the length of time, the proficiency they had made, and the many teachers they had had among them, Co1 3:2 and to prove that they were carnal, and not spiritual, he instances in their envy, strife, and contentions, which were carnal works, or works of the flesh, Co1 3:3 and gives some particulars of their contentions about their ministers, which put it out of all doubt that they were carnal, Co1 3:4 and reproves them for such contentions, and argues the folly and sinfulness of them; partly from the character of their preachers, as servants and ministers, who were the instruments of their faith and conversion, through the grace of God, and therefore not to be set up at the head of them as their lords and masters, Co1 3:5 and partly from the unprofitableness of their ministry, without a divine blessing, Co1 3:6 and also from the unity and equality of the ministers among themselves, though their labours and reward were different, Co1 3:8 and therefore parties and factions were not to be made on their account; and besides, as they were labourers with God, and the church were his husbandry and building, in which they were employed, Co1 3:9, though they might differ in some superstructure points, yet they agreed in the foundation; and the apostle instances in himself under the character of a wise master builder, laying the foundation, and others building on it, Co1 3:10 and declares what this foundation was, which he and other Gospel ministers agreed in laying; nor was there any other that could be laid, to any good purpose besides, which is Jesus Christ, Co1 3:11 and then distinguishes between the different sorts of builders, the one laying on the foundation things of the greatest worth and value, and others things very trifling and useless, Co1 3:12 and intimates that there would be a time, when there would be a revelation and declaration of every man's work, of what sort it is, Co1 3:13 so that, according to their different structures, there will be a different reward, as is suggested, Co1 3:8 for though both sorts of preachers are upon the foundation, and so their persons will be safe, yet what they have built upon that foundation, according to the nature of it, shall either abide or be destroyed, Co1 3:14 wherefore inasmuch then as the church of Christ is a temple, a building laid on such a foundation as Christ, it ought not to be defiled by factions and divisions, by errors and heresies; especially since it is holy, and the Spirit of God dwells in it; and whoever does defile it shall surely be destroyed; and therefore the apostle dissuades from it, both from the turpitude of the action, and the danger of it, Co1 3:16 he cautions against the wisdom of this world, which was the cause of their divisions; as being self-deceiving, and contrary to true wisdom, Co1 3:18 and as being foolishness in the account of God, which he proves by some passages of scripture, Co1 3:19 and concludes, therefore, that no man ought to glory in men, in the best of men, not even in ministers, Co1 3:21 so as to separate and divide them, one from another, and set up one above another, since they, and all things else, were theirs, Co1 3:22 the ground and evidence of which their right and property in them are given, they being Christ's, and Christ's God's, Co1 3:23.

I have planted,.... That is, ministerially; otherwise the planting of souls in Christ, and the implanting of grace in them, are things purely divine, and peculiar to God, and the power of his grace; but his meaning is, that he was at Corinth, as in other places, the first that preached the Gospel to them; and was an instrument of the conversion of many souls, and of laying the foundation, and of raising and forming a Gospel church state, and of planting them in it; Apollos watered; he followed after, and his ministry was blessed for edification; he was a means of carrying on the superstructure, and of building up souls in faith and holiness, and of making them fruitful in every good word and work: each minister of the Gospel has his proper gifts, work, and usefulness; some are planters, others waterers; some are employed in hewing down the sturdy oaks, and others in squaring and fitting, and laying them in the building; some are "Boanergeses", sons of thunder, and are mostly useful in conviction and conversion; and others are "Barnabases", sons of consolation, who are chiefly made use of in comforting and edifying the saints: but God gave the increase: for as the gardener may put his plants into the earth, and water them when he has so done, but cannot cause them to grow, this is owing to a divine blessing; and as the husbandman tills his ground, casts the seed into it, and waits for the former and latter rain, but cannot cause it to spring up, or increase to perfection, this is done by a superior influence; so ministers of the Gospel plant and water, cast in the seed of the word, preach the Gospel, but all the success is from the Lord; God only causes it to spring up and grow; it is he that gives it its increasing, spreading, fructifying virtue and efficacy.

But the new law's wont was to point to clemency, and to convert to tranquillity the pristine ferocity of "glaives" and "lances," and to remodel the pristine execution of "war" upon the rivals and foes of the law into the pacific actions of "ploughing" and "tilling" the land. Therefore as we have shown above that the coming cessation of the old law and of the carnal circumcision was declared, so, too, the observance of the new law and the spiritual circumcision has shone out into the voluntary obediences of peace.

"I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase." That is, I first cast the word into the ground; but, in order that the seeds might not wither away through temptations, Apollos added his own part. But the whole was of God.

I have been planted in the house of the Lord, I mean in the church; not in the walls but in its doctrines. Everyone who has been planted in the house of the Lord, who has put down roots there, brings forth flowers.

To plant is to evangelize and to bring to faith, to water is to baptize with the approved form of words. To forgive sins, however, and to give the Spirit belongs to God alone. We know that the Holy Spirit is given by God without the laying on of hands, and it has happened that an unbaptized person has received the forgiveness of his sins. Was such a person invisibly baptized, considering that he received the gift which belongs to baptism?

I, he says, was the first to sow the preaching; but Apollos, by his constant teaching, did not allow the seed to wither from the heat of the temptations of the evil one, but God made you grow.

Then when he says, I planted, he stresses a similarity between ministers and husbandmen, where two differences in their activities should be noted: one is the difference between the activity of one minister and that of another. In regard to this he says: I planted, i.e., in preaching to you I was like a planter, because I was the first one to preach the faith to you: "I have put my words in your mouth, that you might plant the heavens" (Is 51:16); Apollos watered, i.e., he acted as a person who waters plants to nourish them and make them grow. In the same way we read in Ac (19:1) that after Paul had converted many Corinthians, Apollos came on the scene and contributed many things to the believers, showing publicly by the Scriptures that Jesus is Christ, and fulfilling what is said in Sirach (24:31): "I will water my orchard." The second difference is found in the work of ministers, who by planting and watering cooperate outwardly with the work of God Who works inwardly, hence he adds, but the God gave the increase: "He will increase the harvest of your righteousness" (2 Cor 9:10). So, too, in material things, planters and waterers work from without, but God works from within by the activity of nature to make plants grow.

Because of the carnal, divided state of the people at Corinth, the apostle was obliged to treat them as children in the knowledge of sacred things, Co1 3:1-3. Some were for setting up Paul, others Apollos, as their sole teachers, Co1 3:4. The apostle shows that himself and fellow apostles were only instruments which God used to bring them to the knowledge of the truth; and even their sowing, and watering the seed was of no use unless God gave the increase, Co1 3:5-8. The Church represented as God's husbandry, and as God's building, the foundation of which is Christ Jesus, Co1 3:9-11. Ministers must beware how and what they build on this foundation, Co1 3:12-15. The Church of God is his temple, and he that defiles it shall be destroyed, Co1 3:16, Co1 3:17. No man should depend on his own wisdom; for the wisdom of the world is foolishness with God, Co1 3:18-20. None should glory in man as his teacher; God gives his followers every good, both for time and eternity, Co1 3:21-23.

I have planted - I first sowed the seed of the Gospel at Corinth, and in the region of Achaia. Apollos watered - Apollos came after me, and, by his preachings and exhortations, watered the seed which I had sowed; but God gave the increase. The seed has taken root, has sprung up, and borne much fruit; but this was by the especial blessing of God. As in the natural so in the spiritual world; it is by the especial blessing of God that the grain which is sown in the ground brings forth thirty, sixty, or a hundred fold: it is neither the sower nor the waterer that produces this strange and inexplicable multiplication; it is God alone. So it is by the particular agency of the Spirit of God that even good seed, sown in good ground, the purest doctrine conveyed to the honest heart, produces the salvation of the soul.

PAUL COULD NOT SPEAK TO THEM OF DEEP SPIRITUAL TRUTHS, AS THEY WERE CARNAL, CONTENDING FOR THEIR SEVERAL TEACHERS; THESE ARE NOTHING BUT WORKERS FOR GOD, TO WHOM THEY MUST GIVE ACCOUNT IN THE DAY OF FIERY JUDGMENT. THE HEARERS ARE GOD'S TEMPLE, WHICH THEY MUST NOT DEFILE BY CONTENTIONS FOR TEACHERS, WHO, AS WELL AS ALL THINGS, ARE THEIRS, BEING CHRIST'S. (1Co. 3:1-23) And I--that is, as the natural (animal) man cannot receive, so I also could not speak unto you the deep things of God, as I would to the spiritual; but I was compelled to speak to you as I would to MEN OF FLESH. The oldest manuscripts read this for "carnal." The former (literally, "fleshy") implies men wholly of flesh, or natural. Carnal, or fleshly, implies not they were wholly natural or unregenerate (Co1 2:14), but that they had much of a carnal tendency; for example their divisions. Paul had to speak to them as he would to men wholly natural, inasmuch as they are still carnal (Co1 3:3) in many respects, notwithstanding their conversion (Co1 1:4-9). babes--contrasted with the perfect (fully matured) in Christ (Col 1:28; compare Heb 5:13-14). This implies they were not men wholly of flesh, though carnal in tendencies. They had life in Christ, but it was weak. He blames them for being still in a degree (not altogether, compare Co1 1:5, Co1 1:7; therefore he says as) babes in Christ, when by this time they ought to have "come unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ" (Eph 4:13). In Rom 7:14, also the oldest manuscripts read, "I am a man of flesh."

I . . . planted, Apollos watered-- (Act 18:1; Act 19:1). Apollos at his own desire (Act 18:27) was sent by the brethren to Corinth, and there followed up the work which Paul had begun. God gave the increase--that is, the growth (Co1 3:10; Act 18:27). "Believed through grace." Though ministers are nothing, and God all in all, yet God works by instruments, and promises the Holy Spirit in the faithful use of means. This is the dispensation of the Spirit, and ours is the ministry of the Spirit.