November 4, 2021 — 1 Corinthians 3:1 – 23

“And so, brothers and sisters, I could not speak to you as spiritual people, but rather as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for solid food. Even now you are still not ready, for you are still of the flesh. For as long as there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not of the flesh, and behaving according to human inclinations? For when one says, “I belong to Paul,” and another, “I belong to Apollos,” are you not merely human?

What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you came to believe, as the Lord assigned to each. I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. The one who plants and the one who waters have a common purpose, and each will receive wages according to the labor of each. For we are God’s servants, working together; you are God’s field, God’s building.” 1 Corinthians 3:1-9

From the New Interpreter’s Commentary on 1 Corinthians: “Paul knows that the Corinthian believers are immature because they bicker and are divisive; in fact, they are acting just like ordinary people”.

Imagine Paul hearing about the behavior of the people in one of his churches – a church that could not have been that old. Certainly Paul had a vision that did not include the newly baptized treating one another so terribly. He writes that he hopes one day they may be more — they might become mature believers. Dare we say that the Corinthians are the “mother church” of all subsequent squabbling churches?

I have experienced some of the worst of our humanity in the church. One of the great shames of the church is that the family of G-d has so many members who will not talk to one another, who will not wear a mask for one another, and will not agree to, well agree with one another. Christians should find ways to honor the differences, the otherness, even the divinely inspired differences that we all bring to the table without telling each other to “…just shut up”. Different is not necessarily wrong — no matter if it is that we look differently, we act differently, or we think differently. In the midst of our genuine differences, it is imperative we welcome one another in love.

Let us Pray,

Lord Christ, instead of trying to root out and weed out those who we have differences with, we should be planting, and watering, and sowing, and nurturing — it is G-d who gives the growth. Help me to plant, water and sow the love of G-d today. Amen.

Pastor Dave