Commentary on 1 Corinthians 4:6-15

In the reading which continues from yesterday’s passage, Paul has been describing himself and Apollos as stewards or managers of God’s message. The focus should be totally on the message rather than on the messengers (also good advice for today’s Church!). As Paul says elsewhere, the messengers are just leaking vessels, vessels of brittle clay. The Corinthians therefore should not be taking sides and pitting one messenger against another, accepting one and rejecting the other. They have no right to be doing such a thing. They should keep to “what is written”. This may refer to Scripture or the written traditions and teachings that had been passed on to them.

The Corinthians themselves can only make judgements based on the teaching they were given, and they should not act as if their ideas were their own. Paul says:

Already you have all you want! Already you have become rich! Quite apart from us you have become kings!

There is a strong element of irony and sarcasm here as Paul points out their arrogance coupled with their spiritual poverty, in comparison with those by whom they were taught. He wishes it could be otherwise so Paul could share in their riches, but the sad fact is that those riches do not exist.

And, in spite of their calling to be apostles, missionaries and teachers, Paul and his fellow evangelisers seem to be at the very bottom of the social ladder:

…God has exhibited us apostles as last of all…

It is as if Paul and the other evangelisers were numbered last in the line of condemned men called to fight for their lives in the gladiatorial arena and on display before the whole world.

There is more irony as Paul mockingly compares his position with the imagined superiority of the Corinthians:

We are fools for the sake of Christ, but you are sensible people in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are honored, but we are dishonored.

The fact was, as he had reminded them earlier, they were neither learned nor powerful nor influential. They came from the lower strata of their society.

On the other hand, what Paul says of himself was largely true. He proceeds to give a litany of the trials and hardships he and his companions have to go through to fulfil their mission of proclaiming Christ to the world:

To the present hour we are hungry and thirsty, we are naked and beaten and homeless, and we grow weary from the work of our own hands.

Paul and his companions worked hard to support themselves. For example, we know that Paul supported himself as a tent-maker.

But, following the teaching and example of their Master, they turn the other cheek to all the abuse showered on them:

When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered, we speak kindly. We have become like the rubbish of the world, the dregs of all things, to this very day.

And, as it seems to be implied, some of this abuse comes from the Corinthians themselves.

Paul is saying all this not to shame or condemn them, but “to admonish you as my beloved children”, and to help them realise the real meaning of the Gospel they have been called on to embrace. They may have “ten-thousand guardians in Christ”, but they should remember they have only one father, only one person who originally established the Gospel among them and that person is Paul:

Indeed, in Christ Jesus I fathered you through the gospel.

All too often we hear Church leaders and pastors being criticised, sometimes with justification. But we do need to remember that, from top to bottom, we are a Church of flawed people. And so, we should keep in mind what Paul says—namely, that what we really need to focus on is the Message rather than the messengers. Some people abandon the Message on the basis of the behaviour of one or two messengers. Sometimes this is a rationalisation for not accepting the Message. We might remember Jesus’ words about being too conscious about the splinter in the eye of the other while there is a large beam of wood in our own. Messengers have had their shortcomings since the very beginning. Just look at Peter and Paul. The Gospel, too, is addressed equally to all and the same fidelity is required of every member and not more from some and less from others.