ZA MAGAZINE // seek truth.

Solomon, king of Israel and the wisest man to ever live on earth, boldly declared that “there is nothing new under the sun” (Ecclesiastes 1:9). This is particularly true of the Church. Most (probably all) of the problems that the church faces today have been an issue at point or another, in one for or another.

Disunity is one to emphasize here. We speak of denominational division as though it was a novelty, but the fact of the matter is that, though it has manifested differently in the past, division in doctrine and practice has existed for the entire history of Christianity. In fact, much of the letters written by the early apostles that made it into the Bible address the problems that the churches of the day had, and disunity was certainly one of them. Disunity was caused by a number of things, but today, we’re going to examine how the church in a Greek city called Corinth had started to divide itself.

This article is the first in a series, because the passage that we’ll study hits on a few different topics. To put them all into one piece not only makes for a really long read, but it wouldn’t do justice to some of the concepts studied.

A Problem Defined

1 Corinthians 1:10-11

10 I appeal to you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment.
11 For it has been reported to me by Chloe’s people that there is quarreling among you, my brothers.

After a few introductory lines in Paul’s first letter to the church in Corinth, he gets right to the problem of disunity. As verses 10 and 11 show, it exists, and Paul’s not okay with that. This is a familiar echo through Scripture; Christians are consistently called to do whatever they can to maintain unity, unless the integrity of the faith is in question (see Philippians 2:2, Hebrews 13:1, and Ephesians 4:3).

However, in order for people to stop their bickering, Paul has to get to the core of the issue and set a few things straight, so while the whole passage is for the sake of unity, it’s really about the underlying issue.

The Underlying Issue

1 Corinthians 1:12-13
12 What I mean is that each one of you says, I follow Paul, or I follow Apollos, or I follow Cephas, or I follow Christ.
13 Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?

The underlying issue is existence of factions. But what is causing the division? To better understand this, we have to look at the people mentioned. What do we know about Paul, Apollos, Cephas, and Jesus?

• Paul is a converted Pharisee, someone who knows the Jewish Law inside and out. He’s not the best public speaker in the world (more on that later), but he is a great writer, which is why he basically wrote half of the New Testament. Though he knew Jewish law and could argue it well, his shtick was reaching out to non-Jewish people.
• Apollos gets a mention in Acts 18:24-28, where, among other things, he is noted for being an eloquent speaker who knew his Scriptures well and was able to prove Jesus’ authority with the Word.
• Cephas is Peter. Peter is our English form of the Greek word petros, which means “rock.” Cephas is the Syriac (a descendent of Aramaic and a language of the time) version of rock. I guess the names are interchangeable. Peter was the apostle to the Jews, thus giving him a different mission field than Paul.
• Jesus is Jesus. Savior of the world, the hope of mankind. People who were in His faction probably saw Him directly and thus thought they didn’t need anyone else telling them what do to, or perhaps they just didn’t trust the authority of any other teacher.

You can see how some factions might emerge. People might get sucked in by Apollos’ slick words. The Greeks and other Gentiles (non-Jews) of Corinth might be more drawn to Paul, while the Jews of the area are probably more comfortable with the teachings of Peter. Finally, there’s the people who likely reject any teaching that isn’t directly from Jesus.

What’s important to see, though, is that Paul doesn’t deny the authority of any of these guys. It would seem, then, that the division isn’t about one guy saying that you have to earn your salvation and another guy saying that you have to just accept grace. No, Paul, Apollos, Peter, and certainly Jesus are all very solid people, worthy to have followers. This means that the division has to do with something else, something less critical.

The Real Issue

1 Corinthians 1:14-17
14 I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius,
15 so that no one may say that you were baptized in my name.
16 (I did baptize also the household of Stephanas. Beyond that, I do not know whether I baptized anyone else.)
17 For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with words of eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.

Since Paul talks about baptism for a few verses here, we can conclude that who baptized who was one of the issues at hand. And lest you think that this doesn’t happen today, let’s bring it to the present. If you were baptized by Billy Graham instead of the pastor down the street, would you find yourself tempted to brag about who dunked you? What if your friend was baptized by Rick Warren and always felt the need to slip that into his conversion story? Is it possible that you’d go on a good-natured tangent about whose baptism was better?

But let’s not limit ourselves to baptism, because Paul didn’t. In verse 17, he talks about how he didn’t come with eloquent wisdom. How many of you have a favorite preacher? I do; I love listening to Francis Chan. What if I became so devoted to him that I would talk down on Louie Giglio, another popular speaker, and people who liked him? What if I was SO devoted to this one guy that I moved out to Southern California so that I could go to his church?

We can take it further. What about whose Bible study or small group you attend? Perhaps you’re pretty tight with your pastor, or maybe you even shook the hand of a popular Christian speaker or musician!

The fact of the matter is that we as humans always have a tendency to idolize people, be it our soldiers, our athletes, our parents, our leaders, or others. Paul recognizes this, and is disgusted with it. So much, in fact, that he says he’s glad that people can’t brag about being baptized by him.

Why?

Because, to Paul, that wasn’t the point of what he did. He wasn’t there to baptize (though he did when he needed to), he was there to tell people about Jesus, and he wasn’t doing that with fancy and wise words.

So Where Are We At?

There’s disunity in the church, because people are divided in factions, because people are elitists who think that their guy is the best, because their guy speaks a certain way or reaches a certain crowd or does things a certain way or maybe even looks a certain way. The core problem is that people are drawn to people for worldly reasons.

With this problem established, Paul will bring something important into the mix. What is it, you ask? Stay tuned! Or just read ahead. Either way, there will be more on this passage next week!

Grace and peace,
Brendan