I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another in what you say and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly united in mind and thought. My brothers and sisters, some from Chloe’s household have informed me that there are quarrels among you. What I mean is this: One of you says, “I follow Paul”; another, “I follow Apollos”; another, “I follow Cephas”; still another, “I follow Christ.” Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Were you baptized in the name of Paul? I thank God that I did not baptize any of you except Crispus and Gaius, so no one can say that you were baptized in my name. (Yes, I also baptized the household of Stephanas; beyond that, I don’t remember if I baptized anyone else.) For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel—not with wisdom and eloquence, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.
- 1 Corinthians 1:10-17
With this section of the letter to the church at Corinth, Paul begins to address the primary issue: division within the congregation. While this letter was written to a first-century church, you may be able to tell that things are not much better today on this topic!
In verse 10, Paul first starts with a positive appeal of what the believers should do. While telling people not to do something negative is important, it’s also important to focus on the positive, which is how Paul starts this section. He appeals to them on the authority of Jesus Christ – the highest authority possible, whom they all should worship in a unified manner.
The word for divisions in Greek has the idea of tears or cracks, which implies even a small division should not exist among the believers. Any kind of crack can begin to tear something apart, so even the smallest crack should not exist among them or they will not be united as a body of believers.
He makes sure to explain to them what that means: “perfectly united in mind and thought.” Today, we may find that to be quite a lofty goal! With the hundreds of Christian denominations that exist today and the variety of beliefs even within some of those denominations, we cannot imagine being perfectly united in mind and thought with other believers. It may even be hard for you to come up with one person who you are “perfectly” united with on all topics! But that is the goal for the body of Christ in the church – perfect unity in all things.
Paul received word of these divisions from people in Chloe’s household (verse 11). It is not clear from the Greek if this was a household as referring to immediate family members or whether they were her friends or even her slaves. We do not know anything else about Chloe other than this verse. But it is important for Paul to tell the believers where he got his information, as they would have likely been familiar with Chloe and her household.
Verse 12 indicates that there were at least 4 different groups among the Corinthian Christians – those who follow Paul, Apollos, Cephas (aka Simon Peter), and Christ. Paul, Apollos, and Cephas were all prominent leaders in the early church. Paul, of course, is the author of this letter to the Corinthians and many other letters to other churches. Apollos was a Jew from Alexandria in Egypt who spoke boldly about Jesus in the Jewish synagogues. In Acts 18:26, we see that he didn’t quite have his theology correct, however, as Priscilla and Aquila gave him some further instruction on God. Cephas was the Aramaic name of Simon Peter, who was one of Jesus’ twelve disciples. Christ, of course, refers to Jesus Christ, but this particular group within the church was believed to claim some special relationship to Jesus, or that they placed more emphasis on Jesus than the other teachers did.
Paul gets to his point in verse 13, pointing out that Christ is not divided, therefore there should be no division among His followers. If we strive to imitate Christ, who has no division within Him, then we should also not be divided. Paul also reminds them that there is no comparison between following Jesus and following men who teach about Jesus. Paul’s name is nowhere near as authoritative as the name of Jesus Christ! Paul brings up Jesus’ crucifixion and baptism, and how Paul is nowhere near as worthy as Jesus.
In verses 14-16, Paul explains more on the topic of baptism. Paul lists off the few people that he remembered baptizing – Crispus, Gaius, and the household of Stephanas – as a way to make his point that he is not in the same league as the authority of Jesus Christ. Jesus is the one they should look to for salvation, not Paul. Crispus was the leader of the Corinthian synagogue (Acts 18:8), Gaius was Paul’s hospitable host mentioned in Romans 16:23, and Stephanas and his household were called the first converts in Achaia and then became great servants in the early church (1 Corinthians 16:15-17).
Paul makes his purpose clear in verse 17: “For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel—not with wisdom and eloquence, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.” While baptism is important, preaching the gospel is significantly more important. Paul’s main focus was preaching; baptisms could be done by other leaders in that congregation. When Paul states that he is not called to preach with wisdom and eloquence, he doesn’t mean that he intended to preach unwise things in a manner that’s not understandable. Rather, he meant that he was not trying to make the people believe through clever arguments. The message of the cross is what is important, and the manner in which that message is shared is of much less consequence than the message itself. It is all about the cross of Christ!
In our modern world today, we face constant divisions, even within the Church. We tend to get caught up in little details that really don’t matter, rather than focusing on the one thing that unites us all as believers: the cross of Jesus Christ! Christ is not divided, and the gospel message is not divided. Therefore, as followers of Jesus and adherents to the gospel, we should not be divided either. We are called to be unified in our minds and thoughts around that one central message – Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
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