Chapter 1

Contrary to popular belief probably the most popular city in Greece in the ancient world was not Athens which is admired and revered today, but Corinth, because Corinth was the greatest pleasure city of the ancient world. It had a population of over half a million. The ancients report 607,000 people as the regular population of that city. During the time of the Roman empire it was the vanity fair of the Roman empire.

It was located on an isthmus, the only one of its kind in the ancient world. Between the Adriatic and Ionian Sea on the one hand and the Agean Sea on the other was a system of rollers, and a ship instead of traveling all the way around Greece and having trouble sailing in many difficult winds could go right across the isthmus from the Agean Sea to the Adriatic in a matter of a few hours by being pulled over a system of rollers. This meant that there was always a heavy population of sailors, merchants, traders, and so on, in Corinth. In addition to that, in the time of the Roman empire the Olympic games was not important at all. They had been important in the past, 3 or 400 years before, but the greatest organised games of the Roman empire at the time of writing of this epistle were held in the coliseum at the isthmus just out of Corinth. So the Isthmus games were the greatest athletic games of the ancient world at this time. This means that the people who were interested in athletics were always very much present in the city. So it was famous as a sports centre, a trade centre, but the greatest attraction of all was Venus, the centre of the cult of Aphrodite, the Greek word for Venus the goddess of love. There were more temples to Venus in Corinth than in the rest of the ancient world put together. When one worshipped in the temple of Venus three things were involved. First of all, eating the best food to be found anywhere in the ancient world in the temple restaurants. Secondly, drinking the best whiskey to be found at the bars inside the temple. Thirdly, the most beautiful priestesses in any part of the world who served the temple of Aphrodite. Corinth was a convention town and it was always filled with a floating population with people coming and going.

We know from Acts 18:1-18 that the apostle Paul visited Corinth and founded the church there. Paul stayed long enough to train the nucleus of believers, to organise the church and get things cranked up, and then he left. And because the Greeks were admirers of oratory their second pastor was Apollos who was a very eloquent man but not too strong on doctrine. As a result things went from bad to worse. Corinth needed strong Bible teaching. Instead, Corinth had beautiful oratory which didn’t hold the church together and they began to fall apart. As a result Apollos became very discouraged and walked out on the church.

First of all they had factions. The main problem was that they had quite a few people who were vindictive and implacable. They had jealous people, more than their share of the gossips, legalistic bullying in abundance, and along with a strong brand of legalism in the church they also had a strong brand of licentiousness. Verse 1, “Paul” means ‘little.’ His name was originally Saul but he oriented to the grace of God immediately and changed his name to Paul.

“called to be an apostle,” ‘called’ is an adverbial adjective, it is not a verb. The adverbial adjective is called a timeless connotation in the Greek and it means that God called Paul to be an apostle in eternity past. It also means that Paul was the twelfth apostle, replacing Judas Iscariot.

The doctrine of apostleship

1. The qualifications of an apostle. a) He had to be appointed by the Holy Spirit, 1 Corinthians 12:8,11; b) He had to be an eyewitness to the resurrection or have seen the resurrected Christ. Paul saw the resurrected Christ on the Damascus road, 1 Corinthians 15:8,9; Acts 1:22; c) He had to be endued with miraculous powers, Acts 5:15; 16:16-18; 19:11,12. All of the apostles had miraculous powers. All of their qualifications came from God on the basis of grace.

2. No apostles were appointed to the church until after the ascension of Christ, Ephesians 4:8-11 cf. Matthew 16:18 [after Matthew 10], the Church was still future.

3. The roster of apostles. There were the eleven disciples, the twelfth disciple was Paul, Barnabus, James the Lord’s half brother, Apollos, and possibly Silas and Timothy.

4. The apostles were recipients of direct revelation from God. And when John put the last “Amen” in the book of Revelation that was the last piece of direct revelation that ever came from God or ever will come from God until the Tribulation.

“of Jesus Christ,” genitive of relationship. Paul belongs to Jesus Christ. Application: You [every believer] belong to Jesus Christ; “through the will of God,” preposition dia plus the genitive is instrumentality [dia plus the accusative is ‘because’]. God’s will was the instrument whereby Paul became an apostle.

“and Sosthenes,” Acts 18:17. He was a Jew in Corinth, the chief ruler in the synagogue. He tried to get Paul thrown in prison or executed as an enemy of the Roman empire. He was bitterly opposed to Paul. What happened was amusing. Sosthenes and a deputation of Jews came in to the Roman ruler in Corinth, Galeo, and accused Paul. Galeo was bored stiff so he threw Sosthenes and his accusers out. Then all the Greeks took Sosthenes and beat him before the judgment seat. “And Galeo cared for none of those things.” When Sosthenes bounced outside Paul led him to the Lord! From there Sosthenes became one of the grace crowd, along with Stephanos and others. He was one who responded to doctrine and when Paul left Corinth Sosthenes went with him. When Paul was writing back to the Corinthians Sosthenese was with him.

Verse 2, “Unto the church of God which is at Corinth,” the recipients of the epistle. Here is one of the worst churches of all time. Along with the Laodiceans they held the record for the ancient world. But even though all the terrible things that they have done, all of the evil things which they have done, we read “to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus.”

“Sanctified”

1. It means to be set apart unto God.

2. It is in the perfect tense: they were sanctified in the past and the results go on forever. They were sanctified at the moment they were saved and they remained sanctified forever — positional truth.

3. The passive voice: the subject receives the action of the verb. They didn’t earn or deserve this thing, they received it — grace of God.

4. It is a participle. A participle modifies something and this modifies “in Christ Jesus.” ‘Sanctified’ goes with ‘in Christ Jesus.’

These believers are all carnal and out of fellowship but they are all sanctified in Christ Jesus. To understand this we must know the doctrine of positional truth, the doctrine of the baptism of the Spirit, and the doctrine of sanctification.

The doctrine of positional truth

1. It is not an experience, it is not ecstatics. It is something that God does for you at the moment of salvation and it continues forever.

2. It is not progressive, it cannot be improved. You can never improve your position in Christ, it is perfect as of the moment of salvation.

3. It is not related to human merit in any way, no works involved.

4. It is eternal in nature — perfect tense of sanctified.

5. It is known only by the Word of God, it is taught no other place and is not understood apart from the Word of God.

6. It is obtained en tot at the moment of salvation.

The doctrine of the baptism of the Spirit — the mechanics of positional truth.

1. The baptism of the Spirit did not occur in Old Testament times, ever.

2. The baptism of the Spirit was first prophesied by Jesus Christ during His earthly ministry — John 14:20, “ … I in you and ye in me.” Acts 1:5.

3. The mechanics of the baptism of the Spirit, 1 Corinthians 12:13. The Holy Spirit takes every believer at the moment of salvation and enters him into union with Christ.

4. Unification among believers is achieved by the baptism of the Holy Spirit, Ephesians 4:5.

5. The implications of the baptism of the Spirit are found in Galatians 3:26-28. Distinctions are removed.

6. The baptism of the Spirit provides retroactive identification, Romans 6:3,4. This is the doctrinal basis for victory over the old sin nature.

7. The baptism of the Spirit began the Church Age, Matthew 16:15 cf. Acts 1:5; 11:15,17.

8. The baptism of the Spirit is the basis of positional truth, Ephesians 1:3-6.

9. The baptism of the Spirit is not an experience of any kind.

The doctrine of sanctification

Three categories: positional, progressive or experiential, ultimate or operation phase three. Positional sanctification is union with Christ, 1 Corinthians 1:2, 30; 6:11; Hebrews 10:10-14. Progressive sanctification is an experience. It is the experience of being filled with the Spirit or the experience of learning and applying doctrine, John 17:17; Ephesians 5:26; 1 Thessalonians 5. Ultimate sanctification is receiving a resurrection body minus the old sin nature, 1 John 3:1,2; Philippians 3:21; Romans 8:29. In the New Testament the English words holy, saint, sanctify, and holiness all have exactly the same Greek root. The word ‘saint’ is used for a believer and it means the sanctified one. Every believer is a saint, ‘sanctified in Christ Jesus.’

“called saints,” the timeless verbal adjective again. It means that in eternity past God knew who would believe in Christ and He called them saints long before they lived.

“with all,” the word ‘with’ is called an associative instrumental which anticipates the future use of this epistle to exhort and encourage believers everywhere. This is one of those phrases which anticipates that one day we would study it just as when Titus brought it to Corinth they studied it.

“that in every place,” this anticipates the spreading of the Church throughout the entire world; “call upon the name of the Lord.” “Call upon” is a dative case, present middle participle. It is dative of advantage. It is to the advantage of any member of the human race to call upon the name of the Lord/to believe in Him, Romans 10:13. It is present tense, historical present which means throughout the ages people will call upon the name of the Lord and will be saved. It was true in the day of Paul, it is true today. The middle voice: any member of the human race who believes in Christ is benefited by believing in Christ forever and ever. The name of Jesus Christ is the only name whereby a person must be saved, Acts 4:12.

“both theirs [their Lord] and ours.”

Verse 3, the salutation. Notice that the Holy Spirit is missing in this verse. Why? It is the ministry of the Holy Spirit in the Church Age to glorify Jesus Christ, John 7:39; 16:14. Because of this He is never mentioned in a salutation but He is often mentioned in the benediction. Only the first and second members of the Trinity are mentioned in the salutation. The father is the author of the plan — grace; the Son is the executor of phase one; it is the ministry of the Holy Spirit to glorify Christ.

Grace always comes before peace. You can never have peace until you have grace. And peace doesn’t mean a feeling of peace, it means knowing doctrine and believing it. You never get peace by feeling good. Peace comes from the utilisation and appropriation of grace.

“from” is the preposition a)po, the preposition of ultimate source. The ultimate source of all grace is the Father who is the author of the divine plan, and the Son who executed the plan on the cross. The cross is the source of grace and if you do not believe in Jesus Christ you can never know the source of grace.

In verses 4-9 we have the apostle Paul’s thanksgiving; in vv. 10-16 we have his exhortation; in vv. 17,18 we have his emphasis.

Verse 4, thanksgiving for grace. True thanksgiving is based on receiving something that you do not earn or deserve, the principle of grace, what God has done for us.

“I thank” is a present active indicative. The present tense is linear aktionsart — “I keep on thanking God.” Paul’s orientation to grace was measured in terms of thanksgiving. The indicative mood indicates the reality of his thanksgiving, it was a genuine thanksgiving.

“my God,” possessive pronoun, He belongs to me. This personal pronoun indicates a personal relationship with God. All true thanksgiving is based on a true relationship with God and this relationship begins at the cross.

“always on your behalf,” there are very few things that one could be thankful for when reading about the Corinthians and when one understands the areas of carnality in which they delved. On the surface it would appear that thanksgiving for this collection of carnal believers is a little out of line. But we notice that he was not thankful for what they are doing but he is thankful that they are the recipients of the grace of God.

“which is given you by Jesus Christ,” Paul could not be directly thankful for the Corinthians, they were way out of line. About the worst church in all of the ancient world was Corinth. The object of thanksgiving here is grace, not the Corinthians. And notice that he declares where the grace of God begins — at the cross, “by Jesus Christ.” The grace of God is always said to be given and the verb to give is an aorist passive participle. The aorist tense indicates the point of time when a person believes in Jesus Christ. The passive voice: the individual who is the recipient of this grace cannot earn it. The action of the aorist participle precedes the action of the main verb. The main verb is found in the phrase “I thank my God.” So grace is given before thanksgiving can go into operation. The principle from the aorist participle: Grace precedes thanksgiving. Until a person believes in Jesus Christ and is born again, and enters the family of God, he really has nothing to be thankful for.

“which is given you” is dative of advantage. It is to the advantage of the Corinthians believers to have the grace of God and at this point the great advantage of rebound, 1 John 1:9.

In the KJV text is says that grace came “by Jesus Christ,” but the Greek says “in Christ Jesus.” All grace begins with positional truth. The moment the believer is in union with Christ this is the way that God the Father sees him. Jesus Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father. The believer is in union with Christ. The Father loves the Son with an infinite amount of love, therefore the believer is not accepted on the basis of who and what he is, he is accepted on the basis of who and what Christ is. So all grace begins with “in Christ Jesus.”

Verse 5, Paul is also thankful that the Corinthians, though out of fellowship and in carnality, have great spiritual gifts. So we now have thanksgiving for spiritual wealth. There is a point here: The possession of a spiritual gift does not make a believer great. A believer grows and becomes a wonderful believer because of the techniques which are common to all Christians, but never because of spiritual gifts which are peculiar to individual believers. Spiritual gifts do not determine spirituality. Spirituality is determined by the filling of the Spirit and all believers are commanded to be filled with the Spirit. Some believers have spectacular spiritual gifts, some believers have spiritual gifts that are wonderful but not seen and not obvious. Every believer has at least one spiritual gift. All spiritual gifts are sovereignly bestowed by the Holy Spirit at the moment of salvation. But here, and later on in chapter 12, we see that the possession of a spectacular spiritual gift does not make that individual believer better than other believers. There is one spiritual gift today that gives authority over others and that is the gift of pastor and teacher. There are some spiritual gifts which involve the exercise of authority over other believers but most do not. How great a believer you may be is determined by the filling of the Spirit, by the use of rebound, by the operation of the faith-rest technique, occupation with Christ, living in the Word, by knowledge of doctrine and it’s application to experience.

“That” introduces a result clause, and we could translate this “With the result that in everything ye are enriched.” This result clause is based on the fact that they have been given grace. The Corinthians were the worst Christians of the first century and yet in everything they are enriched. That is grace. The result of having the grace of God is great spiritual riches. “Everything” means that every believer is a spiritual millionaire. The Greek says literally, “in all things you are enriched.” This is in the aorist tense which refers to the point of time when you believe in Jesus Christ. You become enriched in all things at the moment of salvation. They were “once and for all” enriched. In other words, what God gave you at the moment of salvation constitutes eternal riches but whether you use these riches or not is another thing. Many Christians today have tremendous spiritual wealth but they are going around begging bread. The Corinthians fall into that category. But the spiritual wealth is there, and when money is there it is to spend. God’s riches are so great that you don’t have to worry that somehow you are going to exhaust His wealth, so you spend it in the operation of the techniques and use of the doctrines and promises, and so on. We have the passive voice here in which the subject receives the action of the verb. These Corinthians received these riches, they didn’t earn them or deserve them. That is grace. The indicative mood is the reality of having these great riches.

“by him” is literally, “in him.” This is the second statement of positional truth.

These riches have to be stored and spent, and how they are stored and how they are spent is declared at the end of this verse. They are stored by the last word, “knowledge.” You cannot spend what you do not know exists. You have to know these riches that you have in Christ. How can you use this vast wealth that God has given you as an ambassador for Christ until you know what it is? So “in all knowledge” refers to knowing doctrine. Doctrine is the description of this wealth.

“in all utterance,” this is communication. You must have it in the mind and then communicate it. Notice the word order here. Utterance comes before knowledge because in the whole system of Greek culture oratory was one of the greatest and highest activities. The Greeks actually put three things on a pedestal: the human mind, oratory, and a beautiful physical body. God speaks to the human race through believers and it can be seen what a difficult thing this is if believers do not know what to communicate. So all of these marvelous riches are declared to the unbeliever through knowledge and utterance (vocal communication). Utterance is the communication of doctrine (to the unbeliever it is the communication of the gospel) and knowledge refers to doctrine in the mind. The whole concept is service. Christian service is knowing doctrine and you can’t serve the Lord until you do know doctrine. You can’t serve the Lord on emotions. You cannot teach others what you do not know yourself. Behind utterance there must be knowledge.

Verse 6 — thanksgiving is expressed in witnessing. The word “testimony is the Greek word ‘witness,’ and the words ‘of Christ’ is literally ‘concerning Christ.’ “Even as the witness concerning Christ was stood up in you,” literally. “Was confirmed” means to make a stand, to be stabilised. The witness concerning Christ was stabilised in them. In other words, in the past they had done some very effective witnessing, and Paul is thankful for that. This witnessing is now down to a minimum because of carnality.

The doctrine of witnessing

1. Knowledge of salvation is necessary for witnessing, 2 Corinthians 5:17-21. The believer must understand doctrine before he tries to declare the issue.

2. Witnessing is the responsibility of every believer, Acts 1:8; 2 Timothy 4:5. This is the subject of 2 Corinthians chapter 3.

3. The effectiveness of the believer’s witnessing depends on his understanding of the last judgment — Revelation 20:12-15. At the last judgment the unbeliever will not be condemned for his sins.

4. Witnessing is impossible apart from the ministry of the Holy Spirit, John 16:8-11; 1 Corinthians 2:14. John 16 is referring to the sin of unbelief, the only sin on which the Spirit convicts.

5. The pertinent content of the Bible is the believer’s weapon in witnessing, that part of the Bible which deals with the gospel. Everything in the Bible is not for the unbeliever. You don’t have to argue about whether the Bible is the Word of God or not, that is a false issue. Ephesians 6:17; Hebrews 4:12.

6. The dynamics of witnessing depend upon the believer’s mental attitude, not personality. The right mental attitude is found in Romans 1:14-16, “I am debtor; I am ready; I am not ashamed.”

7. The concept of witnessing is twofold: the testimony of the life, 2 Corinthians 3:3; the testimony of the lips, 2 Corinthians 5:14-21.

8. Witnessing is rewarded in eternity, 1 Corinthians 3:11-16.

Verse 7, thanksgiving for spiritual gifts. “So that” is another result clause and it should be translated “With the result that,” “With the result that you do not lack in any spiritual gift.” The words ‘come behind’ in the KJV mean to lack. Present middle infinitive, you keep on not lacking.” The middle voice: they are benefited by having these gifts. The infinitive: it was God’s purpose to have great spiritual gifts in Corinth so that there would be impact for Christ. There was not impact for Christ at the moment of the writing of this epistle because of carnality. The word “gift” is a reference to spiritual gifts.

“waiting” means eager expectancy, intense eagerness; “the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ” refers to the Rapture of the Church.

Verses 4-9, the apostle’s thanksgiving; verses 10-16, the apostle’s exhortation; verses 17.18, the apostle’s emphasis.

Verse 4, thanksgiving for grace. The principle of thanksgiving is very important because whenever a person is thankful for all things he is oriented to grace. Thanksgiving is impossible unless the individual believer is in a position to understand grace and to utilise grace daily in his life. No one can be thankful for all things apart from orientation to grace. Everyone can be thankful for some things when they have a positive nature and pleasant and easy on the individual, but to be thankful for everything, for difficulties, for privations and hardship and all facets of life, to fulfill the principle “in everything give thanks for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you” requires understanding of doctrine and orientation to grace.

Remember that there is nothing good on Corinth. The Corinthian situation is terrible. The only thing that Paul can commend is positional truth. The Corinthians are the worst bunch of believers in the ancient world. But in spite of all the problems he is going to show them the pattern for thanksgiving.

“I thank,” present active indicative. Present tense, linear aktionsart, fulfilling Ephesians 5:20 and 1 Thessalonians 5:18, “I keep on thanking,” literally. The active voice: Paul produces the action of the verb, and even when he contemplates the horrible carnality in Corinth he still finds room for some thanksgiving. The indicative mood of Paul’s thanksgiving: it isn’t feigned.

“my God,” ‘my’ is a possessive pronoun. God is the personal possession of Paul since the day he has accepted Christ as saviour, and here is the beginning of orientation to grace. He is thankful to his God. God belongs to him because he has believed in Jesus Christ, and therefore since God belongs to him God is working on his behalf. God is going to provide everything for eternity, God will provide all blessing in time, and therefore what else can he do but be thankful. The possessive pronoun indicates personal relationship. There is no basis for thanking God for anything unless you have a personal relationship with Him through the cross.

“always,” this means under every circumstance, including the difficult one before him of chewing out the Corinthians; “on your behalf,” he is making a rather rare statement, he is thankful for the fact that the Corinthians are saved. That is what he means here. There isn’t anything else that he can be thankful for. They are way out of line, they are carnal, they are not properly representing the Lord, they are petty, jealous, envious, full of egocentricity, they wear their feelings on their sleeves, and at the same time they are guilty of the sins of the tongue. They are guilty of terrible spiritual pride and legalism on the one hand, and on the other are guilty of lasciviousness.

“for the grace of God,” he can be thankful for the grace of God because the grace of God is the plan of God. There is no plan apart from grace and this means that everything depends on who and what God is. Paul starts out by being thankful for grace because in the plan of God if man can do anything in it then the plan of God is no stronger than its weakest link, the plan is no stronger than man, and man’s plans are temporal and therefore no good. So we can do nothing for salvation. We can do nothing to be spiritual. Spirituality is by grace and therefore it is the ministry of the Holy Spirit apart from man’s works and man’s energy. You cannot have eternal life by your own effort, this is the work of God the Father. Grace all of the way through is the work of God and there is no place for man in the plan of God, except in the concept of the passive voice: man is the recipient of the wonderful assets of God, and God does all of the planning and He provides the means whereby these things are available to man on a non-meritorious basis.

“which is given,” aorist passive participle. Aorist tense: point of time when they were saved. Passive voice: the subject receives the action of the verb. They received grace, they didn’t earn it or deserve. Thanksgiving is a response to God regarding grace.

“you” is a plural pronoun, dative of advantage. It is to the advantage of any member of the human race to be the recipient of the grace of God; “by” is literally “in.” The preposition here is the preposition e)n which always means “in.” He is talking about grace “in Christ Jesus.” The moment we believe in Christ we enter into union with Him, and we share everything that Christ is and has. Therefore grace is given us “in Christ Jesus.” So in the Church Age no one can be thankful to God for anything until they are in union with Christ.

Verse 5, thanksgiving for spiritual wealth. “That in every thing,” ‘that’ introduces a result clause, ‘with the result that everything,’ or literally, ‘in all things.’

“ye are enriched’ — the verb means to have great wealth so that you never have to be concerned about having enough. It is in the aorist tense which refers to a point of time divorced from time and perpetuated forever. So it means as of the point of salvation you have this great wealth, and you keep on having it. Every believer has spiritual capital, but obviously every believer doesn’t utilise it. So here is the problem of failure of utilisation. It is never a case of not having, it is a case of not using.

“by him,” literally, “in him.” Then we have two areas in which these riches should show.

“in all utterance, and all knowledge,” these are in reverse order of operation. He starts with utterance because the Corinthians have a great trend toward sins of the tongue. Utterance is the service resulting from knowledge of doctrine. They have great wealth and it should be manifest through their utterance, through what they say. They should reveal their wealth to others. This is witnessing, this is evangelism, this is the declaration of what God has provided. “Knowledge” is doctrine in the frontal lobe. If you have doctrine in the frontal lobe you can communicate through utterance. Without doctrine in the frontal lobe utterance becomes meaningless no matter how eloquent. So to orient ourselves to service we must know what the Bible provides for the believer and then we must use it.

Verse 6, thanksgiving for Christ in witnessing. The word “testimony” is literally ‘witness.’ “Even as the witness concerning Christ was confirmed.” In other words, when you understand positional truth, the basis of thanksgiving, when you are thankful for your spiritual wealth, it becomes very easy to witness for Christ. The word ‘confirmed’ means to make a stand. They actually had impact for Christ in Corinth when they started out. The witness concerning Christ made s stand in their lives because they were aware of these things in connection with positional truth.

General principles on witnessing

1. Knowledge of salvation is necessary for witnessing. The better you understand salvation the better you can communicate the issue of salvation to others, 2 Corinthians 5:17-21. This means we must understand the doctrine of reconciliation or how the barrier is removed. This doesn’t mean you will present it every time but you must understand that between man and God there is a barrier.

2. Witnessing is the responsibility of every believer, Acts 1:8; 2 Timothy 4:5.

3. The effectiveness of the believer’s witnessing depends on his understanding of the last judgment, John 16:8-11 cf. Revelation 20:12:15. At the last judgment sins will not be mentioned, good deeds will be mentioned. The basis of the unbeliever’s indictment is his good deeds for energy of the flesh comes from the old sin nature and they that are in the flesh cannot please God.

4. Witnessing is impossible apart from the ministry of the Holy Spirit, 1 Corinthians 2:14 cf. John 16:8-11.

5. The pertinent content of the Bible is the believer’s weapon in witnessing, only gospel passages. Ephesians 6:17; Hebrews 4:12; Luke 16:28-31.

6. The dynamics of witnessing depend on the believer’s mental attitude, Romans 1:14-16.

7. The concept of witnessing is twofold: a) The testimony of the life, 2 Corinthians 3; b) the testimony of the lips, 2 Corinthians 5:14-21.

8. Witnessing is rewarded in eternity, 1 Corinthians 3:11-16.

Verse 7, thanksgiving for spiritual gifts. “So that” introduces a result clause, it should be translated ‘With the result that.’

“ye come behind in no gift,” this should be translated, “With the result that you do not lack any spiritual gift.” In other words, the Corinthians church had all the spiritual gifts. But remember that although they had all of these spiritual gifts they were a total flop. Having spiritual gifts does not mean that an assembly will be successful. Spiritual gifts do not determine the success of an assembly of believers, it is spiritual life, and the filling of the Spirit is open to every believer. Every believer has at least one spiritual gift but we all have different spiritual gifts.

Verse 8, thanksgiving for ultimate sanctification. “Who [Jesus Christ] shall also confirm you unto the end.” ‘Shall also confirm’ is future active indicative. The word means to establish or to verify, and it means to receive a resurrection body. Confirmation means to receive a resurrection body, it doesn’t mean to join the church. This is future tense because the Rapture is in the future. Active voice: Jesus Christ accomplishes this. The indicative mood: the reality of a future resurrection body. ‘Unto the end’ refers to the Rapture of the church.

“blameless” is positional truth. Positionally we are blameless; “in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ,” we will be blameless in that day because in a resurrection body we will be minus the old sin nature.

Verse 9, thanksgiving for divine faithfulness. “God faithful,” there is no verb. The absence of the verb draws great attention to the subject and places emphasis on the object of the subject. God is always faithful, regardless of whether we are faithful or not.

“by whom,” relative pronoun referring to God the Father; “ye were [once and for all] called into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ our Lord.” Fellowship in this case means eternal fellowship. The Corinthians are out of fellowship experientially but Paul is talking obviously about positional truth. They are in positional fellowship but experientially they are out of fellowship, they are carnal believers. You cannot improve positional truth, it is perfect at the moment of salvation. Experiential fellowship determines modus operandi for time but positional fellowship determines our relationship with God forever.

Verse 10, a threefold exhortation. “I beseech” is not a word for begging, it means to exhort. The word “now” means that Paul has finished saying pleasant things. Paul is thankful for positional truth and then he has to move right on because that is the only thing the Corinthians have on the positive side of the ledger at this point. “I beseech” is present active indicative: “I exhort you [plural].”

“brethren,” believers; “by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ” is literally, “through the name.” This is followed by three exhortations.

“that” introduces a purpose clause. This is God’s purpose for the believer.

“ye all speak the same thing,” this means the same content, not the same words. That is, speak divine viewpoint, the Bible viewpoint, rather than human viewpoint. In effect, this first exhortation is important because the impact of the Corinthian church on the community of Corinth and that area of Greece has gone down to almost zero. The reason is that people are misinformed as to what Christianity really is and what position Christianity takes on any subject simply because these people, not by their words but by the content of their message, are declaring human viewpoint. Speaking the same thing is accomplished where you have people consistently declaring the gospel the same way, spirituality the same way, and so on. This is one of the most difficult of all the exhortations that Paul gave because it requires more doctrine, more doctrine, and more doctrine to get to this point. The more doctrine there is the more there is uniformity of divine opinion as over against human opinion on any given subject. The word “speak” is a present active subjunctive — present tense, linear aktionsart. It means here to consistently speak, habitually speak on any subject from salvation to socialism. It ought to be divine viewpoint, Bible viewpoint, doctrine or the application of doctrine. The subjunctive mood is a command but it is a command given recognising that at the time it was given it has not been obeyed up to that point. The subjunctive mood recognises human volition. The “same thing,” again, does not mean the same vocabulary but the same content, and content means mental activity. The principle: It is impossible to express the divine viewpoint apart from knowledge of doctrine, knowledge of the Word of God. This exhortation anticipates all of the sins of the tongue which will be given in the next passage.

“that there be no divisions among you,” basically divisions are caused because in some there is divine viewpoint and in some there is human viewpoint. There is another cause for dissension: operation ego and each contending that they are right and trying to superimpose their system and themselves on the congregation as its leaders. In the words “there be” the verb to be is present active subjunctive, the same as the first exhortation. In other words, it is present linear aktionsart. Habitually there should be no divisions.

The third exhortation: “but that ye be perfectly joined together.” The words “perfectly joined together” is one word in the Greek, katartizw. It is a military term used for equipping an army, 2 Corinthians 13:11; it is also used as a naval word used to supply a fleet, 1 Thessalonians 3:10; Galatians 6:1, used as a medical term, to set a bone fracture; it is also a fishing term, 1 Peter 5:10, where it means to mend a broken net. This is in the passive voice and it means the only way they can be perfectly joined together is to be filled with the Spirit through rebound. So this is an exhortation to rebound. The subjunctive mood is tantamount to a command but recognising human volition. The potential of the subjunctive mood means that maybe they will or maybe they will not.

Verse 11, the exposure of the factions who are involved. Paul gives the source of his information and declares that his source is a good one.

“it hath been declared” means it was made known, it was revealed. The aorist tense is the point of time when Chloe went to see Paul in Ephesus. The passive voice: Paul received the information.

“of you” is literally, “concerning you.”

“my brethren,” indicating once again that they are believers. You are ‘my’ brothers and I am ashamed of you.

“by them of Chloe,” the stabilised family; “that there are contentions among you,” the word ‘contentions’ means factions or horrible wranglings resulting in schisms.

Verse 12, the factions. “I say” is present active indicative. This is a dramatic present.

“that every one of you saith,” and here are the factions; “I am” is the Greek word e)gw, and we have ego in every case here; “of Paul,” I belong to the Paul party; “of Apollos,” he was an orator and these are the people who are strong on Greek culture; “of Cephas,” Peter, although Peter has never been in Corinth; “of Christ,” in other words, we are greater than you because Christ is greater than the others. It sounds good but it isn’t good at all because this is the hypocrisy, name-dropping, the great facade of self-righteousness. These are all out of line in different ways and what these four schisms are trying to do is to control the Corinthian church and to superimpose their false system on everyone else.

Verse 13, there are three questions which are now addressed to these three factions which have developed in Corinth. “Is Christ divided?” The word “Christ” here is literally, “the Christ.” There is a definite article here. “The Christ” refers to Christ and all who are in union with Him. In other words, it is a reference to the top circle and the top circle is not divided. The word “divided” is a perfect tense, divided in the past with the result that factions exist in the present. The answer, of course, is no. The passive voice: does Christ receive dividing? Experientially He has; positionally the answer is no. The indicative mood is the reality of unity and position in Christ. This first question attacks the hypocrisy of the fourth party. This was the holier-than-thou party, the pseudo-spiritual group. This “I am of Christ” party was a pseudo spirituality party. This is, of course, spirituality by human effort. They do not have their eyes on Christ, they are simply using Christ as a front. Spirituality by human effort is the confusing of means and result in phase two. The filling of the Spirit is the means of witnessing, the means of prayer, the means of worship, the means of giving, and the means of everything else.

The second question emphasises where they should have their eyes. All of these factions should be occupied with Christ instead of self, instead of ego; so we have the question, “Was Paul crucified for you?” Obviously, this is an attack on the Paul party. Paul is repudiating it, he definitely has nothing to do with them. Paul was not crucified for them, there is only one saviour, Acts 4:12. So there is no justification for using Paul as a front either.

The third question requires much care. This is a reference to Spirit baptism whereas in verse 14 we have ritual baptism. “Were you baptised into the name of Paul?” The word ‘name’ is idiomatic and it stands for the person, “Were you baptised into union with Paul?” No, you were not. Every believer is in union with Christ, 1 Corinthians 12:13. This is the ministry of the Holy Spirit. Positionally every believer is in union with Christ; experientially every believer should be occupied with Christ. The Corinthians believers were not entered into union with Paul, they were entered into union with Christ.

Verse 14, Paul’s record of ritual baptism in Corinth. It should be understood that Paul baptised believers. Cf. Acts 16. In Corinth he did very little baptising. Behind verses 14-16 the Corinthians had the idea that they were superior because of the one who had baptised them. There were people who were contending that they were better than others because Paul baptised them, or I am better than others because Peter bapised me, I am better than you are because Apollos baptised me, etc. Baptism had become a bone of contention. The place for water baptism is with a believer who understands Spirit baptism. But this is the passage where Paul is talking about emphasis. He is saying that baptism has a place but it does not have first place in emphasis. Because part of the faction problem is contention over baptism Paul is delighted that he personally did not baptise too many of them because some have attached erroneous importance to the subject of ritual baptism. Paul is thankful to the Father that he had only baptised a few because if he had baptised many more the factions would only be worse. He had not gone to Corinth to start factions, he went to Corinth to lead people to the Lord and then help them to grow in grace through Bible teaching.

“Crispus” was the ruler of the synagogue in Corinth, Acts 18 records the story of Crispus.

“Gaius” was Paul’s host in Corinth, Romans 16:23.

Verse 15, the reason why Paul is thankful. “Lest” is a negative purpose clause in the Greek. It should be translated “That none of you should say I had baptised in my own name. “In my own name” is an idiom meaning ‘for my own glory’ or ‘for my own advancement.’ Paul’s motives in baptism would have been judged had he baptised extensively in Corinth and the factions would have been worse.

Verse 16, Paul does not cast any reflection on ritual baptism except as certain believers have made it the basis of factions, schisms. He implies that baptism had received a wrong emphasis and he now concludes with a right emphasis in verses 17 and 18. Remember that Paul is a gospeliser, not a baptiser. When he baptised he gave baptism its proper emphasis but no ritual can ever take precedence over reality. The Church Age is not the age of ritual but the age of the reality. The reality is found in the person of Christ and reality is known only through Bible doctrine. So ritual without reality is meaningless and ritual can never take precedence over reality.

Verse 17, Paul’s purpose is declared. Paul is the servant of the Lord Jesus Christ and knowing this he also recognises why he was sent to Corinth. When he arrived in Corinth there were no believers. When he left Corinth there were not only believers but they were organised into a local church and going strong when he left.

“For Christ sent me not to baptise.” We must recognise that the word ‘baptise’ is in the present tense which means at periodic intervals or to make this a pattern. The pattern of his ministry was not to perform baptisms. The present tense would be a pattern concept. The active voice: Paul produces the action of the verb. In this case the negative blocks him from producing the action of the verb. The infinitive plus the negative means it was not Paul’s purpose to baptise. He came to declare the gospel and to lead people to the Lord.

“but,” conjunction of contrast; “to preach the gospel,” present middle infinitive. Middle voice: the subject is benefited by the action of the verb. He is personally benefited by preaching the gospel but the negative with baptising means he isn’t benefited by baptising people. He is benefited by preaching the gospel. The middle voice is also reflexive: he himself must preach the gospel. The infinitive denotes purpose. So, again, Paul is a gospeliser, not a baptiser. Hence, Paul’s emphasis is on the gospel and obviously not on baptism. Only the message of the gospel can save, no one can ever be saved by going through any ritual.

“not with wisdom of words,” the Greek culture emphasis. Just as ritual cannot save so eloquence or persuasive speech cannot save. You cannot be eloquence make people accept Christ, it is the ministry of the Holy Spirit to lead people to the Lord and the objective of speech is to communicate the gospel, not to persuade. Words are the means of expressing thought but ‘wisdom’ of words here actually means eloquence, persuasiveness. Paul declares the gospel but that is where his job ends. He doesn’t use pressure, he doesn’t use gimmicks. The emphasis is on the content of the message rather than the public speaking ability. Paul is not a salesman with a gimmick but a representative of God with good news. The message must be accurate.

“lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect [neutralised, made void].” The cross cannot be voided itself but the message concerning the cross can be voided. To deprive an object of its essence or its virtue is what the Greek word means here. The cross must not be deprived of its essence, its virtue. But when you substitute human power for divine dynamics in the presentation of the cross that is exactly what happens, you neutralise the cross of Christ. The cross is the issue, not sin. Paul says in this verse that human dynamics and divine dynamics cannot coexist.

“Should be made of none effect”

1. This means to be made void, empty, to provide an object of its essence or its virtue.

2. This is in the aorist tense and refers to any point of time when the gospel is not clearly communicated.

3. The verb is in the passive voice which means the gospel, the cross of Christ, receives nullification through the way it is presented by the believer.

4, The subjunctive mood: it doesn’t have to be that way.

Verse 18, “For the preaching of the cross.” This is not the word ‘preaching’ though it could be the word ‘communicating.’ The noun is logoj, an Attic Greek word. It became a technical word in Greek philosophy. The logoj was the original cause of everything. Perhaps this would be better transliterated, “For the logoj of the cross.” The word logoj is a title for the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ is the only member of the Godhead who is revealed, who is communicated, as it were. The logoj is more than a thought, the logoj is a person. It is God and it is God revealed to man. The revealed God is the second person of the Trinity. So the logoj connotes Christ who is the revealer of God, therefore the gospel is not a system, it is a salvation and it is a salvation involving a person. Salvation is a person. Logoj is also the highest concept of God, it is God in His eternity, it is God in His essence. In our verse we have the logoj of the cross. The cross is where Christ died, logoj is the person who died on the cross. But logoj indicates the essence box. The one who died on the cross was the God-Man. As God He is sovereign, absolute righteousness, justice, love, eternal life, omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, immutability, and veracity. Logoj indicates all of these things communicated and revealed. When Christ hung upon the cross He was undiminished deity and at the same time true humanity, perfect humanity. He was different from the rest of the human race in that He had no old sin nature, no imputation of Adam’s sin and no personal sin in His life. Therefore He was qualified to die. When He died on the cross He died twice, Isaiah 53:9. He died spiritually by bearing our sins and He died physically. Jesus Christ in His deity cannot die spiritually and cannot die physically. We have here the essence of the gospel — the person: the logoj; the cross: the work. We not only have the hypostatic union depicted but we have the person and the work. The person is mentioned first because not any other person in the history of the universe is qualified to be saviour. The Father cannot be saviour because you have to become humanity. The Father in essence is deity but no humanity. The same is true of the Holy Spirit. The Son is in essence deity, coequal with the Father and with the Spirit but He is also true humanity. However, He is different from humanity in that He is God. The logoj of the cross is one of those sublime expressions which emphasises what God has done and sets up a pattern — God did all of the work. In the presentation of the gospel man is the agent, man communicates the gospel, but man cannot save anyone. This is the ministry of the Holy Spirit but the Holy Spirit uses accurate pertinent doctrine.

“to them that perish,” one word in the Greek, a dative present middle participle: “to those who are in the process of perishing.” The present tense is a process. They are still alive but if they continue as an unbeliever they will be out of it. The middle voice is reflexive which says they have made their own decision — negative volition. They are responsible for their own decision and the unbeliever perishes by his own choice, it is not God’s will for him to perish.

“foolishness,” human viewpoint. The unbeliever is a soulish man and in his mind he has human viewpoint. You cannot win people to Christ by human viewpoint, energy of the flesh, human gimmicks. The plan of God is the communication of the gospel by spirit-filled people and the ministry of the Spirit in the soulish mind.

“but unto us,” himself and all of the Corinthians who are out of fellowship but saved; “which are saved” — dative present passive participle. The present tense is the process. We have eternal life now but we are going to have a new body in the future. The passive voice: the subject receives the action of the verb; we do not earn or work for salvation, it is strictly the work of God.

“it is the power of God,” the power is in the gospel, the clear presentation of the facts. It is information that people need. Paul is saying in effect that the Corinthians have lowered themselves to human viewpoint, they are all in factions now, they are all mixed up, they are muddying up the water with baptism. They are confusing people, they are appealing human viewpoint, putting an emphasis on oratory, and there is a de-emphasis of the gospel. Where you de-emphasise the gospel you de-emphasise the person of the gospel. They are no longer occupied with Christ, they are occupied with themselves, they are not thinking about Christ at all. It is the cross, the information of the cross, it is the gospel which is the power of God unto salvation.

Verse 19, the Old Testament citation. “For it is written,” perfect tense, it is written in the past with the result that it stands forever. The Word of God liveth and abideth forever. The passive voice: we have received the Bible. This is a quotation from Isaiah 29:14. The background is the Assyrian invasion of Judah and the king of Israel decided to go to Egypt for help against Assyria. God said, “Trust me.” Instead, the king of Judah went to Egypt.

The city of Corinth was very strong in the background of Greek culture. It was one of the three most powerful cities in the Greek area of the ancient world. Generally in Corinth there were three kinds of people who made an attack on Christianity. First of all the philosophers who developed two systems at this time, stoicism and Epicureanism. Secondly, the Jewish theologians who had arrived in town in order to enslave believers and bring them into legalism. And finally, the professional Greek debater. As a type of oratory which was famous in the Graeco-Roman cultural pattern one of the great facets in oratory was the ability to debate. The professional debater would take either side in any argument and seek to win simply by the use of logic. This was highly developed in the ancient world, more so than probably at any time in the history of the human race since then. So there were three attacks on Christianity from the outside. In the first part of this chapter as an introduction to the epistle we saw the inner attacks on Christianity, the various types of carnality, the erroneous mental attitude sins, and then the expression of these things in the sins of the tongue.

Verse 20, the key for the rest of this chapter and for chapter two. There are four great questions which are asked in verse 20. “Where is the wise?” is question #1; “Where is the scribe?” is question #2; “Where is the debater of this age?” is question #3; “Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?” is question #4.

“Where is the wise?” This is a technical word for a philosopher; “Where is the scribe?” This is the Jewish theologian. Originally the scribe was a Bible scholar, an Old Testament scholar. Now he is simply a Jewish theologian and his emphasis is legalism. He has come to Corinth in order to infiltrate the local churches there and seeking in that way to neutralise the effectiveness of the grace of God among believers. The scribe is always a legalist in Corinthians emphasising salvation by works and spirituality by works, or trying to keep the Mosaic law for salvation and using the Mosaic law as a means of spirituality. “Where is the debater of this age?” These are professional debaters who will take either side, without convictions about anything, and his objective is simply to win the argument regardless of which side he is on. Therefore he is under tremendous pressure form his approbation lust. Generally speaking the professional debaters were always opposed to the gospel, always argued against it, they tried to use logic in order to beat it down. The gospel was introduced as an absolute and dogmatic truth. All biblical doctrine is dogmatic in nature and does not permit any equivocation, and if there was anything a debater could not stand it was dogmatism. God is absolute. Anything that comes from God must be absolute. It is impossible for anything which comes from God to be either/or. That is why we have such phrases in the Word as “Thus saith the Lord.” That introduces an absolute, dogmatic principle. One of the reasons that Christianity was hated in the early days in the Roman empire was because Christianity was the first institution of any kind that had existed in the Graeco-Roman world which was absolutely, tenaciously, emphatically dogmatic about everything. And it was making tremendous inroads. “Where is the wise?” The debaters of this age were opposed to dogmatism of any kind.

The fourth question introduces a fight from within. It shows that one of the great attacks made on the Corinthians is human versus divine viewpoint. The soul always has human viewpoint and the spirit always has divine viewpoint. So the fourth question shows the infiltration of human viewpoint in the mind of the believer, therefore neutralising his effectiveness for the cause of Christ.

“hath not God made foolish” — God is the author of the divine viewpoint, Isaiah 55:7-9; “made foolish” means literally to prove foolish — aorist active indicative. God proved foolish in a point of time all of the wisdom of man. Now the point of time is not a point of time. Remember that the aorist tense can be an occurrence in eternity. In eternity past the omniscience of God came up with a plan for the human race — doctrine of divine decrees. The aorist tense refers to that occurrence when the doctrine of divine decrees was first formulated. In the doctrine of divine decrees we have the entire plan of God for man. That plan falls into several operations: phase one, the cross where Jesus Christ provided salvation; phase two, the believer in time. The executor of phase two is the Holy Spirit; phase three is the believer in eternity, and the executor of eternity is God the Father. Under the pan of God, operation grace, God does the work so that man can never receive any of the credit. If the plan is going to be perfect at no point must man cooperate or do anything in the plan. If man can help or do anything then the plan is no stronger than its weakest link. The weakest link is man and if man is in the plan at all then the plan is no good because it is no stronger than man. God is omnipotent and therefore His plan has perfect strength. It is perfect in its activity as well as in its concept and therefore there is no place for man. This just galled the unbeliever in Corinth especially. Consequently, one of the great problems that these three professional groups, all academically brilliant, were able to attack some believers with the result that believers began to accept human rather than divine viewpoint in their minds, and they began to break down with regard to the importance of doctrine and to the concept of operation grace. The aorist tense is the occurrence in eternity. When did God prove man’s plans foolish? In eternity past when He devised a perfect plan. One perfect plan proves all imperfect plans foolish and ridiculous.

“the wisdom of this world?” the devices and plans of this cosmos, the Satanic system.

Where is the philosopher? To preach Christ as a system of philosophy or ethics is to turn Christianity into a culture. Christianity is not culture or a system of ethics.

Verse 21, divine wisdom in the appropriation of phase one. “For after that,” ‘after that’ is ‘since’ or ‘inasmuch as.’

“in the wisdom of God the world through the instrumentality of wisdom knew not God” — all human ethical systems demand human activity and ability to comply with a human standard, but there is no relationship with God offered whereby they could meet His standard. The wisdom of God is divine omniscience developing operation grace. The plan of God is grace all the way and therefore it must be appropriated by grace, it must be understood by grace — the Holy Spirit teaches the human spirit, and so on. In appropriation, in perception, it is always on a non-meritorious basis. The ‘world’ is a Satanic system of ideas and ideals. ‘Wisdom’ here is any system which comes from rationalism or empiricism.

“through the instrumentality of wisdom,” dia plus the genitive.

“knew not,” aorist tense. In the point of time when trying to understand God by rationalism or empiricism. It is impossible to know God through either system. The philosopher doesn’t know God and can’t know God, he is using the wrong tools.

“it pleased God,” the Greek says, “God decided with pleasure.”

“by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe,” the philosopher is trying to understand God but He can’t do it because he is trying to use human ability and human ingenuity. But inside of that same philosopher is the system known as faith by which he originally learned about 90 per cent of everything that he ever learned. That is true of all of us. We learn most of what we learn through faith.

“to save,” aorist active infinitive, to once and for all save them that believe. The infinitive denotes purpose. It is God’s purpose to save anyone who will believe in Christ.

“them” is an accusative plural referring to all members of the human race, without exception.

“that believe,” the aoristic present tense. The aorist tense makes no provision for punctiliar action in present time, therefore the Greeks had to use present tense, and occasionally when you wanted to produce a status quo in present time you had to use the present tense, and it has the punctiliar action of the aorist tense so it is called an aoristic present tense. It also has a dramatic quality, so those who believe refers to the fact that this is addressed to Corinthian believers whose status quo at the time Paul writes is that they are saved but very obviously deceived by Greek philosophy. It is God’s plan and purpose to once and for all save them who believe. Notice: “though the foolishness of preaching.” Why preaching? Because in the Graeco-Roman world they worshipped oratory. And here are people who are not eloquent and great at oratory but they can declare the simple gospel. And the simple gospel from simple-minded people and simple lips results in something that lasts forever: eternal salvation.

Verse 22, There are two types of false criteria which are introduced in this verse. The first criterion is emotionalism. This leads so many believers astray. The second criterion is rationalism. The Jews, the emotional religious types, “keep on demanding a sign.” A sign is the Greek word for a miracle which stimulates their emotions, a miracle that thrills them. In fact, the Jews has received three great signs in the Old Testament, all found in Isaiah. The first was in Isaiah 7:14, the virgin birth; second was the unique death of Christ, Isaiah 53:9, He died twice, spiritually and physically; the third, the sign of tongues in 28:11,12. But now the day of signs is over with the Jews under the fifth cycle of discipline. The signs ended with the gift of tongues and any signs that exist today are false signs. The people who demand signs are simply catering to their emotional pattern. This is a warning against the fact that there are believers in the Corinthians congregation who are emotional and emotion becomes their criterion. Paul warned the Corinthians against emotionalism as the criterion, 2 Corinthians 6:11,12.

The second great criterion was rationalism, “the Greeks keep on seeking wisdom.” Wisdom is used in the sense here of philosophy and culture. In essence, man by mans thoughts and efforts trying to produce a better world. The problem was that these Corinthians were falling into these patterns of false criteria.

The first three question of verse 20 are answered in context. Question #1 is answered in verses 21-29; question #2 is answered in verses 30 and 31; question #3 is answered in chapter two verses 1-16.

Verse 23, the Christian emphasis. “But” is a conjunction of contrast and we have a contrast between the false criteria of the previous verses — emotionalism and rationalism — and the emphasis of Christianity.

“we preach Christ crucified,” ‘we preach’ is present active indicative, the present tense is linear aktionsart. Christianity always emphasises Christ. The word ‘preach’ doesn’t mean to stand up and preach from a pulpit, it means to announce, to make a declaration. It has the idea of announcing something of importance. The linear aktionsart means that this is the way that Christianity is declared, this is God’s method for presenting Christ to a lost and dying world. The indicative mood is the reality of evangelism in every generation. There never will be a generation in the history of the human race which does not have the opportunity of hearing the gospel. Christ is the person of the gospel and ‘crucified’ is the work of the gospel. Both must be involved in announcing the good news. The word ‘crucified’ is perfect passive participle. The perfect tense indicates that Christ’s crucifixion was different from all other crucifixions in that he was the God-Man. The uniqueness of His person leads to the uniqueness of His crucifixion, and in His case we have the only crucifixion or the only death that has ever existed in the human race where at the point of death the one who was dying died twice. He died spiritually by bearing our sins and taking our place and dying physically because His work was finished or completed. The perfect tense means a past action with results that go on forever. Christ was crucified in the past with the results of this crucifixion continuing forever. The passive voice indicates that Christ received crucifixion, and we know that He received it from God the Father. He didn’t earn it or deserve it, He received it as the only way in which God could break down the barrier between Himself and the human race. The passive voice is very important because it emphasises the principle of grace. The emphasis of the gospel, this passage says, is not on the signs or the miracles or the emotionalism of some religious system, and it isn’t based upon human philosophy.

“unto the Jews a stumbling block,” what is a stumbling block to the Jews? Christ? No, Christ crucified. To the Jew the idea of the Lord Jesus Christ dying on the cross is something that he can’t stand, and ‘stumbling block’ is simply an idiom for his rejection of the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ is called a stumbling block in Psalm 118:22 which is quoted in 1 Peter 2:8 and Romans 9:32,33.

“and unto the Greeks” whose criterion is rationalism this is “foolishness.” The Greeks could not squeeze the gospel into their philosophical mould and they refused to abandon their criterion which was either rationalism or empiricism, and therefore they refused to respond to the gospel on that basis. We have two illustration of “to the Jews a stumbling block”: Peter’s sermon on the day of Pentecost would be one, but the sermon that was given to the Jews by Philip explaining the great principle that Jesus Christ is the God of Israel is an illustration of how Christ is the stumbling block to the Jews. The great illustration of the stumbling block to the Greeks is Paul’s sermon on Mars hill.

Verse 24, the attitude of the Christian is now given by way of contrast. “Unto them” is dative of advantage and it refers to a Jew or a Gentile who personally believed in the Lord Jesus Christ.

“who are called,” this is not a verb, it is a noun and therefore has great emphasis, “unto them, the called” literally. At this point we have a summary of the doctrine of election. Jesus Christ was elected from all eternity past, He is the elect one. God the Father did the electing. Election only takes place in connection with the incarnation of Christ. The Father elected the Son to go to the cross and be the only saviour, the means of entering into the plan of God, and when a person believes in Jesus Christ he enters into union with Christ and the election of Christ becomes his election. So election is really a description of a believer. In Romans 11 we have the elect of the remnant according to the election of grace and this refers to a Jewish believer. When you find the word ‘elect’ or ‘election’ you are referring to someone who is born again and therefore is in union with Christ and shares the election of Christ. Under this concept we have seven basic points:

a) Christ is elected from all eternity past, 1 Peter 2:6; Isaiah 42:1.

b) The election of Christ took place in the eternal life conference or the time of the doctrine of divine decrees, Ephesians 1:4; 2 Thessalonians 2:13; 1 Peter 1:2.

c) Election is a present as well as a future possession of every believer, Colossians 3:12.

d) Every believer mechanically and actually shares the election of Christ, Romans 8:28-33.

e) Election takes place at the moment of salvation, 2 Thessalonians 2:13; 1 Corinthians 1:9.

f) Election is the foundation of the church, 1 Thessalonians 1:4.

g) The purpose of election as far as the elect living on the earth is found in Galatians 5:8 — to represent the Lord Jesus Christ on the earth. The purpose of having an elect kingdom on the earth is that Jesus Christ in His absence from the earth might be properly represented on the earth.

“both Jew and Greek,” in other words, in the election of God saved people save d people include Jews and saved people include Gentiles.

“Christ” is in the emphatic position in the Greek and should be translated “Christ and only Christ.”

“the power of God and the wisdom of God,” power goes with signs. The Jews seek signs, miracles performed by extra-natural power and sometimes supernatural power, but Christ is the power of God. The Greeks seek wisdom and Christ is the wisdom of God. So whether a person is a Jew or a Gentile Christ is the only answer. There is no other answer to the problems of the human race. All of the problems of the human race can be solved in Christ and in no other way. Christ is the power of God: God’s ability to save is based upon the work of Christ. Christ is the wisdom of God: the Father’s plan is centred in the person and the work of Christ, and God is smarter than anyone who ever lived or ever will, therefore His plan even though it is simple in appropriation is brilliant beyond the greatest thinking that has ever been done in the history of the human race. Man’s plans all end with death. God’s plan begins with death, “Christ crucified.” The death of Jesus Christ begins the plan of God.

Verse 25, the foolishness of God. “The foolishness of God is wiser than men.” The word ‘is’ is present active indicative of e)imi and it should be translated “keeps on being wiser than men.” “Foolishness of God” is an abstract neuter singular. ‘God’ is in the masculine gender; the word ‘foolishness’ is neuter, and you don’t have neuters with masculines! But these two go together. So what do you have when you have a neuter modifying a masculine (which you can’t have in the English). What does it mean? It doesn’t means the foolishness of God because God is not foolish. So obviously you couldn’t have ‘foolish’ in the masculine here because then it would be saying that God can be foolish, which is impossible and blasphemous. And there is even more to it than that. When you have a neuter with a masculine or a feminine gender it does not mean the foolishness in a person, it means an act of that person. So we translate this correctly, “the foolish act of God is wiser than men.” What is the foolish act of God? To what does it refer? The cross. The preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness.” This is sarcasm. The foolish act of God is dying on the cross for our sins. Death ends man’s plans; God’s plan begins at death. Death to the Greeks is foolishness; death to God is the quintessence of divine wisdom. The word ‘wiser’ is a comparative. Man’s plans all terminate at death, therefore the foolish act of God (Christ dying on the cross) — from man’s standpoint — is wiser than anything that man could ever develop, because death chops off man’s plans and begins God’s plan.

“and the weakness of God is stronger than men,” is God weak? Omnipotence is divine power, there is no weakness in omnipotence. Omnipotence plus eternity means that there never will be a time when God will be weak. Immutability: God can’t change His omnipotence. So what does this mean? We have another abstract neuter singular noun plus the definite article, and this means the weak act of God. What is the weak act of God? Christ dying on the cross. The weak act of God simply means that Christ in weakness hung upon the cross. Humanly speaking He was weak. He was physically strong but was weak through the terrible beating He took, and then what weakened Him further was bearing our sins. We have a neuter with a masculine to indicate that the person involved does not have the characteristic mentioned but that this characteristic mentioned is separated from the essence of the individual in order to make a point. There is no ‘is’ this time; “stronger than men.”

Verses 26-29, God’s plan is based upon the principle of grace. The principle of grace means there is no place for man’s works, God’s plan is based on grace. “For you see your election, brethren” — “take a good look at your election.”

When it says that “not many wise according to the flesh, not many noble,” and so on, it means people who stand on these things really. “Take a good look at election, brethren, how that not many wise men.” This word ‘wise’ means human wisdom — the philosopher. Not many philosophers are saved because they won’t leave their criterion of rationalism or empiricism. Philosophical criteria becomes a system of mental attitude works and there is no place in salvation for works. In order for a Greek philosopher in a sense he has to stop being a Greek philosopher. That is the point.

The word ‘mighty’ refers to those who have human talents or human ability. In other words, if you try to use human ability to be saved you cannot be saved. The word ‘noble’ means not many who rule, those who exert power. Power that they hold won’t save them.

Verse 27, “But God hath chosen [elected].” He has elected those who come on a non-meritorious basis indicated by ‘foolish things.’ “God hath chosen” is in the aorist tense, once and for all. The middle voice: God has elected for His own benefit. The indicative mood is the reality of election as God’s work in salvation. The ‘foolish things’ means any member of the human race who approaches God on a non-meritorious basis. The word ‘foolish’ is used again in a sarcastic way. In other words, the people who are really smart in life are the people who believe in Christ.

“to” is literally “that” and it introduces a purpose clause; “he might confound the wise,” the word ‘confound’ means to confuse or to put to shame. In other words, they should be ashamed of trying to be saved by human merit. While this does not appear to be so in the English, in the Greek this is one of the strongest statements against legalism outside of the book of Galatians.

“the things which are mighty,” those who try to use human power, human talent, human ability in order to be saved.

Verse 28, “And base things of the world.” The word ‘base’ means to have no family tree by which you can trace your lineage back to some type of nobility. It means to have obscure background. This means it doesn’t make any difference who your ancestors were. Whatever you are by physical birth that does not count. It is the new birth that counts.

“God hath elected,” God does the work; “and the things which are not, in order that he might bring to nothing the things that are.” The things that are not are the people who approach on the basis of grace. Because one person has been saved through grace it brings to nothing people who try to be saved by works, people who try to be saved by who and what they are rather than who and what God is.

Verse 29, Why? “That no flesh should glory in His presence.” One thing about the grace of God: there is no place for human glory. The word ‘glory’ means to be glorified; it also means to boast.

“Where is the scribe?” The scribe is a Jewish theologian. Jesus condemns the scribes in Matthew 23. A scribe was originally a student of the Old Testament scriptures, but eventually the scribe came to connote the theologian, a religious man rather than a saved man. The Jewish theologians are proud of their knowledge of the Old Testament, they are very legalistic, and they teach two systems of legalism. First of all, salvation by works; secondly, spirituality by works. The book of Galatians is really the background for the next two verses and covers the full answer to “where is the scribe?” Only two sentences are used here to handle this particular problem and it tells is two things: a) the Judaisers had not been too successful in Corinth; b) The believers there were already alert to the Judaistic heresy, therefore only two verses are necessary. The great inroads came from the Greek philosophers and from the professional debaters.

Verse 30, the work of Christ refutes the scribe. “But of him,” this is literally, “But from the source of him.” There is a preposition found in the Greek and is also almost universally translated “of.” It is a very poor translation. We have the preposition e)k and it is a preposition of source. It is always translated “of” and usually in connection with God, “of God” or “of Him.” But it should be translated “from.” It connotes “from the source of him,” and that is the translation here — “But from the source of him.” In other words, God developed a plan whereby man could have relationship with Himself. The Jewish theologian also portrays a plan whereby man does the work. So God has a plan and man has a plan. In man’s plan man works; in God’s plan God works. So it is man’s work versus God’s work. “Of him” means the work of the Son on the cross. This solved man’s problem of sin. Christ did the work, He bore our sins. Human works: Christ rejected human works. So the issue at the cross is human good [what man can accomplish] versus divine good [what God has accomplished]. The scribe says you must do the works but God’s plan says God doesn’t need any help, it’s God’s plan, God works.

“are ye,” literally, “you are.” This is the present active indicative for the verb e)imi, absolute status quo. The present tense is linear aktionsart and this should be translated literally, “But from the source of him you keep on being in Christ.” You are in Christ as of the moment of salvation and you keep on being in Christ. This situation can never be changed and never will be changed. In other words, the whole principle of the system of the Jewish theologian, man’s works for salvation, is destroyed by the cross, for one of the activities of the cross is that we enter into union with Christ. Since you keep on being in Christ and since you entered into Christ by the work of God we enter into that position without doing a thing. This refutes the whole stand of Judaism and the system of salvation by works.

“who of God is made wisdom to us” should be “who became unto us wisdom from God.” Christ Jesus who became unto us wisdom from God. The point: God has a wisdom — His plan in Christ. Man has a wisdom — human works. So you have divine good versus human good. The whole issue of the cross is good versus good and it goes right to the heart of Jewish theology.

Translation so far: “But from the source of him you keep on being in union with Christ who became unto us wisdom from God,” “who” is a relative pronoun referring to Jesus Christ; “became” — aorist passive indicative of ginomai which means to become something you were not before. Before, Jesus Christ was eternal God and when He became true humanity He also became the plan of God. The plan of God is the wisdom of God. The aorist tense of the verb ginomai is the point of time of the virgin birth where Christ became incarnate. The passive voice means that man received this salvation from God, he didn’t earn it or deserve it, and that Christ received a human body from God the Father, Hebrews 10:5,7, “A body hast thou prepared me.” All divine wisdom is tied up in the cross as far as the human race is concerned. At the cross God made the greatest display of His wisdom while man made the greatest display of his ignorance. The cross brings out the wisdom of God and the stupidity of man and at the cross is the conflict between the plan of God and the plan of man, plus the great issue of good versus good.

Three aspects of phase one, the work of Christ, are listed in this context. There should be a colon in this verse after “wisdom.” Then there are three manifestations listed of the wisdom of God. “righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.”

The first “and” which precedes ‘righteousness’ is not found in the Greek. First of all, “righteousness.” Man is -R, a relative righteousness but not absolute. On the other side of the fence we have God with +R, absolute righteousness. There is no possible way that a relative righteousness can be converted into an absolute righteousness. The only possible way that man can have fellowship with God forever is to have a righteousness which is equivalent to God’s righteousness, and the only righteousness which is equivalent is God’s own righteousness. No one else has it. The only way this can be changed is for God’s righteousness to become man’s righteousness. So at the cross one of the 36 things that happened is that when man enters into union with Christ, Christ has this absolute righteousness and this becomes the believer’s righteousness. Any person who is born again also has +R. When God the Father looks at the +R in any believer He justifies him. Justification means vindication, and justification actually follows vindication. First of all God’s righteousness is imputed — 2 Corinthians 5:21. The moment that we receive His righteousness God the Father looks at the righteousness of God the Son which is acceptable to Him. We know it is acceptable to Him because of the doctrine of ascension. When God the Father said to God the Son, “Sit thou on my right hand” He was addressing the humanity of Christ, the deity of Christ doesn’t sit. The humanity of Christ was told to sit down in heaven because the God-Man, the humanity of Christ, had +R, and this +R which the humanity of Christ possessed was acceptable to God, and that +R is our +R. Judicially at the moment of salvation we are as acceptable to God as we ever will be. Our salvation is perfect at the moment we receive Christ as saviour. Righteousness imputed is a part of the wisdom of God. What is the point? All of the Jewish theologians who have ever lived over centuries of self-righteousness have never been able to produce one iota of +R.

The second aspect is sanctification which means to be set apart unto God and refers again to union with Christ. Sanctification is mentioned because this is something we receive at the moment of salvation that will never be improved. The righteousness that we receive at the moment of salvation is positional righteousness, God’s righteousness, and it can never be improved. Our position in Christ can never be improved. Experientially what kind of righteousness we have depends upon our relationship to the Holy Spirit. So again, the wisdom of God is infinitely greater than anything that man can concoct. Notice that man’s plans always demand progression, but there is no progression in God’s plan of salvation. There is neither process nor progression. Salvation isn’t a process it is instantaneous. It is also perfect and is not subject to improvement. Regeneration provides what man’s plans cannot do.

“and redemption,” the concept of redemption is very simple. Redemption means to be purchased from a slave market. Man is said to be born inside of the slave market of sin, and one slave cannot free another slave. The only person who can free slaves is a free man, and Jesus Christ through the virgin birth cam into the world a free man, born outside of the slave market of sin. In the history of the human race Jesus Christ is the only one who was born outside of the slave market of sin. The virgin birth means that Christ came into the world without an old sin nature, without the imputation of Adam’s sin, He lived a perfect life and therefore was qualified to free slaves. He did so by the cross. The blood of Christ is used as the price. Redemption means to purchase freedom from a slave market. So Christ purchased the freedom of all who are born in the slave market of sin, i.e. the human race. Now, all we have to do is simply walk out through the door, which is the cross, through faith in Jesus Christ and we are free. The meaning of redemption is found in 1 Peter 1:18,19.

Three words are used to describe the perfection of God’s plan: righteousness, sanctification, and redemption.

Verse 31, the person of Christ refutes the scribe. The scribe it outside of the plan of God and anything that the scribe suggests is outside of the plan of God and is contrary to the plan of God. The scribe advocates salvation by works. “That” introduces a purpose clause’ “according as it is written” — referring to Old Testament , Jeremiah 9:24. “As it is written” is perfect tense, it is written in the past with the result that it stands written forever. The passive voice indicates that the Old Testament is received from God. The indicative mood is the reality of the existence of the canon of the Old Testament.

“He that glorieth [boasteth],” present active participle; “let him glory,” present active imperative, “let him keep on glorying in the Lord.” The principle is very simple. In God’s plan only the Lord is glorified. In man’s plan, man in glorified. When God does the work God receives the glory; if man can do any work then man can receive glory. There is no place in the plan of God for man’s glory. God does all of the work and God receives all of the glory.

So the question, Where is the scribe? is answered now. The scribe seeks the glory of man by promoting a system of salvation by man’s works. But as far as God’s operation is concerned God does all of the work and He receives all of the glory.