Having
described God’s faithfulness in calling the believing Corinthians into fellowship,
Paul launched immediately into calling for unity. Obviously, there was schism among
the believers in Corinth. One common feature of ancient Greek was their
infighting. They couldn’t get along with each other, so one city would fight against
another. The church in Corinth was like that. Similar to the Greeks, believers
in Corinth had lots of disagreement that were threatening their unity. As an
apostle, Paul could have demanded unity. Knowing that it could not be
legislated that way, he chose a softer approach. He appealed to them as fellow brethren
in the Lord, as one who with them was in fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ.
In calling them to be in the same mind and in the same judgment, Paul was in
effect urging them to be in agreement and to operate in the same mind and judgment
as Christ. He was not calling for total conformity because there would be differences
in opinion. And problems only arise when one uses a personal view to judge other
believers, to exclude them from fellowship in Christ. Christians may have
differences without animosity.
Paul
wanted them to know that his information about their division came from some
people whom he trusted. They told him that there were rivalry among them.
In
verse 12 the serious threat to the fellowship is highlighted. The believers in
Corinth were rallying different leaders. In so doing they had excluded one leader
from another, as well as the followers of one group from the followers of another.
In actuality, the fellowship was cut up into camps. Some claimed to be in Paul’s
camp, some in Apollo’s’, others in Peter’s and still others claimed to belong
to Christ. This kind of disunity have devastating effects:
(1)
It causes one to think that some Christians
don’t belong to Christ.
(2)
It redirects our energy to fight each
other rather than the forces of darkness.
(3)
It creates hate for another rather than
loving them in Christ.
(4)
It gives us the wrong picture of seeing
Christ as divided.
(5)
It reduces the effectiveness of the church.
(6)
It develops the false idea of one’s
importance over another.
(7)
It stops us from relating with other
believers with different opinions.
The immaturity of the Corinthians made them acted the way they
did. But Christ had united us in Him. We are all in the different stages of
growth in Him Let’s be of one mind and heart and “Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but
with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely
look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others.”
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