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CONNIE: How do you respond when the Holy Spirit seems to be leading church members in opposing directions? Join us today as we consider Paul’s counsel to the Quarreling Corinthian Christians.

Giving God’s trumpet a Certain Sound for 75 years, this is the Voice of Prophecy.

CONNIE: Hello, I’m Connie Jeffery,

LONNIE: and I’m Lonnie Melashenko. Welcome to our broadcast, as we continue our look at the life of the apostle Paul, and particularly at his spiritual journey—how God worked with Paul, helping him to grow spiritually day by day, even as He used him to lead others to begin their own spiritual journeys.

CONNIE: Today we’ll be considering Paul’s interactions with the people of Corinth—a place where he had founded a church made up largely of Gentiles from a pagan background.

LONNIE: Through his interactions with the people during his time there, and especially through the letters he wrote after his departure, we learn a lot about the workings of the early church, and especially about how God continued to lead Paul.

CONNIE: Paul faced situations similar to what we see in some churches today: Groups of members who can’t agree on just what the Holy Spirit is guiding the church to do.

LONNIE: Paul had seen the Spirit lead powerfully in Corinth, but after he left, the church quickly split into factions—all claiming that the Spirit was leading them. This challenged Paul, and as he sought to heal the rifts, he grew in his own understanding of how the Holy Spirit works.

CONNIE: And what he learned was that love is the true test of the Spirit’s presence.

LONNIE: And actually, we can thank the Quarreling Corinthians for one of the most precious chapters in the whole Bible—1 Corinthians 13, the love chapter.

CONNIE: To broaden our perspective on this episode in Paul’s life, we invited Professor Angel Hernandez to join us. Ken Wade spoke with him. Let’s listen in.

KEN: I want to welcome Dr. Angel Hernandez to our program to day. Dr. Hernandez is professor of religion at Pacific Union College, welcome to our broadcast.

ANGEL: Thank you for the invitation.

KEN: You know, as we were talking some time ago, you mentioned to me that you have a particular interest in the relationship between Paul and the Corinthians, and I guess this interaction between Paul and those people, really reveals a lot about the apostle himself, doesn’t it?

ANGEL: It does. I t reveals a lot about the apostle and his personality, his character, his passion, and his love. It also shows us his vulnerability and his growth.

KEN: We have quite a bit of correspondence back and forth between them, don’t we?

ANGEL: Yes, it’s very rare, probably the exception, here we have Paul speaking to the church but we have a correspondence coming from the church to Paul too. They write to him and they raise questions about the issues of relations between husbands and wives.

KEN: There seems to be a disparity. Paul has spent 18 months there and has raised church and there seems to be different groups within the church that maybe aren’t holding together too well.

ANGEL: Yes! Well the composition, there’s a great mix of people. There’s people on the higher end of the social scale and there are people on the lower end, and there are those who are just passing by or traveling. There’s a lot of traveling going by. Corinth was a cosmopolitan city.

KEN: There are specific people mentioned who were quite wealthy.

ANGEL: Yes, some of them that come to my mind are Gaius who had a very large home, mentioned in Romans 16, as the one who hosted the entire church of Corinth, and we have the mention of Chloe who is a woman, and she has a great degree of prominence just to be mentioned in the Bible.

KEN: She actually must have been wealthy enough that she’s able to send a delegation of people traveling a great distance to talk to Paul.

ANGEL: Absolutely.

KEN: There’s another well known woman, Phoebe, right?

ANGEL: Yes, there is Phoebe, and she has a house which apparently was another place where they met in Corinth, apparently there was more than one church location and Phoebe has a large house that accommodates the Christians there.

KEN: This is fascinating to find these women involved in leadership, apparently so.

ANGEL: It is one amazing thing. When we think about the role of women and we think about Paul who is perceived to be anti-women, but here we see the contrary. We see that Paul has given these women a place to function in the church, and a very prominent one at that.

KEN: There’s another man mentioned by the name of Aristobulus, and we actually have some archeological evidence about him, don’t we?

ANGEL: In 1929, we discovered a slate which bore his name on it, and shows that he was the city administrator. That is so interesting, because that is exactly what Romans 16, tells us. That he was a city administrator.

KEN: So he would be a very powerful and wealthy person, and he was part of the church there.

ANGEL: He was one of those prominent leaders there who had great affluence, and Paul mentions him as a beloved brother.

KEN: So, Paul is dealing with a wide variety of people here, and with some of the conflicts and questions that have arisen from having brought together a church, largely of people without a religious background in the scriptures or anything like that, and through this experience Paul himself has some growing to do, doesn’t he?

ANGEL: Definitely! In the Corinthian correspondence it reveals to us the joys and disappointments of Paul as he dealt with the church and serious problems. We get a picture of him as a real pastor in a real church. We see the agony and the ecstasy that he went through. In trying to love people that came from pagan backgrounds. Struggling to see the church make progress, but at the same time we see a missionary who is vulnerable and as he is giving love he expects some expressions of acceptance and love from the church that he is ministering to.

KEN: Well, we have just about a half a minute left here, but this is one of the things that I think is most impressive about Paul’s relationship with the Corinthians. You see a man who loves them very deeply, and in loving them, of course, he is vulnerable to being hurt himself.

ANGEL: Yes, and that is one of the things and one of the beauties that I like the most about this apostle, is it just gives us a picture of a human being. Not only of an idealistic pastor, but a real pastor who has feelings, who is ministering, but also needs to be accepted and loved, and we can see that through the epistles, the rivalry between people who sided with Apollos and those who sided with Paul, and the way that he responds to this.

KEN: Well, it’s a great study. I thank you very much for your insights that you’ve shared with us today that help us better understand the relationship that Paul shared with his church.


“Come, Holy Spirit”, King’s Heralds, from VOP Music Library #42 CD.

CONNIE: That was a classic 1953 King’s Heralds recording of “Come Holy Spirit.” The message of the song is just as up-to-date as tomorrow’s newspaper, though. And it was a message that was pertinent back in Paul’s day as well, wasn’t it Lonnie?

LONNIE: It sure was, because Paul’s Corinthian congregation seems to have lost sight of that fundamental principle “love one another.” A couple of years ago on our daily program, we did a long series focusing especially on the message of Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians. We called in Rock Solid Living in a Run Amok World, because things really did run amok in Corinth while Paul was away.

CONNIE: I believe the sermons from that series were turned into a book, weren’t they?

LONNIE: You’re absolutely right. It’s a sizable book—over 300 pages—but we have a special offer today for any of our listeners who’d like to have a copy. For your gift of $10 or more, we’ll send a copy of the book Rock Solid Living to you as our Thank You.

CONNIE: The book is full of contemporary illustrations that make the Bible come alive in the 21st century, so we’d love to send one your way. Just give us a call on our toll-free line in 1-800-872-0055, and be sure to have a credit card ready. We’ll send a copy of the book for your donation of $10 or more.

LONNIE: The number to call again is 1-800-872-0055, and we’ll also give you our mailing address later in the broadcast.

CONNIE: But right now, it’s time for Lonnie’s message: “Ah, Corinthians!

Ah, Corinthians!

“Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing” (James 1:2-4, NASB).

Those are the words of James the brother of Jesus, but they could just as well have been written by the apostle Paul—especially after he had spent years dealing with the problems and trials of the church at Corinth.

As we continue our look at the ways that God worked in Paul’s life, we arrive at a time when we can examine events that happened over a span of several years, and we can observe Paul’s response to the situations that developed during that time.

Often in the story told in Acts, we see Paul moving into a city, raising up a church, and moving on, and we don’t know how things went after that. But Paul’s letters to the Corinthians open a window that gives us a panoramic view.

Things started off reasonably well in Corinth—in fact better than in many places. Paul lived there after an extended journey across Asia Minor, and then down through Macedonia to Athens. In Macedonia he had hurriedly raised up three churches, but then had been forced to leave each town by opposition from people who didn’t accept his teachings about Jesus. He’d then spent a short time in Athens, and had even had an opportunity to preach to some of the leading philosophers there. But then he had moved on to Corinth.

As usual, he began his ministry by going to the synagogue and proclaiming that the Old Testament prophecies had been fulfilled. The Messiah had come, and His name was Jesus.

And, as usual, some of the synagogue members accepted his message, but others rejected it. Two who accepted his preaching were fellow tent-makers Aquila and Priscilla, who soon became leaders in the new Christian congregation.

Paul responded to those who wouldn’t accept the Christian message by shaking the dust off his clothes and leaving the synagogue. “‘Your blood be on your own heads! I am innocent,’ ” he said. “‘From now on I will go to the Gentiles (Acts 18:6, NRSV).

Even though Paul had been called, years earlier, to be the apostle to the Gentiles, he offered the gospel to the Jews first whenever he had a chance. This is the first instance we have where he specifically ends his mission to Jews and moves to a new venue to focus his efforts on outreach to Gentiles. In other cities when he encountered opposition, he usually left town altogether. But the Lord was opening special doors for him in Corinth.

Doors of opportunity. But also doors of trial.

The opportunities lay right next door—literally. Acts 18:7 tells us, “Then he left the synagogue and went to the house of a man named Titius Justus, a worshiper of God; his house was next door to the synagogue” (NRSV). And that’s where the Corinthian Church was founded. In a vision, Paul received instructions not to leave Corinth despite the opposition he faced. He was to stay the course there, because God had many souls who were to be saved, and God promised that no harm would come to him if he stayed.

Here’s where Paul really began to wrestle with the challenges of leading pagans from their idolatry to full faith in Jesus.

It was a task with different challenges than preaching to Jews who already accepted the Scriptures.

Paul had done this kind of work in other places, but never on the scale that God opened up to him in Corinth.

Can you imagine holding an 18-month evangelistic campaign? That’s what Paul did. He stayed in Corinth for a year and a half.

Evangelists these days often come into a church and preach for a week or two. Sometimes four or five weeks—as I did in two venues last year.

But there was a time, not long ago, when an evangelist would go into a town and set up a tent and preach for six months, maybe even nine months, laboring with the people and establishing them fully in their faith, often founding a new church before moving on to the next town.

Believe me, those people who came out and listened to the preacher every night for months on end became good, solid church members. If they had been committed enough to come to meetings night after night for that long, they were IN for the long haul.

And that must have been the type of ministry that Paul had in Corinth—a long-haul teaching ministry that ministered to his hearers on every level and firmly established them in their faith.

So firmly, in fact, that when it finally came time for him to leave, Paul felt confident enough to take his whole evangelistic team with him.

It was a move he would come to regret. But remember, as we’re studying the lives of the great heroes of the Bible, these were human beings—people that God worked mightily through, but also people whom the Lord taught new things to every day of their lives!

Paul still had some important things to learn after he left Corinth.

One of them was an understanding of the depth of transformation that becoming a Christian works in a person’s life and the absolute essentiality of adequate nurturing.

This is something I think the church still tends to miss in its evangelistic outreach to the world. In some circles it’s still popular to present four or five “spiritual laws” to an individual, get them to assent to these basic truths, and then to sign them up as sealed and delivered members of the kingdom of God. It can be done in eighteen minutes or less.

But when Paul left his fledgling congregation in Corinth after eighteen months of ministry among them, it’s almost like God made Corinth a case-study in the fallacy of leaving newborn Christians to their own devices. Paul took Aquila and Priscilla with him when he departed. Their next major stopping point was Ephesus, and Aquila and Priscilla stayed there while Paul went on to Caesarea.

In Ephesus Aquila and Priscilla met a preacher named Apollos who had some knowledge of Jesus, and they gave him a brief course in Christian doctrines and soon sent him off to Corinth—at his request. It wasn’t long until Apollos’ preaching abilities won him a leadership role in Corinth.

And there you had a TNT mix that was just waiting to blow up if not handled carefully.

You had a brand new church made up largely of people who had come from a pagan background. And you had an inexperienced pastor who’d been given a crash course in Christian teaching and sent off to lead a group who needed seasoned, careful counsel as they continued their growth in the Christian graces.

It was a dangerous mix that literally blew up in Paul’s face. A fact that becomes obvious when you read First and Second Corinthians—his letters to this church.

Here’s a selection of verses from the letters that illustrate the kind of serious difficulties the church got itself into rather quickly:

1 Corinthians 1:11-12

“It has been reported to me . . . that there are quarrels among you, my brothers and sisters. . . . [E]ach of you says, ‘I belong to Paul,’ or ‘I belong to Apollos,’ or ‘I belong to Cephas,’ or ‘I belong to Christ.’ ” (NRSV).

1 Corinthians 3:2-3

“I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for solid food. Even now you are still not ready, for you are still of the flesh. For as long as there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not of the flesh, and behaving according to human inclinations?” (NRSV).

1 Corinthians 4:18

“But some of you, thinking that I am not coming to you, have become arrogant” (NRSV).

1 Corinthians 5:1

“It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that is not found even among pagans; for a man is living with his father's wife” (NRSV).

1 Corinthians 11:20-21

“When you come together, it is not really to eat the Lord's Supper. For when the time comes to eat, each of you goes ahead with your own supper, and one goes hungry and another becomes drunk” (NRSV).

2 Corinthians 12:21

“I fear that when I come again, . . . I may have to mourn over many who previously sinned and have not repented of the impurity, sexual immorality, and licentiousness that they have practiced” (NRSV).
In other words, these brand new Christians had rather quickly fallen back into their old ways as soon as Paul and the other leaders had left. And then when Apollos appeared on the scene, proclaiming the gospel as he understood it, some people began to play his preaching off against Paul’s.

Church became a popularity contest—with those who thought Apollos was a better preacher than Paul pitting their champion against those who remained loyal to Paul.

And the factions didn’t end there. The rich were pitted against the poor. Some were saying that Christians didn’t have to be moral people—after all, they’d been delivered from the law!

Oh, friend, I’m sorry to say that churches can still fall into these same sorts of traps. Churches still split into factions with one group supporting one leader and others another. There are still cliques in the church.

And all too often there’s a failure to call sin by its right name and a resulting lack of repentance.

But as Paul faced these challenges in dealing with his Corinthian family, he turned his struggles into an opportunity for spiritual growth.

The troubles in the Corinthian church had sprung up despite his best efforts to minister to them in a gentile, unassuming way. But when other leaders came who lacked his humility, they seemed to the people to be more powerful than Paul—more erudite and more eloquent (not to mention more demanding!)

But it was out of the conflict with these other preachers that one of the greatest, most precious passages in the entire Bible sprang. For, when Paul compared his ministry to the ministry of others, he wanted his readers to understand that it is not wisdom or eloquence that demonstrates the power of the Holy Spirit in a Christian’s life. It is love. And so he penned these precious words:

“If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. . . .

“Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.

“Love never ends. . . .

“And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love” (1 Co 13:1-8, 13, NRSV).

Paul had some difficult, irascible, irritating people to deal with in Corinth. They made his life hard at times. But through those hard times, the apostle’s love for them grew as the Spirit of Jesus continued to work in his life.

Through the hard times he learned that true love is indeed patient and kind and has not a smidgeon of arrogance or pride.

And because he learned that, we have the precious “Love” chapter in 1 Corinthians.

How is it with you, friend? Has the Spirit delivered its finest gift to your life? Does His love flow through you to other church members, and to the world? Why not ask Him to make that flow even stronger, right now?

David E. Gonzalez “How Lovely Is Your Dwelling Place” from On the Wings of Your Spirit