The thing we celebrate in this season of Epiphany is that Jesus came as a light to the nations. The revelation that Jesus is Lord of all the earth, of both Jews and gentiles, as prophesied by Isaiah in this morning’s reading
The apostle Paul was sent to preach Christ to the gentiles and on his second missionary journey (AD 49-52) he started a small church in a house belonging to Titius Justus in the bustling, cosmopolitan and multicultural port city of Corinth in the Roman province of Achia, in southern Greece.
He spent eighteen months there and the church grew rapidly and with that growth came the problem that has beset the universal Church ever since – disunity.
But first, I think we need a little background.
Now at the heart of all of Paul’s letters is the cross of our Lord Jesus. In fact it is so central to Paul’s teaching that he wrote in the very next chapter of this letter to the Corinthians that “I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1 Cor 2:2)
He also writes in his letter to the Colossians that it is only in Christ that “all things hold together” (Col 1:17). In other words, when we as a church don’t live, act, and think through the prism or lens of the cross, all things will fall apart. We will not be members of one body, but dismembered or disunified (if there is such a word!)
The cross transforms all of our actions and words by the power of the Spirit. Because of the cross we must learn to view the world differently. This transformation is through what Paul writes elsewhere “as being transformed by the renewing of our minds” (Romans 12:2).
In his letters Paul urges us to participate, if you will, in the story of the cross – a story in which all we think we know about the world, what is valuable, its knowledge and its wisdom and virtue is utterly changed and reconfigured by God’s great act of salvation in Jesus Christ.
The message of the cross is not something that only applies to our coming to faith and so joining the great family of God by faith, but it also gives shape to the whole of our life together.
So outside of the cross of Christ all things will not hold together, but will fall apart through disunity.
This is why Paul begins today’s reading by urging the Corinthians, in the name of Jesus Christ, to live up to their identity in Christ. That “all of you be in agreement and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same purpose” (v.10).
Paul is calling for unity.
His appeals to them “in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ” shouldn’t be skipped over too quickly. The name of Jesus is not only the authority by which Paul calls them to account, it is the name that makes the Corinthians one. When Paul later asks, “Were you baptized into the name of Paul?” (1:13), the obvious answer is, “No, we were baptized into the name of Jesus.”
So here is the thing. In this problem of disunity, ‘the name of the Lord Jesus’ carries with it both the explanation of their problem of disunity, in that they are claiming someone and somewhere else as the heart of their identity as a church.
As well as the solution, which is to be united in their common identity in Christ.
The greatest blessing in any church fellowship is not to have factions or power groups. It is very common in many churches and in all different types of fellowships. It’s the quickest way I know for a church to die.
But we mustn’t get complacent, so at this time leading up to our AGMs, we must always be seeking the face of Jesus in all things so that he will remain as our common identity. Jesus must always be at the hearts of everything we think, do and plan. Not anything else.
One of these factions in Corinth, “Chloe’s people,” write, or somehow get word to Paul that the church is fracturing along human lines. Each group is rallying to a particular leader. Each implying that the church in Corinth revolves around the knowledge and power that these teachers have. Jesus is no longer the heart of their identity as a church.
This is common now, too. A vibrant leader comes into a leadership position, the church grows, the leader leaves for some reason and the fellowship crumbles. Who were they worshipping?
Now a powerful leader may not necessarily need to even be part of the church. Cephas (the apostle Peter) wasn’t even part of the Corinthian church, but was a very respected elder of the church everywhere.
It is very easy for us too, to follow, say, a bishop instead of Jesus. To follow some online church leader or preacher instead of Jesus. To follow the Pope, or Calvin, or Luther, or Augustine instead of Jesus.
But as far as it is in my hands, here we will be centred in and follow Jesus alone, which is always characterised by humble love of God and each other, and pure, see-through motives.
The book of Acts tells us Apollos was a very strong believer and good man, and it is doubtful that he instigated this following of him. Paul had no problem with him. In fact when Paul signs off this first letter to the Corinthians, he writes that that Apollos is with him in Ephesus and says that he is encouraging Apollos to return to Corinth (1 Corinthians 16:12).
In response to this partisan bickering, Paul brings them back to the story that defines us all as the people of God: the crucifixion of Christ. “Paul was not crucified for you, was he? Or were you baptized into the name of Paul?” (1 Corinthians 1:13).
It is important that we not allow ourselves to separate these two questions. The crucifixion is at the heart of the story of God’s action to save a people to himself; baptism is how we come to play a part in that activity of God.
Christ’s own crucifixion saves us, and our baptism into his name makes us “Christ people,” which also means that we are a “a people of the cross,” the very cross of Christ.
For Paul, this arguing in Corinth over whom to follow is nothing less than a denial of the gospel itself. The gospel (good news) says that Christ is crucified, and when we act as though anything else (or anyone else) defines who we are, then we deny the story of our salvation. Let me pray …