1 Corinthians 3:12,13

“But if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; 13. every man's work shall be made manifest; for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire, and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is.”

The δέ is adversative: “My work, the part assigned to me, is done, and well done. But let those who labour now take heed what they do!” The εἰ might be taken interrogatively: Is it that? as sometimes. But it is simpler to translate it in its ordinary sense of if, and to find the principal proposition at the beginning of 1 Corinthians 3:13.

The guidance of converted souls is a much more delicate work than the labour bestowed on their conversion; in fact, it is easy to employ materials in the work of their spiritual development which shall be more hurtful than useful. Now the Church is God's house, God's habitation, and into such a building no materials should enter save such as are worthy of its sublime destination. Oriental palaces and temples presented to the eye only the most precious materials: marble, jasper, alabaster (precious stones), besides gold and silver in profusion. This is what is still seen at the present day when one penetrates into the interior of the dwellings of rich Oriental merchants. The houses of the poor, on the contrary, are built of wood and of earth hardened with straw, and covered with thatch. The diminutives χρυσίον and ἀργύριον differ from χρυσός and ἄργυρος (in T. R.) only in this that they denote specially either an ingot, or a piece of gold or silver.

God, the owner of the Church which is to become His dwelling, is represented here as a Lord who has contracted with numerous builders each charged with a part of the building. They are of course held bound to employ only materials appropriate to such an edifice, and to the dignity of him who means to make it His habitation. Most modern commentators think that the three kinds, whether of good or of bad materials, represent the doctrines taught by preachers, the didactic developments added by them to the fundamental truth of the gospel, that of salvation. This, with shades of difference, is the opinion of Clement of Alexandria, Erasmus, Luther, Beza, Calvin, Grotius, Neander, de Wette, Meyer, etc. But is not this to forget that the edifice to be built is not a book of dogmatics, but the Church itself, composed of living personalities? Other commentators have been led by this reflection to apply the figure of the various materials to the different classes in the membership of the Church: so Pelagius, Bengel, Hofmann; preachers, according to this view, are regarded as responsible for the good or bad composition of the churches which they instruct and guide. But if Paul could censure those preachers for having tolerated unworthy members or allowed them to make their way into the Church, could he have accused them of having voluntarily introduced them into it, as would be implied by the figure of the bad materials employed in the work? And could preachers of this kind end with being saved (1 Corinthians 3:15)? The good or bad materials can therefore neither represent the doctrines preached, true or false, nor the members of the Church, worthy or unworthy. There remains only one interpretation, which is to a certain extent that of Origen, Chrysostom, Augustine, and, in our day, of Osiander. The apostle means to speak of the religious and moral fruits produced in the Church by preaching. The spiritual life of the members of the flock is, in a certain measure, the teaching itself received, assimilated, and realized in practice. Either the pastor, by his preaching, his conversation, his example, the daily acts of his ministry, succeeds in developing among his flock a healthy religious life, drawn from communion with Christ, abounding in the fruits of sanctification and love; and it is this strong and normal life which St. Paul describes under the figure of precious materials; or the pastor, by his pathetic discourses, his ingenious explanations, succeeds indeed in attracting a great concourse of hearers, in producing enthusiastic admiration and lively emotions; but all this stir is only external and superficial; with it all there is no real consecration to the Saviour. This faith without energy, this love without the spirit of sacrifice, this hope without joy or elasticity, this Christianity saturated with egoism and vanity: such are the wood, hay, stubble. The apostle himself sets us on the way of this explanation when in chap. 13 he calls faith, hope, and love “the three things which remain; ” these then are the materials which will survive intact the trial by fire.

It was for the successors of Paul and Apollos to judge whether they had continued in the spirit which had animated the authors of the work. Chaps. 12-14 show plainly enough that it was not so.

It would be a mistake to think that the gold, silver, precious stones represent three different stages of the Christian life. As, in the figure, these three kinds of materials have their normal place side by side with one another in the temple or palace, they must be taken to represent the different forms of spiritual life which are produced in souls by healthy evangelical preaching.

The apostle had declared, 1 Corinthians 3:8, that each would be appraised and recompensed according to the nature of his work. He now points out when and how this discrimination will take place.