_MILK IS FIT FOR CHILDREN. STRIFE AND DIVISION, ARGUMENTS OF A FLESHLY MIND. HE THAT PLANTETH, AND HE THAT WATERETH, IS NOTHING. THE MINISTERS ARE GOD'S FELLOW-WORKMEN. CHRIST THE ONLY FOUNDATION. MEN THE TEMPLES OF GOD, WHICH MUST BE KEPT HOLY. THE WISDOM OF THIS WORLD IS FOOLISHNESS WITH GOD._ _... [ Continue Reading ]
AND I, BRETHREN, &C.— The next matter of boasting, which the faction made use of to give the pre-eminence and preference to their leader above St. Paul, seems to have been this, That their new teacher had led them farther, and given them a deeper insight into the mysteries of the Gospel than St. Pau... [ Continue Reading ]
I HAVE FED YOU WITH MILK— "You being such babes, such mere beginners in the divine life, I could not go so far as I desired in the great doctrines of the Christian religion; but was obliged to content myself with instructing you in the first principles, the more obvious and easy doctrines of it. I c... [ Continue Reading ]
AND WALK AS MEN?— _Speaking according to man,_ signifies, speaking according to the principles of natural reason, in contradistinction to revelation. See ch. 1 Corinthians 9:8. Galatians 1:11 and so _walking according to man_ must here be understood. See on 1 Corinthians 3:1.... [ Continue Reading ]
I AM OF APOLLOS— From this verse, compared with ch. 1 Corinthians 4:6 it may be no improbable conjecture, says Mr. Locke, that the division in his church was owing to two opposite parties, whereof the one adhered to St. Paul, the other stood up for their head, a false Apostle, who opposed St. Paul.... [ Continue Reading ]
WHO THEN IS PAUL, &C.— Some would read this and the following verse thus: _Who is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed?—And as the Lord gave to every man, I planted, Apollos watered,_ &c. See Markland on Lysias, p. 560.... [ Continue Reading ]
ARE ONE— This is another cogent argument against division,—that though their labours were different, and their rewards proportionable, yet they had in the general one office, and were employed as _workers-together_ by God, to plant the seeds of grace and holiness in the souls of men, and to bring th... [ Continue Reading ]
FOR WE ARE LABOURERS TOGETHER WITH GOD— _For we are the fellow-labourers of God._ Doddridge.... [ Continue Reading ]
NOW IF ANY MAN BUILD, &C.— "Though no man who pretends to be a preacher of the Gospel can build upon any other foundation than that of Jesus Christ, yet you ought not to cry up your new instructor, who has come and built upon the foundation that _I_ laid, for the doctrines that he builds thereon,as... [ Continue Reading ]
KNOW YE NOT THAT YE ARE THE TEMPLE, &C.— "I told you that _ye are God's building,_ 1 Corinthians 3:9. I now observe more than that;—_Ye are the temple of God,_ in which his Spirit dwells." Many of the first ancient writers represent a holy mind as the temple of God, and speak in the highest and stro... [ Continue Reading ]
IF ANY MAN— It is not unreasonable to think, that, by _any man,_ St. Paul designs _one_ particular man;—namely, the false Apostle, who, it is probable, by the strength of his party, supporting and retaining the fornicator mentioned, ch. 5 in the church, had _defiled_ it. We may look upon most of the... [ Continue Reading ]
LET NO MAN DECEIVE HIMSELF.— It was not necessary for St. Paul, writing to the Corinthians, who knew the matter of fact, to particularize what it was wherein the craftiness of the person here mentioned had appeared: therefore it was left us to guess; and possibly we shall not be much out, if we take... [ Continue Reading ]
ALL THINGS ARE YOURS, &C.— How magnificently are the happy privileges of Christians, through Christ, set forth in this noble exultation! First, here is a full and vehement enumeration of particulars; and then a noble gradation, which rises up to Heaven, and terminates in God himself! See Blackwall's... [ Continue Reading ]