I Corinthians 4:1-13
Today we have an eye-awakening verse: For I am not aware of anything against myself, but I am not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me. (v. 4) We have a time of confession every Sunday, whether it’s Morning Prayer (as it has been most often recently) or a Eucharistic celebration. Here is the version from the Holy Eucharist, Renewed Ancient Text: “Most merciful God, we confess that we have sinned against you in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done, and by what we have left undone.” (http://bcp2019.anglicanchurch.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/BCP2019.pdf) If we are given a moment or two during the service and we take the time seriously, we can probably name a few things that tend to be recurring items in our lives. Then if we reflect more fully in our own time at home, we probably find more shortcomings in our lives. However, when I finally come before Almighty God and He shows me from my life those many, many “things done and things left undone”, there’s no way that I could stand before Him except to beg His forgiveness through the mercy of His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. That’s essentially what Paul is saying here, It is the Lord who judges me.
In challenging himself, Paul is also challenging the Corinthians. Mostly I think he is going back to their internal divisions – some “of Paul” and some “of Apollos”. I daresay that they were being arrogant in their divisiveness, claiming that to be “of Paul” was of a higher order than being “of Apollos”, or vice versa. Paul is telling them not to judge others whom they might fashion as somehow inferior due to their allegiance or even to their position in life. If you re-read today’s readings with those thoughts in mind, I think you’ll find more clarity.
And I do love Paul’s sarcasm in verses 8 to 13…!!
Slava Bohu!
I was struck by v 7. Paul applies it to the teachings. But it applies to all of us, both spiritually and materially. “For who sees anything different in you? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you received it, why do you boast as if it were not a gift?”