I Corinthians 1: 10-17
Now I exhort you, brethren, by the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ,
Paul now begins to address some of the problems and issues these Corinthians needed to deal with, urging them strongly for Christ's sake.
that you all agree and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be made complete in the same mind and in the same judgment.
Jesus prayed to the Father that we would have unity of mind and purpose, as He has with the Father. These believers needed to work on this.
For I have been informed concerning you, my brethren, by Chloe's people, that there are quarrels among you.
These are more than differences of opinion, these were contentious divisions into mutually opposed parties, causing heated arguments.
Now I mean this, that each one of you is saying, I am of Paul, and I am of Apollos, and I am of Cephas, and I am of Christ.
Different believers were putting their confidence into different teachers, as though they were teaching different doctrines, rather than displaying their own personalities in the Truth they were teaching. So they were fighting among themselves over nothing.
Has Christ been divided? Paul was not crucified for you, was he? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?
Paul was appalled that some would be lifting him up this way. The Truth is all one story, Christ cannot be divided up. Paul and Apollos and Peter all were teaching the same Truth, and none were better than any other. Christ is our Savior, and their focus was to be on Him.
I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius,
so that no one would say you were baptized in my name.
(Now I did baptize also the household of Stephanus; beyond that, I do not know whether I baptized any other.)
For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the Gospel, not in cleverness of speech, so that the Cross of Christ would not be made void.
Paul never wanted to draw attention to himself, so he didn't even do the baptizing while he was planting churches all over the known World. And he was disappointed that these believers would lift him up, or Apollos or Peter, instead of our Lord Jesus Christ.
There are many teachers today who are making their own disciples, drawing people away from unity in Christ. Unity is not uniformity. It is all believing in Jesus as our Savior, and learning to love Him and one another. It's believing the same fundamental Truth and having the same overarching purpose to promote God's righteousness in the World today.
Some churches today teach that they are the only real church, or that the church can save you. Or they take the focus off of what Jesus accomplished and teach instead that we need to earn our own salvation. Or that Jesus died so we can be rich in this world to enjoy for ourselves.
God gave us all His Truth, and each of us our own personalities. We are to have unity in our doctrinal foundation, and the high morality of our characters while helping one another with our varied gifts and abilities.
We need unity in our foundational beliefs and purpose, but have diversity in our working out how to share what God has given us. Where you are strong, you can help me where I am weak, and where I am strong, I am to help you in your weakness. God made us all different, so that everything would get done. We're always better when we work together.
Let's not let our varying personalities get us into arguments, or even disagreements. We are united on the fundamentals, and have freedom on the peripherals.
O my Father, thank You for giving us the Pauls and the Peters today in our societies to present Your wonderful Truth with our different approaches and personalities. Help us all to hold one another up in the compassionate affection of family love, and to always remember that You are leading each of us in the path You have put our feet on. Where our paths meet, let there be sweet fellowship, granting each other grace on the incidentals that come and go.
And strengthen us to broadcast the seed of Your Gospel across all the fertile fields of the World, to reach and draw in all the lost sheep into the safety of the Fold.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
