1 Corinthians 3:1-9
Chapter 3
The Immaturity of the Corinthians
I could not, friends, speak to you as spiritual people but as worldly ones, for you are still infants in Christ.I gave you milk, not solid food,
because you weren’t ready for it, and even now, you can’t receive it because you’re still fleshly. As long as jealousy and conflict exist among you, I can only say that you’re acting on a fleshly level and behaving like ordinary people.
While one says, ‘I follow Paul,’ and another, ‘I follow Apollos,’ what are you but people still on a human level?
What are Apollos and Paul? They are ministers through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each of them.
I planted, and Apollos watered the plant, but God made it grow.
Neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything; it is God who makes the plant grow.
The person who plants and the one who waters work together toward the same goal, and the Lord will reward each according to their efforts.
We are coworkers with God, but you are God’s field and building.
Commentaries
The Immaturity of the Corinthians.
After establishing the essential Christian principles that every community of believers should be built upon, Paul addresses the specific issues faced by his beloved Corinthians, starting with the main one: the envy and discord that had divided the community into factions (4). He then works to dismantle these factions rooted in personality cults: “Who is Apollos? Who is Paul?” (5). Ministers and servants of faith are not the owners of the community. They plant, water, build, and encourage growth; that is, “we are God’s fellow workers” (9), but only God causes the growth, and “no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ” (11), cf. Ephesians 2:20-22. Paul’s insightful perspective offers us a powerful conclusion: “All things are yours, you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s” (22f).