II. THE BASIS OF ALL TRUE SPIRITUAL ONENESS AND FELLOWSHIP AMONG MEN. The Church at Corinth had become a distracted and divided communion. It failed to maintain the "unity of the spirit in the bond of peace." St. Paul knew well where the secret of this lay. As a "wise master builder," he saw at once that the breach, the disruption in the house was caused by some fault in its relation to the Foundation on which it was supposed to rest. In spite of all his care, the superstructure had not been based with sufficient firmness upon that. He calls them back to the principle and ground of their unity. They were divided because they had in some way wandered from it, had slipped off from it, lost their hold on it. The uniting principle had become less to them than the forces that rend asunder. There is no real, living, lasting union among men, except on the basis of a common life in Christ. There are appearances, shadows of it, approximations to it more or less near, but not the Divine reality. Think of those associations into which men enter for purposes of commerce, personal enrichment, science, pleasure, politics, philanthropy; the oneness of a nation m its devotion to the throne and constitution; of an army in the enthusiasm of its service; of a popular assembly under the spell of some commanding influence; the oneness even of a family, with its identity of interest and interchange of natural affection;—what are all these forms of unity compared with that of souls that are bound together in the fellowship of the eternal life of Christ, members of his body, and therefore "members one of another"? The true brotherhood, which men seek elsewhere in vain, they find in the Church ransomed by the blood of Christ and built on him as its eternal Foundation.
III. THE ROOT OF AN ENDURING PERSONAL RIGHTEOUSNESS. In what the apostle afterwards says of the different ways in which men "build," he probably has religious teachers and the quality of their teaching specially in view. But we may also apply it to the quality of a man's personal character and life. The picture is presented of one who, as regards the groundwork of his being, may be "in Christ," but whose practice is not altogether worthy of the sacred relationship—a loose fabric of "wood, hay, stubble." In the day "when every man's work shall be made manifest of what sort it is," how mournfully will the defective doings of the unfaithful servant, the careless slothful builder, be swept away before the consuming fire! "He shall suffer loss:… saved; yet so as by fire." And this suggests an opposite picture. There are those whose virtue has no living root in Christ, draws none of its inspiration from the faith of which he is the "Author and Finisher." It is a fabric symmetrical and. fair to look upon, but it rests not on the true Foundation. It is not for us to judge any man. "To his own Master he standeth or falleth." But this we know—that the criterion by which Christ will judge us all "at that day" is the relation in which we stand towards himself, and "other foundation" of personal righteousness "can no man lay."—W.
1 Corinthians 3:13
Proof by fire.
There can be no doubt as to what day it is that is here intended. It is that "great and dreadful day" of the Lord's coming to judgment, to which all Scripture bears more or less distinct prophetic witness—the day when the final issues of time shall be gathered up, and time itself shall melt into the measureless eternity. One special characteristic of the day is that then all human works will be put to the supreme and decisive test. Consider—
I. THE INSTRUMENT OF THE TEST. "The fire shall prove each man's work."
1. Literal elemental fire. It is the plain teaching of Scripture that the visible, material world around us shall undergo some wondrous transformation by fire, that out of the ashes of the old there may arise "the new heavens and the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness" (see Malachi 4:1; 2 Thessalonians 1:8; 2 Peter 3:7, 2 Peter 3:10). And science confirms the possibility, if not actual probability, of such an issue.
2. The fire of Divine holiness. The elemental fire is but the outward symbol of moral judgment. It was for such judgment that Christ came into the world at first (Isaiah 10:17; Malachi 3:2, Malachi 3:3; Matthew 3:11, Matthew 3:12). He will finally and completely fulfil in the last day this judicial function. The holy love of God, in its fiery antagonism to all evil, is incarnated in "that Man whom he hath ordained to be the Judge of quick and dead."
II. THE PURPOSE OF THE TEST. To make manifest "every man's work of what sort it is." To make manifest:
1. The basis on which it rests. Christ is the Source of all true saintliness of character and righteousness of life in men. Only as our souls are "rooted and grounded" in him can we build up a fabric of personal virtue that will stand the searching test of that day. "This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent" (John 6:29).
2. The spirit that inspires it. The mere form of the work, the place and space it has visibly occupied on the stage of the world's history, is of comparatively small moment. The spirit that has animated it, this is its living substance, its essential quality. It is this that makes it of "the sort it is."
3. The practical results of it. Not all the works even of the best of men will bear the revealing light and the consuming fire of that day. When the good die, "their works do follow them," as grateful memories, as enduring fruits of goodness and of blessing to the world. And yet not all. There may have been works among them that were too much "of the earth, earthy." They perish with meaner things, not worthy of immortality. While in the case of some men it is as if all were lost; they leave no lasting memorials behind them, over which the living may rejoice; but like one flying from his burning house, escaping with bare life, they are "saved; yet so as by fire." Prove yourself and yore work now by the Divine standard, "that when He shall appear you may have confidence, and not be ashamed before him at his coming."—W.
HOMILIES BY D. FRASER
1 Corinthians 3:16, 1 Corinthians 3:17
The New Testament temple.
Under the Old Testament, the temple of God was a house made with hands, a worldly sanctuary. The New Testament or dispensation reckons the people of God to be his temple, "the habitation of God in the Spirit." At Corinth there were many temples to the gods, but one temple of God. And the former were of dead stones, however beautiful to the eye. It is a common saying, "As dead as a stone." But St. Paul, with a fine audacity of thought, conceived of the latter—the temple of God—as formed of living stones, from the Foundation upwards.
I. THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE TEMPLE. The foundation of the whole Church God himself laid in raising up Christ from the dead. Whom men despised, he accepted; whom men slew, he quickened. And this living One is made "the Headstone of the corner." A "tried stone," too, thoroughly tested and proved to be sufficient. The foundation of the local Church at Corinth, Paul as a wise master builder had laid, i.e. he had made known Jesus Christ as crucified and risen from the dead, and taught the Corinthian converts to rest on him. Eloquent Apollos followed; and, though a party formed itself under his name, saying "I am of Apollos," St. Paul never blamed the eloquent preacher for this or showed the least jealousy of his influence. On the contrary, at the end of the Epistle he promised to the Corinthians another visit from "our brother Apollos,… when he shall have convenient time." Any builder was welcome to continue the work and enter into St. Paul's labours, provided that he did not disturb the Foundation which had been laid and could not be improved, and that he took good heed how he built thereon. The duty of builders is first to gather men, even though they be dead stones, to Jesus Christ, that they may live; and then to build them together, or edify them in faith and love. For this the proper means are found in the exposition and application of the Word with tenderness, pointedness, comprehensiveness, fearlessness, and fidelity. The power is altogether of God. Paul planted, Apollos watered; but the Church at Corinth was not their husbandry, but God's. Paul laid the foundation, Apollos built on it; but the Church was God's building, not theirs. It is so always and everywhere. "Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it."
II. THE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE TEMPLE.
1. Holiness. "Holiness becometh thine house, O Lord, forever." The temple built by Solomon was holy, or separated to sacred use; but when its holiness was outraged by the idolatrous images and altars afterwards placed within its courts, it still retained beauty, because it was material. But now that the temple is spiritual only, its holiness is its attraction. Corrupt the character, degrade the purity of the Church, and you destroy its beauty too. The holiness of the Church is produced and maintained by the Holy Ghost abiding therein. We have not "influences of the Spirit" as from a distance, but his personal presence. When the Lord Jesus stood in the house of God at Jerusalem, he said, "In this place is One greater than the temple." For once, the less contained the Greater. Now in every meeting of the saints is One greater than the Church, for the Holy Spirit is there. And it concerns his Divine honour to purify the place of his habitation. It is his high prerogative to consecrate; and the New Testament temple is throughout consecrated, not by man, but by the Spirit of God. And as it is in calling and consecration, so ought it to be in fact and in service—holy to the Lord.
2. Unity. We read not of temples, but of one temple. However men may arrange themselves ecclesiastically, God sees but one temple or Church in each city, as of old at Corinth or at Ephesus. Indeed, there is but one temple, one Body of Christ, in all the world. And the unity is not brought about by negotiation or legislation; it is wrought by God. "By one Spirit are we all baptized into one Body." We have nothing to do with making the unity; but we are to know, feel, and evince it, worshipping together with joy, helping and exhorting each other, working together for the glory of God and good of man, and partaking together of the same bread and the same cup, not as partisans, but as Christians, members of one Body, guided by one Spirit, and cheered by one hope of our calling.
3. Variety. There are various courts, wings, towers, and porticoes in this great building. To our minds there may seem to be confusion and incongruity; but the supreme Architect knows how to adjust and reconcile all in a building "fitly framed together." Variety is not desultoriness. The mere heaping of stones together gives no temple, far less the making of little groups or heaps here and there over a wide field. They must be built and knit together in love. And then, too, there is variety in the places assigned to individual Christians. Some "seem to be pillars." They are like those vertical columns which supported a horizontal entablature in those classical temples with which the Corinthians were familiar. Others must be content to fill a niche or fit into a corner. It is an honour to be anywhere in the spiritual house.
III. A WARNING AGAINST INJURING THIS TEMPLE, One may mar the temple by not taking heed to what he builds. It may be called very liberal and tolerant to make no distinctions, and bestow Christian privileges on all; but St. Paul would call it the building of "wood, hay, and stubble," which cannot abide the fiery trial that comes on every man's work. One may also mar the temple by introducing the temper of the market place, and of the tables of the money changers into its courts. Such things call again and again for censure and a whip of small cords. One may destroy the temple, i.e. aim blows at its very life, by striking at its holiness, its unity, or its variety. Not that any one can actually demolish it; for it is an ever living Church: "The gates of hades shall not prevail against it." It is a capital crime against Christ and the Church, either
1 Corinthians 3:21-23
A Christian's possessions.
It is a folly under the sun to live above one's means. It is the folly of very many Christians that they live spiritually far below their means of grace and godliness. They are like poor people who have come into a large estate, and cannot for some time adapt themselves to their altered position or comport themselves as befits their fortune. They still betray the narrow ideas and awkward manners of their former condition. So Christians are assured that they have unsearchable riches in Christ, but cannot elevate their ideas and modes of life to the high level of their spiritual privilege. They still betray the narrow estimates and unworthy habits of their time of unregeneracy and unbelief. To correct this tendency and raise the standard of Christian sentiment and conduct, let us look into this inventory of a believer's possessions, and the right or charter by which they are his.
I. THE PROPERTY. "All things are yours." It is at once real and movable estate. It has the most permanent character; and yet it may be taken by the Christian whithersoever he goes, and enjoyed anywhere. A man rich in this world's goods has necessary limits to his possessions. His real estate is irremovable and his personality or movable wealth is perishable. But he whose riches are intellectual and spiritual has property everywhere. Cast him naked and shipwrecked on an unknown coast; yet he is rich. Spoil him of all earthly goods; reduce him to the very almshouse; and yet he is rich. When he has nothing, he still possesses all things.
1. The Christian ministry, represented by Paul, Apollos, and Cephas. The Church is not for the ministry, but the ministry for the Church. The Corinthian Christians did not belong to the great preachers here named, but the great preachers belonged to them. Often the isolation of particular flocks under their own pastors is carried to an extent which virtually brings the doctrine to nought, and gives them no enjoyment of other gifts bestowed by the Head of the Church for the perfecting of his saints. But some are best for planting, others for watering. Let ministers and teachers of the Word, variously qualified, be welcomed and cherished. All of them are yours.
2. The world. It is a bad master, but a useful servant. All things in it that are not sinful may be made serviceable to the happiness and progress of the Christian, and to the glory of God. "Use this world as not abusing it."
3. Life, with all its vicissitudes and possibilities, sorrow and joy, trial and success. It is quite different to the Christian from what it is to the non Christian. He is never helpless, and need never be in despair; for he may be sure that the circumstances of his life are ordered by his heavenly Friend, the lines of his life are drawn according to the plan of his loving Saviour.
4. Death; which comes, not as a grisly terror, but to do a kindly office. Death, like life, just because it is not in the Christian's power, serves his best interests. "Whether we live or die, we are the Lord's." We may add—The death of friends is yours, softening your heart. The death of enemies is yours, delivering you out of their hand. And as for yourself, Boston has said, "Death comes to the godly man as Haman to Mordecai, with royal apparel and the horse, and commission to do him honour, though with a sullen voice and unkind countenance."
5. Things present. The Christian has a promise that he will lack no good thing, and things that seem evil, wounds, losses, disappointments, all tend by the Divine blessing to exercise his faith and patience, and so to strengthen his soul.
6. Things to come. Of these we cannot speak. The sights we may see, the feelings we may experience, the changes we may witness, within a year or two, who can tell? How much less can we descant on things beyond? But enough to know that the future is ours. There will be no power among things to come which can separate us from the love of God.
II. THE SECURITY FOR ALL THIS PROPERTY. The Christian holds all through his relation to Christ, "the Heir of all things." "Ye are Christ's; and Christ is God's." Believers belong to Christ, as given to him by the Father, redeemed by him on the cross, effectually called and mystically united to him by the Holy Spirit. And Christ is God's, as the well beloved of the Father, to whom all things are made subject both in heaven and earth. Now believers inherit through Christ, are co-heirs with him. It is because he is Heir and Lord of all, that all things are theirs. To quote an old divine: "The saints have nothing but through Christ; and whatsoever is his, is theirs. His God is their God; his Father, their Father; his blood, his merits, his Spirit, his victories, all the spoil he hath gotten, all the revenue and income of his life and death,—all is theirs." If men only believed that these things are so, that Christians have such treasures, and hold them by such a tenure, surely a motive of enlightened self interest would urge them to the feet of Christ. Alas! all men have not faith. The current ideas of wealth and substance are quite unconnected with religion, which seems to many a good thing to die with, but rather a hindrance than otherwise in life. St. Paul's teaching tells a different tale. It is the Christless who, being without God in the world, are poor and indigent. It is those who are Christ's who, however poor in this world, are rich towards God.—F.
HOMILIES BY R. TUCK
1 Corinthians 3:1
The carnal mind.
In view of St. Paul's description of the immoralities and sensualities of the pagan peoples, given in Romans 1:1-32., and in special lists of prevailing iniquities, such as are given in Galatians 5:19-21, his sense of the hindrance the carnal mind presents to the reception of spiritual teachings can be fully apprehended. Probably the severest thing St. Paul said about the carnal mind is that it is "enmity against God: for it is net subject to the Law of God, neither indeed can be. They that are in the flesh cannot please God" (Romans 8:7, Romans 8:8). Possibly a distinction between the "natural" man and the "carnal" man may be intended. The natural man is one "whose hopes and desires are bounded by the limits of the physical principle of life;" the carnal man is regarded as more or less under the influence of the sensual passions. But St. Paul seems to recognize that the Corinthian tendency to disputes and religious strife was a sign that the carnal principles were yet strongly working in them; and "an appetite for religious strife prevents us from discerning the deeper truths of the Christian faith." It is broadly true that the reception of spiritual truth mainly depends on the openness and preparedness and culture of those to whom such teaching is given. The teacher may indeed be unskilful, but more often the hindrance is that the hearer is unspiritual. The preparation of the teacher is considered to be essential, the preparation of the taught is left to the accident of personal earnestness.
I. THE SIGNS OF THE CARNAL MIND. With the hints given above two signs may be fully dealt with and illustrated.
1. Inability to receive advanced spiritual instruction. Self indulgence in meat or drink, inordinate pursuit of pleasure, the captivity of mind and heart to business schemes, the deteriorating influence of worldly ambitions,—all destroy interest in Divine things, and take from us the very possibility of apprehending the higher mysteries of the kingdom.
2. A spirit of strife and division. It is never the best people in a Christian community who are the cause of strife. Contention and controversy are only interesting to those who are not really growing in likeness to and nearness to Christ. Schism and strife are sure signs of carnality. Men who get soul visions of the truth never can want to contend over words. It would seem that St. Paul recognized signs of remaining carnality in the regenerate members of the Church, and found this to be a principal hindrance to the advance of his teaching. Such signs of the "carnal mind" are still observed by Christian pastors, and are the occasions of their deepest depressions and constant grief.
II. THE FOOD FOR THE CARNAL MIND. St. Paul does not neglect it or refuse to consider it. And it is remarkable that he does not deal with it by warnings or threatenings, but by food, and that of a kind carefully appropriated and adapted. So the physician deals with some classes of disease; he gives no medicine, but nourishes the general health, with a full expectancy that the renewed vitality will throw off, out of the system, the specific disease. St. Paul evidently thinks the real cause of carnality to be low spiritual vitality, want of capacity to digest and assimilate good strong food of truth. These religious men were, m regard to religious truths and principles, really only babes, and religious food suited to babes, to beginners, must be provided for them. They must have the "milk" of gospel simplicities until they are strong enough to take the "meat" of gospel mysteries. Only the milk was to be given with the purpose of nourishing the powers for better food. First principles duly apprehended would prepare the way for higher teachings.
Impress that in Christian congregations there is always a call for the gospel simplicities, but that call should not be continually made, as it so often and so sadly is, by the same persons. Milk prepares the way for meat. It may be earnestly urged that, after all these centuries of Christian teaching in the home and in the Church, there ought to be an earnest and a mighty cry for advanced and spiritual preaching of the great revealed mysteries of God in Christ. We ought to be "men."—R.T.
1 Corinthians 3:5-7
Man's work and God's.
Explain the agricultural figure used in 1 Corinthians 3:6. In the production of the year's harvest many different agencies are employed. Each man has work and his time for work, and upon man's labour the harvest in large measure depends. Yet sun, and wind, and rain, and atmosphere, and soil, are things quite as essential as man's work, but absolutely out of man's control. Year by year man ploughs, man plants, man tends, but God gives the increase. So in spiritual things, there is an important sphere for man's agency, but efficiency and result depend on the cooperating grace and blessing of God.
I. MAN NEVER CAN GET BEYOND MINISTRY. That is his duty, and that is his dignity. Even Paul and Apollos can be but "ministers by whom we believe." Man cannot control the plan into which his work may fit, or the issues which his work should reach. Man never can be independent, so as to take up anything and do it completely. He never has entrusted to him more than a piece or part, which, if well done, fits into other pieces and parts, entrusted to other men, and goes to complete the whole purpose that was in God's thought. And so no honour of results can ever attach to man the agent. Servants only ask praise for faithfulness, the honour of the work belongs wholly to the master whose thought and plan are thus wrought out. This feeling should ensure the sincere humility of all Christian teachers.
II. BEHIND MINISTRY IS ALWAYS MASTERSHIP. We serve somebody. "We serve the Lord Christ." But in the case of spiritual work, we may say that in God is more than mastership, there is presidency over and use of more important agencies than man's, though agencies related to man's, and working in with his. Spiritual agencies are as much out of our control as sun, or wind, or rain; yet God uses them, with ours, to win the increase. Man can never, by himself, accomplish any moral or spiritual service. Paul and Apollos could do much for the Church at Corinth, but they stand aside, and let men see how gloriously and effectively God works.—R.T.
1 Corinthians 3:9-12
Foundations and buildings.
A curious and interesting blending of metaphors is found in 1 Corinthians 3:9. "Ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building." The sudden changing of metaphors is a characteristic of St. Paul's style; for instances, see 1 Corinthians 9:7; 2 Corinthians 10:4-8; Ephesians 3:17; Colossians 2:6-7. The apostle now dwells fully on the architectural metaphor, and gives some thoughts of singular depth and importance on the true foundation for a noble life work, and the kind of buildings which may hopefully be reared upon it. The apostle speaks of himself as a foundation layer; reminds the Corinthians that it had been his work to commence or found Christian Churches; that this he had successfully done again and again during his missionary travels; and that the Corinthian Church had its first announcement of the gospel from him, and the first stones of its spiritual Church laid by him. He naturally felt jealous concerning the character of the members of that Church, and would have them such as would stand the testing of the great day.
I. ST. PAUL AS A LAYER OF FOUNDATIONS. Only the layer, not the maker. The Foundation was provided (Colossians 2:11); with it not even an apostle could interfere. St. Paul was fitted for the work of laying it, or of commencing a Christian Church in new districts,
His personal and persuasive influence on his fellow men needs to be taken into account. But St. Paul did not look upon the beginning of a Church or the conversion of a soul as any end of his work. Laying foundations involves a design for a building that is to be raised upon it, and the apostle kept up his relations with the Churches he was honoured to found, so that he might ensure that the building was being raised in a manner worthy of the Foundation, and in harmony with it. He had no greater joy than to know that "his children walked in the truth."
II. OTHER TEACHERS AS BUILDERS ON THE FOUNDATION. St. Paul's call to the missionary work involved the necessity of removing from place to place, and prevented his personally watching over the uprising or growth of any one Church. This disability he often seriously felt, and it made him very anxious concerning the wisdom, skill, and character of those teachers who continued his work. That anxiety comes out in our text, and it made him appeal even to the individual Church member, urging him to see that, whatever might be the character of his teachers, his own personal character was being nobly and safely reared. The following points may be dwelt on:—
1. The builders of any one Church may be many. There may be a long succession of pastors and teachers, with very various gifts and endowments; but each may, in his time and way, add to the symmetrical and harmonious growth of the building. Each must have done so up to the measure of his loyalty to Christ and openness to his Divine lead. Still the same variety and succession are maintained, and under the many builders' hands the great Church of the redeemed advances to its perfection.
2. The materials used in the construction may differ. Even of right materials there is diversity, represented by "gold, silver, precious stones." Some teachers are strong in Biblical exposition, others in enforcement of practical duties, and others in appeal to pious feeling; but all bear upon the harmonious uprising of the building.
3. The architectural features may in parts differ. The general design cannot be altered, but multitudes of details are left open. A Christian character and a Christian Church can have but one general form; but there may be decoration and tracery according to men's thought of the morally beautiful in the age in which they build, and the whole Church appears at last as a composite structure, combining all architectural thought and form. But man's work, in character or Church, must be subject to a final and fierce testing, and only the really substantial and good may hope to bear that test.—R.T.
1 Corinthians 3:13-15
Final testings of our life work.
In treating this passage it should be noted that the first and chief reference of it is to Christian teachers and their work, and that it can only in a second sense be applied to the ordinary Christian, and the kind of influence for good which he strives to exert. Still, a great principle is enunciated in St. Paul's counsel to the teachers, and we may give that principle a wide and general application. The apostle is, in this part of the Epistle, dealing with the tendency of the teachers at Corinth to overpress their individual apprehensions of the truth, and so to make parties under their lead, instead of carefully preserving the unity of the Church in the common truth "as it is in Christ Jesus." "The image, in these verses, is taken from what would meet the eye of a traveller in Ephesus, where St. Paul now was, or in:Corinth, where his letter was to be first read. It is such a contrast as may be seen (though not in precisely the same striking form of difference) in London in our own day. The stately palaces of marble and of granite, with roof and column glittering with gold and silver decorations, and, close by these, the wretched hovels of the poor and outcast, the walls made of laths of wood, with the interstices stuffed with straw, and a thatched roof above. Then arose before the apostle's vision the thought of a city being visited by a mighty conflagration, such as desolated Corinth itself in the time of Mummius. The mean structures of perishable wood and straw would be utterly consumed, while, as was actually the case at Corinth, the mighty palaces and temples would stand after the fire had exhausted itself" (T. T. Shore). The point of the apostle is that, sooner or later, all earthly works come under severe and searching testings, which prove whether there is anything in them of permanent value, and destroy what had but a temporary use or was really worthless. There is a good and important sense in which the testing day is a continuous day. We need not put the thought of the proving of our life work off to some indefinite future. Every day tests and tries. Every night we may think that God weighs the day and its works in his perfectly adjusted balances. But the early Christian mind was very fully occupied with the idea of a particular day, on which Christ would appear and the judgment of mankind be completed; see 2 Corinthians 5:10.
I. THE FIRE TEST FOR ALL LIFE WORK. Fire is conceived as:
1. The most destructive agent.
2. The most searching agent. Recent fires have shown how it can destroy eves buildings of brick and stone. Illustrate from the great Chicago fire.
3. The most purifying agent. Illustrate its power to cleanse the dross from metals. Compare the two other cleansing agents noticed in Scripture—water and blood. Both these cleanse by a mechanical process; fire cleanses by a chemical process, Nowadays, in great cities and in regard to great buildings, the most anxious question is, "Will the walls etc., stand fire?" We try to build places that shall be fire proof. Fire fitly represents the searching power of God: "As fire does, so does God in the end thoroughly search out and destroy all that is vile or refuse, all that is not thoroughly genuine and durable." For passages associating fire symbols with God, see Deuteronomy 4:24; Deuteronomy 9:3; Psalms 1:3; Psalms 97:3; Isaiah 66:15, Isaiah 66:16; Malachi 3:2, Malachi 3:3; 2 Thessalonians 1:8; Hebrews 12:29. It may be shown that
Sooner or later, even in this life, men find out of what sort their work has been, but all mistake and delusion about the quality of our work will be swept away in the great revealing day of God.
II. THE REWARD FOR ALL WHOSE LIFE WORK ABIDES THE TEST. The reward is really found in the abiding, the permanent character of the work. "Those who have built well shall have their reward in their work having survived the trial: of the fire." F. W. Robertson points out the doctrine of the rewardableness of work, as taught in this passage. "All were one, on the one Foundation; yet St. Paul modifies this: they were not one in such a sense that all their work was equally valuable, for 'every man shall receive his own reward according to his labour.' It is incredible that the mere theologian, defending the outworks, writing a book on the evidences of Christianity, or elaborating a theological system, shall be as blessed as he who has hungered and thirsted with Christ, and like Christ suffered. Nevertheless, each in his own way shall gain the exact recompense of what he has done." On the doctrine of rewards, consider
III. THE LOSS OF THOSE WHOSE LIFE WORK WILL NOT ABIDE THE TEST. Their work will perish. It is proved to be "of the earth, earthy." It had no abiding spiritual character. Reference, no doubt, is to all so called Christian teaching that has mind in it, energy in it, individuality in it, but not Christ in it, and Christ wholly. All work that only glorifies the worker must perish. Only work that glorifies Christ can stand the fire test. Show with what care we should test our own work in God's sight, to be sure that no self seeking has crept into it and spoiled it. "If we would judge ourselves we shall not be judged." But St. Paul, while writing such severe and searching things, makes most careful qualifications, so that none should be unduly discouraged. This is said for the comfort of sincere souls whose life work has proved a failure. "He himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire." "He shall be saved, while all his work shall be destroyed, just as, to use St. Paul's metaphor, a builder escapes from his house which has been burnt over his head, and stands trembling yet safe, looking on his work in ruins." "Surely the 'smell of fire' may be said to pass on him who sees all those works which he so honestly believed to be for God vanishing as worthless stubble in the searching trial which will 'purge away all the dross' of our human doings, and leave only what is of real value in God's sight." Impress how entirely our human will should be lost in the Divine will, so that our Christian work should be in no sense at all our work, but entirely God's appointment for us, and wholly done under his guidance and in his strength. Work that has the self seeking stamp on it will be sure to burn up. Precious stonework, gold and silver work, is work done wholly for Christ, in which the self does not appear. Let each man, then, test his ministry, his teaching, his influence, now, while he may correct his errors, and begin to do better things in a better spirit.—R.T.
1 Corinthians 3:16, 1 Corinthians 3:17
The Church a temple.