BEHAVING LIKE MERE MEN

1 CORINTHIANS 3:3–4

For where there are envy, strife, and divisions among you, are you not carnal and behaving like mere men?

(1 Cor. 3:3).

Yesterday we studied what Paul meant by calling the Corinthians carnal. Today we will see how they were behaving carnally instead of exhibiting the virtues of Christ in their relations with one another. Verse 3 says that they were carnal because there was envy, strife, and divisions among them. Paul asks that in light of such behavior, “are you not carnal and behaving like mere men?” God’s people are to behave like Christ and not like the world, which is composed of mere men who do not claim submission to God’s law. But the people of Corinth, like all of us, were imperfectly sanctified, and far more imperfectly than some because of the blatant envy, strife, and division that marred the church.

“The description here given of the state of the church of Corinth is not inconsistent with the commendations bestowed upon it in the beginning of the first chapter,” Hodge wrote. “Viewed in comparison with the heathen around them, or even with other churches, the Corinthians deserved the praise there given them. But judged by the standard of the gospel, or of their privileges, they deserved the censures which the apostle so faithfully administers.” Notice Paul’s earnest appeal and forthright rebuke in this passage. He is not afraid to point out the sins of the church and confront the individuals responsible. Paul realizes that he is a sinner as well as others, for elsewhere he calls himself carnal, meaning still plagued by the flesh. But Paul does not allow his own sinfulness to stand in the way of confronting the sin of others. He recognizes the seriousness of the sins of envy and strife, which tear apart the church and bring dishonor to the name of Christ.

Like a faithful shepherd who clears away the weeds from the pasture and puts healing balm on the festering wounds of his sheep, Paul tended to the church in Corinth with rebuke, exhortation, and reminders of the high standards to which they were called. They, and Christians in every age, were not brought into the kingdom to behave like the world, like mere men, but they were brought into the means of God’s sanctifying grace to put off the flesh and put on the Lord Jesus Christ. As Paul teaches in Romans 13: “Let us cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light.”

CORAM DEO

Numbers 21–22

Mark 8:1–21

Read 2 Corinthians 12:20–13:10. What sins were the Corinthians guilty of? What is Paul’s prayer? Read Paul’s exhortation in 13:5–10 carefully. Examine your own life today. Are you guilty of strife, quarreling, anger, slander, gossip, envy, any of those sins Paul lists? If so, confess them to the Lord and seek His grace to be more godly.

For further study: Prov. 3:30; 17:14; 20:3; 25:8; 26:17 • 2 Tim. 2:14, 24

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