T H E
N E W
T E S T A M E N T
CO PY R IG H T BY W ILLIAM EVANS
FIRST CORINTHIANS Continued
T ' HE article on I Corinthians is briefer -1 this month than usual, for the reason that we present the exposition of the Intro duction (i. 1-9) only. It is our desire- in order that the reader may get a com- prehensive grasp of the ;first section—to reserve the entire exposition of Section I. (i. 10-iv. 21) for the next issue of the magazine. THE EXPOSITION OF THE BOOK Introduction— i. 1-9. 1 T he S alutation (i. 1-3). The salu tation contains three thoughts: the writer, those addressed, and the greeting. (a) The Writer (i. 1). Paul, the divinely called and commissioned apostle of Jesus Christ, is declared in the Introduction to be the writer of the epistle. Sosthenes, a prominent Christian, well-known to the Corinthian church (i. 1; cf. Acts xviii. 17), was probably the amanuensis, and is thus associated with Paul in the authorship of this letter, doubtless by courtesy on the part of the apostle, just as Timothy is associated with him in the address of the second epistle to the Corinthians, and Sil- vanus and Timothy in connection with 1 and 2 Thessalonians. (See Introduction). Emphasis is here laid on the fact of the divine call of Paul to the office of apostle- ship. Throughout his epistles Paul felt the necessity of asserting his apostleship as being equal to that of the twelve (cf. ix. 1-15; xv. 9; 2 Corinthians xi. 5; xii. l'l,
12; Galatians i. 1-19). The vindication of his apostleship was made necessary because it was challenged by certain false Judaistic teachers. In his epistle to the Romans, in which his apostolic authority was not questioned, Paul refers to himself simply as “a bondman of Jesus Christ” (Romans i. 1). In 1 Corinthians, however, his apos tleship had been challenged. He therefore would have them know that he had been commissioned by a divine call, and that only thus does he speak in the name of God. No self-appointed minister is he (cf. Hebrews v. 1, 4; Jeremiah xiv. 14; xxiii. 21; 1 Corinthians xii. 28). (b) The Persons Addressed (i. 2). “Thé church of God which is at Corinth.” They are “called saints”—that is to say, they are the “called out” ones, those who, having heard the call of Christ and obeyed it, have separated themselves from the present evil age (cf. 2 Corinthians vi. 14-17). The same grace that called Paul “to be an apostle” (i. 1) called them “to be saints,” not by any ability or merit on his or their part, but by the gracious “will of God.” They were not only called to be saints, but were saints in reality. “Beloved, now are we the sons of God” (1 John iii. 1, 2). Every believer is a saint—is sanctified. If a man is not a saint, he is not a Christian ; if he is a Christian, he is a saint. Sanctifi cation, according to the teaching of the New Testament, is used in a threefold
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