(Notes of an address on 1 Corinthians 1.)
The truth of the First Epistle to the Corinthians was well-known to those who separated from the great ecclesiastical systems of Christendom last century to gather together according to the light given of God in the Holy Scriptures. In searching the Scriptures to find what the church was according to the mind of God, they discovered that the systems with which they were connected were not according to the divine pattern. They bore the name of the church, but in their foundation, character and function, they were far removed from the assembly of God as described by the Spirit of God in the epistles of the apostle Paul, God’s chosen vessel to minister the truth of the church.
Before the Reformation, the professed church had become utterly corrupt, and its practices were revolting to men of integrity. Many of the writers who proclaimed against the excesses of the church were not concerned with the Reformed doctrines, but were shocked at the idolatry and corruption of that which professed the Name of Christ. When the Reformation took place, much of the idolatry and corruption was destroyed, and such doctrines as Justification by Faith were recovered; but the Reformed churches, in their ecclesiastical systems, were never recovered to the divine pattern as given in the writings of Paul.
Scripture has nothing to say of many of the offices in the great human, religious systems of Christendom. We do not read of Archbishops, Archdeacons or Popes in the Scriptures; nor do we find the assembly of God gathered in buildings patterned on the Tabernacle and Temple systems of Judaism. Indeed, the vestments of the clergy and the buildings and altars of ecclesiastical systems of Christendom, show them to be fashioned after the “Camp” of Judaism, out of which true Christians were called of God.
In the midst of all the corruption and confusion of that which has professed the Name of Christ down the centuries, the true church of God was watched over by Christ. It may be difficult for us to trace its history among the human records that remain, but God, in His Word, traced prophetically the course of the professing church, and marked out the path for the overcomer, and this was the path taken by the true church, even if the great body of truth was lost to them concerning God’s thoughts for the gatherings of His assembly.
Here, in 1st Corinthians, we have God’s thoughts of His church: it is composed of those who are “sanctified in Christ Jesus, called saints” (1 Cor. 1:2). Sanctification is the work of the Holy Spirit, and only those in whom the Holy Spirit has wrought in divine power belong to the church of God. The church is not a voluntary body to which men may join themselves, or to which men may unite them: it is a heavenly body of true believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, who are indwelt by the Spirit of God, and who, by the same Spirit, have been set apart for the will and pleasure of God. Such are saints by divine calling. It is the call of God that has made us saints, and that has brought us into this favoured place where we have the privilege of answering to the mind of God, where we are taught of God, and where we are responsible to maintain all that is of God in righteousness and holiness.
The church is presented to us in different ways in Scripture, bringing before us what it is to God and to Christ. It is spoken of the House of God, the vessel in which God dwells by His Spirit, and in which His testimony is found. The church is also the Body of Christ, and the subject of the Body is brought out in different aspects, local, universal and complete. Again we see the church to be the Bride of Christ, the object of His deep love, and which He soon shall present to Himself without spot or wrinkle or any such thing.
In First Corinthians the aspect of the church is mainly local, although it is not confined to this aspect. When the apostle writes in chapter 10, “Because we, (being) many, are one loaf, one body” (1 Cor. 10:17), he is thinking of the whole church in its organic unity. When he writes, “Now ye are Christ’s body” in 1 Corinthians 12:27, he is presenting the church in its local aspect as bearing all the features of the true church. Paul does not present the church in relation to Christ as Head of the Body in this epistle, as he does in Ephesians and Colossians, nor does he view the church in its completeness as in Ephesians 1:23, where it is seen as “the fulness of Him who fills all in all.”
Not only does the apostle address the assembly of God in Corinth, but also “all that in every place call on the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ.” The whole Christian profession is addressed, for the truth communicated to the Corinthian church was for saints of God everywhere, and the injunctions given to the local assembly were binding upon all who professed the Name of Christ. This at once manifests and acknowledges the unity of the church, for there is but one church of God, and the whole church is responsible to God to act according to the divine instructions given by the Holy Spirit.
At the beginning, there is no reason to suppose that the professed church greatly exceeded numerically the true church, for those who accepted Christianity at the outset exposed themselves to persecution for Jesus’ sake. But it was not long before “certain men…got in unnoticed” (Jude 4), until there grew a great tree of religious profession (Matt. 13:31-32), when the mere professors outnumbered those who were true believers, indwelt by the Spirit of God.
Paul could always thank God “in respect of the grace of God given” to the Corinthians in Christ Jesus. He could not thank God for their spiritual state, for they were divided in parties under various leaders, and the moral tone demanded stern rebuke; nor could he thank God for their orderly gatherings, for a good deal of disorder required to be corrected. Spite of these things, and spite of allowed moral and doctrinal evil, which he has to put right, the apostle is able to thank God “that in everything ye have been enriched in Him, in all word (of doctrine), and all knowledge, (according as the testimony of the Christ has been confirmed in you,) so that ye come short in no gift.”
For the moment, before dealing with different aspects of failure, the apostle has His eye upon the enrichment of the grace God, and for this he can give thanks, The assembly at Corinth was very highly favoured; all the different characters of spiritual gifts were there so that they might profit from them; it was God’s rich grace to them in confirming the testimony concerning Christ which they had accepted.
Instead of profiting from all the spiritual gifts they had received, the Corinthian saints used their gifts to call attention to themselves. Yet, in the wisdom of God, Paul turns the abuse of divine gifts into an occasion for instructing the saints in the ordering of the assembly according to the mind of God. Where the flesh intrudes into divine things, the way to put things right is not to institute a human order or arrangement pleasing to men, but rather to seek afresh God’s order, and endeavour by His grace to carry it out.
This is exactly where men have gone astray. At the time of the Reformation there were godly men, who not only sought to put away the idolatry and corruption that were widespread in the professing church, but who desired to teach the people the pure doctrines of the Scriptures. The Reformers refused the doctrine of Transubstantiation, but most of them never saw the simple truth of the elements of the Supper representing the body and blood of the Lord. Of the leading Reformers, Zwingli of Zurich was the only one who did not give up one error for another as regards the Lord’s Supper, though all refused the sacrifice of the Mass.
As regards God’s order for the assembly, in England it was not the word of God that decided the matter, but the King. Is it then to be wondered at that God’s order has been set aside and man’s order has been substituted? In almost all the lands where the Reformation took place, political considerations affected the decisions of the Reformers. Yet there were those who, though relatively few in number, maintained that the church of God should be entirely free from the interference and influences of the men and governments of this world. It is difficult to find from the historical records of men how much light they possessed as regards the truth of the assembly, but it is clear that they perceived that the church was “not of this world.”
It was not until the beginning of last century, in a great movement of the Spirit of God, that the precious truths relating to the church were recovered. Saints of God were drawn out of the human religious systems, and gathered in simplicity to the Name of the Lord, and in their gatherings were enlightened through reading the Scriptures as to the heavenly nature and calling of God’s assembly.
Reading in 1st Corinthians they discovered that God had called true believers “into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord” (1 Cor. 1:9). They found that all true believers, in any locality, formed the church of God in that locality. The notion of a church composed of all the inhabitants of a parish or town was not to be found in Scripture: it was a human formation, for God’s church had been called out from the world. Christ’s body is composed only of those in whom God’s Spirit has wrought, for it is by the Spirit they have been baptized into one body (1 Cor. 12:13).
Later in the epistle they found the place the Lord’s Supper had in relation to the assembly; also that the clerical system had come into existence because some members of the body were virtually saying, “I am not of that body,” and others were saying, “I have not need of thee” (1 Cor. 12:15-16, 21). How blessed it is to have the members of the body functioning according to the thought of God, where the saints are gathered together with Christ in their midst in the liberty of the Spirit.
Although we are in the last days, with the assembly in ruin, it is still possible for two or three to gather together to Christ’s Name, and to be regulated in their gatherings by the truth ministered by the apostle Paul as to the assembly. Such will not claim to be the assembly, but will count it as a privilege to act in the light of the assembly, and realise that nothing can excuse them from seeking to gather together according to the truth of the one body, and to maintain the truth, although in weakness, so as to safeguard the holiness and righteousness connected with the Name of the Lord.
R. 19.3.60