CORRECTING ILLS AND IMMORALITY (1 CORINTHIANS 4:1–6:20)
Nobody likes correction. From the five-year-old who’s told she didn’t wash up properly to the fifty-year-old whose employer criticizes his lackluster performance —people don’t want to be told they’ve done something wrong. Some of us get defensive, trying to blame somebody else or striking back at the person correcting us. Even those who take it well would resonate with the admission of the author of Hebrews: “All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful” (Heb. 12:11).
Christians, however, should realize that correction by God through His Word, His works, and His workers is a necessary part of spiritual growth. Our heavenly Father disciplines us so we can “share His holiness” (Heb. 12:10). Unlike our earthly parents —who may have punished us wrongly at times by being too harsh or too lax —the Lord always chastens us for the right reasons, in the right way, at the right time, and to the right degree (Heb. 12:10-11).
So it is with authority and love that Paul uses his pen as a rod of correction to discipline the wayward Corinthian Christians for a variety of ills, including immorality. We’ve already seen in the previous section that Paul had to correct schisms, factions, parties, and divisions in Corinth. Now, he reasserts his unique apostolic authority (1 Cor. 4:1-21) and challenges the Corinthians on an issue of gross sexual immorality: “that someone has his father’s wife” (5:1). Paul then describes the principles of church discipline, seeking to purge the church of wickedness and to purify its people (5:1-13). Besides this, the Corinthian Christians didn’t hesitate to sue one another in secular court (6:1-8), and some failed to accompany their conversion to Christianity by a converted lifestyle of sexual purity (6:9-20). So Paul, as their father in the faith, turns his attention to the Corinthians’ failure to live up to their reputation as followers of Jesus Christ.
Paul’s strong words correcting community ills and personal immorality continue to speak to us in the twenty-first century. We would all do well to hear the words and heed the warnings, avoiding the unpleasant but necessary discipline God will use to restore His disobedient children.
KEY TERMS IN 1 CORINTHIANS 4:1–6:20
oikonomos (οἰκονόμος) [3623] “steward,” “custodian,” “caretaker”
In 1 Corinthians 4:1-2, Paul says he and his fellow apostles should be regarded as “stewards” (oikonomos) of the mysteries of God (4:1), entrusted with a great responsibility for which they must be found faithful (4:2). The word oikonomos literally means “rule of a house,” and referred primarily to a manager or caretaker who worked under the authority of the lord of the house (Luke 12:42; 16:1). In Romans 16:23 the word refers to a “treasurer” of the city, entrusted with public funds. Church leaders, too, are regarded as “stewards” of the local assembly (Titus 1:7), as are all believers who have a responsibility toward each other in the church (1 Pet. 4:10).
porneia (πορνεία) [4202] “immorality,” “fornication”
A most general term for sexual immorality, porneia can include premarital or extramarital sexual relations, including prostitution and homosexuality. The specific term for adultery, moicheia [3430], can sometimes be used synonymously, as in Galatians 1:19 where many Greek manuscripts include moicheia instead of porneia, though the range of meaning for porneia is much broader. The root porn- still endures in modern English in the word “pornography” (pornē + graphein), which designates a graphic representation of immoral sexual behavior.