1 Corinthians 3

1 Corinthians 3:1

COuld not,] hee goeth on with an objection which the Corinthians made. Seeing that spirituall men are capable of Gods mysteries, why hast thou not revealed them all to us, and preached them in a high and divine stile, but hast given us onely the first rudiments, and that in a vulgar and familiar manner? Whereupon is growne the contempt of thy person, and the affectation to raise them higher by humane wisdome. He answers by a kinde way of grant, and by an oblique recrimination thus. And if it were so, lay not the fault upon me, but upon your owne incapacitie, and to the carnall passions which possesse you Babes,] opposite to those perfect ones spoken of 1 Corinthians 2:6 In Christ,] namely in the knowledge and faith of Christ, in the state of spirituall life, which beleevers enjoy in the communion of him, which hath its progresses, and encreaseth as mans age doth, untill it come to its perfection in life everlasting. See Ephes. 4. 13.

1 Corinthians 3:3

Carnall,] following for the most part, the sence and affections of your vicious nature And walke,] do not ye walk, according to that vice which remaineth in man through sinne, and not according to God.

1 Corinthians 3:5

Ministers,] to whom that dependency ought not to be attributed, which is due onely to the Lord, namely Christ By whom,] but not in them, as in Christ Even as the,] besides that, their externall ministery, which hath beene the meanes of your saith, is not of themselves, nor by any vertue of their owne, but of the Holy Ghosts meere gift.

1 Corinthians 3:6

Gave the,] hath blessed, and wrought inwardly, to make our preaching lively and effectuall.

1 Corinthians 3:7

Any thing,] of himselfe, nor in respect of God and the height of his Action. And absolutely cn have no part in the command of the soule, and the conscience, which belongeth wholly to Christ, who is, and worketh every thing in all men, 1 Corinthians 12:6. Colossians 3:1-25 〈◊〉.

1 Corinthians 3:8

Now e,] he points at the Corinthians other error, namely to take an occasion of divisions, from the number, and diversity of the ministers, chusing as it were each one to make him head of a faction are one,] they have the same office, from the same Lord, and all worke in one and the same externall manner, and neither the one nor the other can make any impression upon the soule, nor infuse any vertue into it, and if their be any difference in the degree of this worke, the reward shall likewise be different in heavenly glory. Dan. 2. 3. and with this they ought to be contented, without desiring any thing of men.

1 Corinthians 3:9

Labouers,] namely ministers, and instruments in that whereof God is the supreame author.

1 Corinthians 3:10

To the grace,] namely to the office of Appostle, and the gifts which are sitting for it, I have layd,] namely I have taught by the infallible guide of the Holy Ghost, the first and most certaine and undoubted truth of the Gospell, upon which ought to be built, and by which ought to be ruled, all the doctrine of those who come after, as the foundaion beares up the building, and by its dimensions gives a rule, for the setting up and rasing of it, and by its soundnesse, and firmenesse, to the matter or stuffe wherewith it is to be built.

1 Corinthians 3:12

Build,] that is to say continueth to preach the pure divine sound and precious doctrine of the Gospell, in a way conformable to the substance therof, and according to mine example?Wood. Hay,] mingling in his preaching, termes of humane art, rethoricall ornaments, philosophicall questions or reasons &c. which though peradventure they doe not falsifie the substance of the Gospell, yet they disfigure the face of it, by an unseemely variation. 1 Corinthians 1:17. 1 Peter 4:11. 2 Peter 1:16.

1 Corinthians 3:13

Worke,] though at some times for a time the Church being darkened with ignorance, or with perverse affections, doth not plainly discerne, which is the pure manner of teaching the Gospell, yet God doth at his appointed time, send againe the cleerenes of the spirit, which sheweth beleevers, the truth and vanity of things, and like fire consumes and brings to nought all what is of human invention. Nor can any thing subsist to be continually beleeved by the church unlesse it be truly divine and spirituall.

1 Corinthians 3:14

Abide,] as the good mettall in the furnace, which is not consumed like the drosse or other light stuffe.

1 Corinthians 3:15

Hee shall suffer losse] this his labour of preaching the Gospell, with that false annexion of worldly doctrines and artifices being not able to stand that triall of the Holy Ghost, shall not be accepted of, nor rewarded at Gods hands, Yet for his owne person if he have kept himselfe to the faith of Chist, he shal be saved, as by 〈◊〉,] yet he must be prified by the Holy Ghost, of that mixture, and drosse of worldlinesse, wherewith he hath defiled himselfe and his ministery. Or like unto them who save themselves naked out of the fire, without carrying away any of their goods, so his person shall be saved, but he shall not have the reward of a well qualified minister.

1 Corinthians 3:17

Defile,] breaking the union of the church or corrupting the purity of its faith, as the Corinthis did, is holy,] and therefore ought to be inviolable.

1 Corinthians 3:18

If any man,] against the affectation of worldly knowledge and the foolish presumption of being wise, wherewith the Corinthians were defiled, ee sheweth that contrariwise, to be truly wise and understanding before God, one ought for to renounce his owne understanding, and all manner of good opinion of himselfe, to give way to Gods onely wisdome, which is incompatible with worldly wisdome and with fleshly pride Matthew 16:1-28. 4. 〈…〉d 8. 3.

1 Corinthians 3:19

With God.] seeing God is n adversary to this worldly wisedome, and that it doth not bring forth any fruit of salvation to those that trust in it, wee must conclude that it is but a folly in Gods judgement.

1 Corinthians 3:20

Of the wise,] the Psalmist saith only, of men, but Saint Paul to make it the stronger doth restraine it to the wise, and understanding.

1 Corinthians 3:21

Let no man,] a generall conclusion, exhorting every one, not to acknowledge any minister, for head of a faction, nor to bragge that he is one of his followers: Seeing the Church is not made for them, but they for the Church; at the good and profit of which all things ought to ayme both i life, and in death, in the present, and in the everlasting time it not being subject to any, but to Christ, who is its head whose office is likewise to b〈…〉 Mediatour to guide and unite men to God his Father, who is the supreame head of Christ, and of his Church, Iohn 14. 28. 1 Cor. 11. 3. and 15. 〈◊〉. so farre is it from having any Ministers usurpe the dominion over consciences.