1 Corinthians 3

1 Corinthians 3:1

Render therefore to all their dues. To all rulers. Render them whatever they have a right to claim. Tribute. Direct taxes, whether upon persons or property. Custom. A toll on goods, similar to the modern tariff. It was usually collected at the gates of cities on all goods entering. See Matthew 9:9.

1 Corinthians 3:2

Owe no man any thing, but to love one another. Not only pay all tribute due, but all that is due every man. Every obligation must be discharged. The church member, who makes debts and does not meet them, violates this command. Bengel says: ``Pay every debt; let none remain due to any man, save that immortal debt of mutual love, which, though fully paid, is still forever due.’' Hath fulfilled the law. He who loves his neighbor will not do to his neighbor any of the things forbidden by the law; will not steal, kill, commit adultery, bear false witness, covet, and hence his love fulfills the Mosaic law.

1 Corinthians 3:3

It is briefly comprehended. It is summed up in the single sentence. In this saying. See Leviticus 19:18,34. Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. The several laws that flow from love are gathered up in this saying as a fountain head. See notes on Matthew 5:43 22:39.

1 Corinthians 3:4

Love worketh no ill to his neighbour. Neither the ills forbidden in the commandments, not any other. Love [is] the fulfilling of the law. Not “the law”, but “law”. There is no article in the Greek. All divine law is fulfilled by love. God requires nothing which is not comprehended in this word.

1 Corinthians 3:5

[It is] high time to awake out of sleep. To awake from carelessness and indifference. For now [is] our salvation nearer than when we believed. Their eternal salvation. That was certainly true of them, and is true of every believer now. Some have thought that Paul referred to the speedy second coming of the Lord. He did not know the time of that event, nor did any man, but it might be that he shared the hope of the early, suffering church, that it would be speedy. See Matthew 24:36 1 Thessalonians 5:1,2 2 Thessalonians 2:1.

1 Corinthians 3:6

The night is far spent. The night is the period before the full realization of that salvation named in v. 11, whether that be when Christ comes, or when we are called to Christ. The day. That salvation. The works of darkness. Such sinful deeds as men do under the cover of darkness, and all sinful deeds. The armour of light. The armor worn in the light, and with which the Christian will be clad when “the day” comes. See Ephesians 6:11.

1 Corinthians 3:7

Let us walk honestly. Dishonesty seeks the night. The children of the day will walk honestly. This implies honest, upright, pure lives, which need no concealment. Not in rioting. Nocturnal revels. Not in chambering and wantonness. In lascivious vice. Not in strife and envying. These followed naturally upon revels and drunkenness, and shameless sensuality. This passage is referred to by the great Augustine as the cause of his conversion. It rebuked his own sins, which were the common sins of his time. (“Confessions”, 8.12).

1 Corinthians 3:8

But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ. For the way to put on Christ, see Galatians 3:27. To put on Christ is to enter into fellowship with him. He who is in fellowship with Christ cannot fulfill the lusts of the flesh. “He walks after the Spirit, and not after the flesh” (Romans 8:1).

1 Corinthians 3:10

Differences of Opinion SUMMARY OF ROMANS 14: Differences Concerning Food and Holy Days. We May Not Condemn One Another for Things Indifferent. Let Us Not Judge One Another. Let Us Be Charitable to Each Other. The Kingdom Higher Than Meats, Drinks, or Days. Do Nothing Doubtful in Your Mind. Him that is weak in the faith. Not firmly established; not “rooted and grounded in the faith” (Colossians 2:7); not fully instructed in Christian knowledge. Receive ye, etc. Take him into your fellowship, but not to discuss and pass judgments on any doubts he may entertain. Conybeare and Howson write: ``Literally, not acting so as to make distinctions about disputatious reasonings". The idea is that disputes over doubtful questions must not be in the way of Christian fellowship.''

1 Corinthians 3:11

For one believeth that he may eat all things. The apostle now names one of those differences of opinion that had made trouble. Differences had risen over food. The flesh of animals offered in idol sacrifices was offered in the markets, and one buying could not always be sure that he did not get it. Others, Jewish Christians, or of Judaizing tendencies, believed it wrong to eat any food forbidden by the law. Another . . . eateth herbs. Perhaps others believed, like the Essenes, that the regenerate man should eat only vegetables, like the primitive race in Eden. Hence, for one or all of these causes, some thought meat ought to be abstained from entirely. Disputes arose over the difference.

1 Corinthians 3:12

Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not. Look with contempt on what he considers the weakness of the other. Let not him who eateth not judge him that eateth. Condemn as guilty of sinful practices. For God hath received him. God hath taken him into his church without making conditions concerning meats. Hence, you have no right to reject him.

1 Corinthians 3:13

Who art thou that judgest another man’s servant? Since God has received him, he is God’s servant, and his accountability is not to you, but to God. God is able to make him stand. In spite of what some of you think is an error, he shall stand, for God is able to keep him. This conduct shall not cut him off from the grace of God in which we all stand.

1 Corinthians 3:14

One man esteemeth one day above another. A second difference of opinion is not cited. Some Jewish converts or Gentiles who did not understand that the old covenant was ended, believed that the Jewish Sabbaths and new moons should be kept sacred. Compare Colossians 2:16 Galatians 4:10. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. Let each act as he thinks right. If he thinks he ought to observe the days, let him do as his conscience demands. If he thinks otherwise, let him not observe them.

1 Corinthians 3:15

He that regardeth the day, regardeth [it] unto the Lord. It is regarded unto the Lord if he keeps it, because he thinks it is the Lord’s will. If another refuses to keep it, because he believes it is the Lord’s will that he should not, his non-keeping is to the Lord. He that eateth, eateth to the Lord. Meats. See Romans 14:2. He who obeys what he regards the Lord’s will in this, either eating or abstaining, does it with reference to the Lord.

1 Corinthians 3:16

For none of us liveth to himself. No Christian lives to please himself, but with the conscious aim of pleasing the Lord.

1 Corinthians 3:17

We are the Lord’s. While living, the aim must be to do the Lord’s will, and even when we die we will be fully resigned to his will. We are not at our own disposal.

1 Corinthians 3:18

For to this end Christ both died, and rose, and revived. The life of the Christian is a new life that springs out of Christ’s death; we die with him; we rise with him (Romans 6:4). That he might be Lord of the dead and living. Hence, since our life comes from him, and springs from his death and resurrection, these make him our Lord, whether we be living or dead.

1 Corinthians 3:19

Why dost thou judge thy brother? Christ, the Lord of all, is his Lord. He shall judge him and us alike. We are not the judges, “for we shall all stand before the judgment-seat of Christ”.

1 Corinthians 3:20

For it is written. In Isaiah 45:23. The passage quoted declares that the whole world will yet make humble acknowledgment of the sovereignty of Jehovah.

1 Corinthians 3:21

So then every one of us shall give account. God’s eternal sovereignty gives him the right to call every mortal to account. Hence, we should leave judgment to God.

1 Corinthians 3:22

Let us not therefore judge one another. Since God is to judge us all, brethren should not condemn each other for differences of opinion over some untaught question. But judge this rather. Rather condemn severely throwing a stumbling-block in a brother’s way. Stumblingblock. Anything which might cause a brother to fall.

1 Corinthians 3:23

I know, and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus. The conviction is that of a mind in communion with Christ, enlightened by his Spirit. That nothing. No kind of food. Is unclean of itself. Is by its own nature such that it is a sin to partake of it. The legal distinction between clean and unclean animals is abolished. But to him. If one, uninstructed, considers anything unclean, to his conscience it is so. It is wrong for him to eat it.