who shall also confirm you to [the] end, unimpeachable in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Paul ends his opening thanks by looking past everything the Corinthians were. How can he tell a church he is about to correct chapter after chapter that they will stand "guiltless" at the end?
Paul says this before a single word of rebuke. Their state did not weaken his confidence.
Verses 8 and 9 are very important. He had the hope that they were saints in a general way. Then he casts them on God's faithfulness, so that they would be blameless in the day of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is one of the plainest cases of what people commonly, though not happily, call the perseverance of the saints. At that time they were going on very badly, yet here he introduces that they would be not safe but blameless. He connects this with the faithfulness of God.
Older translations render this word "blameless" or "unimpeachable." It describes a person no one can bring a charge against.
Besides Colossians 1:22 mentioned above, it occurs only in 1 Timothy 3:10 and Titus 1:6-7, where elders and deacons should be unimpeachable. It also occurs in 1 Corinthians 1:8, where the Lord Jesus will confirm the saints unimpeachable in His own day. There will be no room for any possible accusation.
The verse gives no ground in the Corinthians themselves. Their place in that day rests elsewhere.
In that day they will stand there, not on the ground of what they have done, but on the ground of what Christ has done. Thank God we are never told to strive to get to heaven. We should never get there; but we shall be there despite the trials and difficulties, "blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ." Some say that if these things are made known, people will claim it does not matter how we live. But if we are to be there blameless on the ground of what Christ has done, we will seek to be blameless in what we are doing in this world.
The rebukes ahead do not weaken this promise. The promise does not soften the rebukes.
A soul never needs to hold fast grace more than when the unsparing, all-detecting word of God probes and searches it. So the apostle does not hesitate to say that the Lord will also confirm them to the last, unimpeachable in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. How sad, then, that a Christian should be a reproach to Christ now! … "God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ our Lord." If He has called, will He not also perform?
The verse says "the day," not "the coming." One writer ties that choice to service and responsibility.
The apostle speaks of the saints. They are responsible to use each gift in Christ's service now, and they wait for "the revelation" of our Lord Jesus Christ. He will also confirm them to the end, unimpeachable in the "day" of our Lord Jesus Christ. But here again we see how responsibility brings in the "day." Grace, in its heavenly privileges, always goes with His "coming" and "presence."
That day carries three titles, and each has its own glory.
1 Corinthians 1:8 shows us the ability of Christ. In view of His appearing in glory, He is able to confirm the saints "to the end, that you may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ." Scripture speaks of the "day of Christ" and the "day of the Lord." These point to different aspects of the same period. That period will also display the glories that belong to that Person as Lord, Jesus, Christ. God's purpose is that each one of us should be kept blameless, in moral agreement with the shining out of that glorious day.
The promise reaches wider than the individual. It touches God's whole intention for His people.
This is a very wonderful thing to lay hold of and not to forget: nothing will defeat God's purpose for the church. God has committed Himself to the blessing of His people, and He will secure it despite all the enemy's attacks and despite all our failure.
- Who — Christ confirms us; we do not confirm ourselves. The next verse gives the reason: God is faithful.
- What — not just safe, but guiltless: no room for any possible accusation.
- On what ground — believers stand in that day on the ground of what Christ has done, never on their own record.
- When — "the day," not "the coming": the day brings in responsibility, the coming brings in grace.
- So what — Paul gives this promise before a letter full of correction. Certainty at the end is the reason to hold fast grace now, and to refuse to be a reproach to Christ.
God [is] faithful, by whom ye have been called into [the] fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
God's faithfulness is the last word in Paul's opening to Corinth. He is about to correct that church, starting with its divisions. Before he names a single fault, he tells them who called them, and what He called them into.
Paul puts this at the end of his greeting, just before the corrections start. What he expects for the Corinthians rests on God's record, not theirs.
Verses 8 and 9 are very important. He hoped they were saints in a general way. Then he casts them on God's faithfulness, so that they would be blameless in the day of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is one of the plainest cases of what is commonly called the perseverance of the saints — though that is not a happy name for it. At that time they were doing very badly. Yet here he says they would be not merely safe, but blameless.
The call rests on God, so its completion does too. But a call that sure also lays a claim on the people who received it.
If He has called, will He not also carry it through? (Philippians 1:6; 1 Thessalonians 5:24.) His call into the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ our Lord is sure in His grace. It is no less serious in the claim it makes on us now: that we cast no shadow of unfaithfulness on either, staining His name, which is named on us.
Greek had two words for sharing. The word here is the closer of the two.
"Fellowship of His Son," which comes just after, means having a part together, and with Christ (koinonia), and in the blessings that are with Him. Partaking (metoke) is not communion (koinonia), and communion is the closer of the two. I partake of a thing, and to that extent I have it in common with someone else.
The exact wording matters. Paul does not write "fellowship with His Son" here. One writer separates this verse from the fellowship John's first letter describes.
Here again we find it set higher than if we limited our thoughts to "the communion of saints." It is the communion, or fellowship, of the Son of God. Notice that this passage does not say fellowship with His Son. That is the wonderful privilege of everyone who has eternal life, and we find it in 1 John 1:1-4. That fellowship with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ, is individual. It would be true of each child of God even if no one else on earth had entered into it.
How does anyone get into this fellowship? The answer separates it from every group people join by choice.
There were famous schools of philosophy when Paul wrote, and men joined them by their own choice. The assembly of God was not formed that way. Our choice did not put us there; His call did. He has truly called us into the fellowship of His Son. Since He has called us into it, we can be sure that here we find what those schools of human wisdom argued over and never reached — the knowledge of God.
Paul does not stop at "His Son." He gives four titles, and each adds something to the fellowship they name.
The full title — "His Son Jesus Christ our Lord" — carries something of the atmosphere of this fellowship. … He is supreme as God's Beloved Son, in whom God finds His delight; supreme as Jesus, the One God has highly exalted; supreme as Christ, the One in whom God will bring "all things" together under one head for His own glory; and supreme as Lord, to whom the whole universe will one day give undisputed allegiance.
Verse 9 is not a polite sign-off. What comes right after it shows why Paul set it there.
If 1 John 1:1-4 presents fellowship in its moral or spiritual power, which alone can keep it real, then 1 Corinthians 1:9 presents it from the side of our being called to it — our responsibility. So the apostle at once begins to speak of the divisions among them.
That responsibility reaches into daily conduct, since the One named is also called "our Lord."
So those who are called should value the dignity that belongs to Him as Lord. Then they will order all their ways by recognising His authority. They will avoid anything that does not fit with His lordship.
- Faithful — the verse starts with God's character, not ours. Paul writes to people who were doing very badly, and still promises them blameless, not merely safe.
- Called — you do not sign up for this fellowship. His call, not our choice, put us there.
- Fellowship — koinonia: having a part together with Christ, and in the blessings that are with Him. It is closer than merely partaking.
- Of His Son — commentators mark this off from the individual fellowship with the Father and the Son in 1 John. Here it is the fellowship that belongs to the Son of God Himself.
- Our Lord — the last title turns the privilege into a claim. What clashes with His lordship has no place here. That is why Paul turns first to their divisions.
Now I exhort you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all say the same thing, and that there be not among you divisions; but that ye be perfectly united in the same mind and in the same opinion.
Paul has just thanked God for the Corinthians and for their calling into fellowship with God's Son. Now he begs them to stop splitting apart, which raises a hard question: how far does agreement have to go?
Paul could have leaned on his own standing. Instead he appeals by a name. It holds believers together, and it searches anyone who only claims it.
He was an apostle. He had taught them about Christ, and he had brought them to birth through the gospel. Even so, he appeals to them here by that name which touches the believer most closely, and speaks most solemnly even to the person who only professes to believe. That name is the centre of unity, as the Holy Spirit is its bond. If anything could bring his appeal home to their souls, that name would. He is jealous for the honour of Him, their Lord, whom their quarrels compromised. In these rival schools with their misguided leaders, where was the witness to the fellowship of God's Son?
He starts with speech. That order matters.
First, Paul urges that they "all speak the same thing." For it is wrong speaking that is the beginning of division. If we are inclined to "speak our mind," let us remember first that "we have the mind of Christ" (1 Cor. 2:16), and be watchful that it is His mind that moves our tongues. If this is true, we shall "all speak the same thing." Our speaking will have one agreed goal, moving in the same steady direction.
Where the ESV says "united," older translations say "perfectly joined together." The same verb turns up in other places, and those places explain it.
In other passages, translators render forms of the verb "perfect" from Hebrews 13:21 as "mending" (Matt. 4:21), "restore" (Gal. 6:1), and "united" (1 Cor. 1:10). A note on the last of these explains it: every member has its own place, and together they make a whole. If broken, they are restored to one complete whole.
Paul's appeal moves in three steps, and the last step names two different things.
Would the apostle have been satisfied with the same outward confession alone? By no means. But that is where he begins, following the wisdom of the Spirit who guided him. Then he adds, "that there be no divisions among you" — their party cries were the expression of those divisions. Lastly he begs that they may be "made perfect" (see Eph. 4:12 as well as 2 Cor. 13:9), or "wholly united," in the same mind and in the same judgment. He does not mean the will by this... for nous means the mind viewed as the thinking faculty, while gnōmē is the opinion or judgment that it forms. He wanted them to have careful, intelligent thought. They were weakest where they were proud or vain, as people usually are.
Some argue that Paul condemned only the bad temper of the Corinthian parties, not the parties themselves. His own words answer that.
Nothing is more dangerous than trying to blunt the edge of Scripture so as to escape a wound to our own consciences. The apostle does not say, "I beg you all to speak different things in a friendly way." He says, "I beg you that you all speak the same thing." He does not say, "Keep your divisions friendly." He says, "Let there be no divisions among you." He does not say, "Let there be peace among people of different minds and different judgments." He says, "Be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment."
The Corinthians admired real gifts in real servants. The trouble lay deeper.
This party spirit among them had its source not in the Spirit of God, but in the flesh. It did not glorify the Lord; it exalted man. They thought more about Paul and Apollos, and about their persons and talents, than about the Lord Jesus Christ. This is how sectarianism began, as the fruit of the flesh. And the remedy for it is "seeing no man but Jesus only."
Agreement does not mean every believer sees equally far.
If all were walking in the Spirit, we should be perfectly joined together, in the same mind and in the same judgment. There would be no occasion for a divided judgment. Believers may indeed grasp divine truth in different measures. Some see further than others. But if the same Spirit controls all, all look in the same direction.
- One name. The appeal rests on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ — the centre of unity, with the Spirit as its bond.
- One speech. Wrong speaking begins division, so the cure begins at the tongue: let His mind move it.
- One repair. "United" is a mending word. Each member has its own place, and the broken thing becomes one whole.
- One direction. Different depths of understanding are not division; all led by the same Spirit face the same way.
- One remedy. Party spirit is the flesh exalting man; it dies where believers see "no man but Jesus only."