Already ye are filled; already ye have been enriched; ye have reigned without us; and I would that ye reigned, that *we* also might reign with you.
Paul has just asked the Corinthians what they have that they did not receive. Now he draws a picture. The church acts as if the day of glory has already come, while the men who brought them the gospel still suffer.
The words are not praise. One writer hears irony in them, and points to the bad teaching behind it.
But he strikes another blow, and this one is the sharpest irony. Isaiah did the same when he exposed the folly of idol-worship. Poor, even corrupting, doctrine always lowers practice. Without noticing it, the Corinthians had given up the place of sufferers with Christ. The apostle points this out witheringly. "Already" here means before the time. When Christ reigns, we shall indeed be at ease and fully satisfied. But now is the time to deny self, to take up one's cross, and follow Him, who suffered many things, indeed all things, here below. They were deceiving themselves: the time had not yet come.
Their fullness showed itself in material things. One writer ties it to money and comfort, and to what those had done to the church.
This spirit had also led to self-satisfaction and a focus on material advantage. That focus practically made them reign as kings. They were filled up with earthly things (Corinth means "satiated"), and rich — but not in any practical spiritual sense. This display of material prosperity does not suit the character of the Church of God. His people trust a despised, rejected Lord. They wait for the time when He will be exalted and reigning.
These two small words carry the sting. The apostles were not reigning at all, and that fact sets a test for every claim of prosperity.
They were full, they were rich, they had reigned as kings, "without us," adds the apostle. It is plain that the apostles were not reigning... they were a spectacle to the world for their sufferings, and to angels as well as men. What a false test, then, of a Christian's condition is what men would call his prosperity!
A bigger absence lies behind the missing apostles. Christ Himself is not reigning yet.
The thought that the church will one day reign without Christ is very harmful, though it comes naturally to man's heart! The Corinthian saints fell into it (1 Cor. 4:8) and were rebuked for its unspiritual, worldly character. What could be more opposed to the portion of the apostles, and of Christ? We are called to suffer now, not to reign... A loyal Christian heart could not enjoy, or even accept, a reign of saints without Christ, the Firstborn among many brothers.
This was more than a mood. What they believed had changed what they wanted.
No doubt it was with much anguish of heart that Paul wrote these words. Bad doctrine, as it always does, had produced bad practice. They had forgotten that the Lord's pathway through this world was one of suffering, shame and loss, and that theirs should be the same. Instead of suffering they preferred indulgence. Instead of trouble they preferred triumph. Instead of the world's curse they preferred its crown... Paul waited patiently for the time of reigning, so he could share it with his beloved children. But they preferred to reign without him.
The Corinthian mistake is still alive. One writer pictures it at a coronation.
At the crowning of a British king or queen, the lords and ladies who may attend Westminster Abbey bring their coronets with them. But they do not put them on until the crown goes on the sovereign's head. Today many Christians seem eager to put on their coronets before the Saviour appears, crowned with His many crowns.
- Already — The key word is timing. They claimed the fullness, riches and royalty of the coming kingdom now, while their Lord is still rejected.
- Without us — Look at the company they had left behind: the apostles, who suffered and became a spectacle to the world. Prosperity that leaves such servants behind proves nothing about spiritual health.
- Without Him — Deeper still, a reign begun now is a reign without Christ, who is not yet on His own throne. No loyal heart could want a crown He is not wearing.
- Doctrine into practice — Bad teaching produced bad living. They chose indulgence over suffering, triumph over trouble, and the world's crown over its curse.
- Would that you did reign — Paul truly wanted that day, shared with them and with Christ. Until it comes, the coronets stay off.
For I think that God has set us the apostles for the last, as appointed to death. For we have become a spectacle to the world, both to angels and men.
The Corinthians were living as if the day of glory had already come. Paul sets his own life beside theirs and turns their picture of success upside down. God places His apostles at the end of the parade, marked out for death, with the whole universe watching.
The Corinthians had taken the honour and comfort of the world while their Lord was still refused by it. Paul's wish that they really were reigning carries an edge:
They were full and rich, and reigning like kings, having a real "good time." Meanwhile their Lord was still rejected, and His apostles were sharing His rejection. There is a touch of holy sarcasm in Paul's words: "I wish you really were reigning, so that we might reign with you too." The saints will reign when Christ reigns, and the apostles will not be missing from their thrones.
Paul's picture comes from the public games. The order of events there explains the force of "last":
First came the smaller fights, with men and beasts. The great spectacle was kept for the end. Perhaps it was some famous prisoner of war, some notorious criminal, or some fighter who would draw the eager eyes of the blood-crazed crowd. They would shout for his death till they could shout no more. "I think," said Paul, as it were, "that it is like that."
The Corinthians wanted honour now. God's own ranking runs the other way:
How movingly the apostle corrects their worldly-minded desire. Those whom He put first in the church He displayed last, as patterns of outward suffering. What could be plainer than the place God shows the Christian here below — a place of affliction, apart from the world?
Being placed last is not a demotion. It is the closest a servant can stand to his Master:
This was the ambition of the apostles — if ambition can ever be holy. God gave it to them when He appointed them last. That place put them nearest to Christ, who went down into depths of suffering where no one could follow Him. But there are sufferings of Christ which grace does share with the Christian, and the apostles knew these best.
The onlookers are not a holiday crowd only. Angels are watching, and what they are watching is instruction, not entertainment:
As far as this world is concerned, the apostles had much the same lot as the poor people condemned to death. The Romans kept them back for the last scene in their great public shows. The onlookers are not just a holiday crowd at an arena. They are the world, the angels and men. We do well to remember that the church is the lesson-book of the rulers and powers in heavenly places (Ephesians 3:10).
Why must angels watch and learn? Some things about God show only in redeemed people:
Man is not like the angels — glorious creatures, but kept unfallen by the power of God... In a certain way angels do need mercy, for no creature can even stand unless God upholds it. But they do not need redemption. Grace, mercy and love all come out in man. As Paul says, "we have become a spectacle to the world, to angels, and to men."
This verse shows the present scene, not the last one. Glory is coming, and with it a reversal:
They gave themselves to Him, and so became a spectacle to the world, to angels and men. How right it will be that they are lifted up with Christ in the coming day of glory!
- Last — God put the apostles at the end of the parade, like the condemned kept back for the closing act of the games. "Last" describes their public standing, not their worth.
- First — God set the same men first in the church. The lowest place in the world and the highest place in the church belong together.
- Nearest — that last place brought them closest to Christ. They shared the sufferings He lets His people share.
- Watched — the arena has a wider audience than the crowd. Angels learn from the church what only redeemed people can show.
- Then — the Corinthians tried to reign too early and without the apostles. The reign comes when Christ reigns. Then those who were the spectacle will be lifted up with Him.
*We* [are] fools for Christ's sake, but *ye* prudent in Christ *we* weak, but *ye* strong *ye* glorious, but *we* in dishonour.
Paul sets himself beside the Corinthians in three short contrasts: fool against wise, weak against strong, honoured against despised. Every comparison makes him the loser. The sting is that he means it as a rebuke to them, not a complaint about himself.
Is Paul serious here, or ironic? One writer weighs how much human praise counts now:
When God makes the counsels of the heart plain, people will get praise that is worth something, but now it is all a mere nothing.
The sharpness is not bitterness. It comes with real love:
The apostle writes with the finest feeling. There is sarcasm, but also real love that could use it for good. He sets out the true path of Christ: a path of suffering, but of victory over the world. Faith working by love can alone secure such victory.
The word "fools" is not Paul's own verdict on himself. It is the world's label, and he accepted it:
The world viewed them as "fools" and "weak", and so "despised" them. But they were content to be thought fools "for Christ's sake". Sadly, like the believers at Corinth, we may often be tempted to use our knowledge of Christ to appear wise in the eyes of the world. We may use it to gain power and honour there.
Paul does not say the Corinthians were wise for Christ. One writer draws out the double meaning in the phrase:
The saints at Corinth were wise (not for Christ, but) in Christ; they were strong and they were honourable. There is a double meaning in this description. For them, as for their teacher, there is wisdom, strength, and honour in their Head. But the apostle truly grasped his own standing as a man in Christ, and this led him to live and work for Christ.
The Corinthians held real truth. What they refused was the cost that comes attached to it:
The world held them up to contempt and ridicule. They were a strange sight to angels and to men, willing to be fools in the world's eyes for Christ's sake. This was practical experience. The Corinthians would stop short at the position that was theirs as "wise in Christ." They did not choose to accept the experience of suffering with Christ that goes with it. In this real Christian experience the apostles were "weak" and "despised." The Corinthians wanted only the attractive side of the truth, with its strength and honour.
Behind this lay a bigger mistake: they treated the present hour as their time to reign. God arranged things otherwise for His servants:
They were taking their ease, reigning as kings without us, he said. "And would that you did reign, so that we might share the rule with you," that is, at Christ's appearing. Instead of that, God set the apostles last of all. He did not display them in fine clothes, feasting in luxury every day, though they were first in spiritual power and authority. He set them out as men doomed to death, a spectacle to the world, both to angels and to men.
At first glance the Corinthians look like the fortunate ones. One writer sets Paul beside Obadiah, a man who took ease and honour among the ungodly, and reaches the opposite verdict:
How much Obadiah missed by pandering to the world, accepting ease and honour among the ungodly! … "You are held in honor," wrote the Apostle to the ease-loving Corinthians, "but we in disrepute." But Paul was happier than they. Yes, standing apart from the world system is loss, as men judge. But the spiritual gain in fellowship with God is immense.
The question does not stop with Corinth:
From a worldly standpoint how foolish of Moses to leave the splendid place he had in Pharaoh's court! And so we might go on until we come to Paul and his companions, who were "fools for Christ's sake." What are we who profess the name of Christ? Have we fitted ourselves to the spirit of the age so well that we hardly know what reproach for Christ is?
- Irony — Paul writes the three contrasts with a sting, but not with spite. No present verdict on who is wise counts for anything. That waits until God makes the heart's counsels plain.
- Fools — "Fools" and "weak" are the world's labels. Paul took them gladly, because they came "for Christ's sake." Our temptation is to use our knowledge of Christ to look wise to the world instead.
- In Christ — The Corinthians were wise in Christ but not for Christ. The wisdom is real, because it is theirs in their Head. But it never shaped how they lived.
- Position — They kept the attractive half of the truth, strength and honour, and refused the half that costs. So they reigned as kings, while God set His servants last, a spectacle to the world.
- Reversal — Disrepute looks like the losing side. Yet the writers call Paul the happier man: loss as men judge it, immense gain in fellowship with God, and reigning with Christ when He appears.
To the present hour we both hunger and thirst, and are in nakedness, and buffeted, and wander without a home,
The Corinthians felt full, rich and already reigning. Paul sets his own daily life beside theirs. The list is not a complaint but a measuring rod. If hunger, exposure, blows and homelessness marked the apostles, what does comfort prove about us?
The opening words matter. Paul is not recalling a hard season that had ended. He was living it as he wrote, while the Corinthians sat at ease.
They had despised the apostle. Yes, he says, we have been put to shame, despised, persecuted, in distress; you have been at ease, like kings. That reproach matched their own pretensions and their own reproaches. It cut them to the quick, if they had any feeling left. Paul and his companions had been like the rubbish swept off the earth for Christ's sake. Meanwhile the Corinthians were resting in comfort and ease. Even while writing to them, this was still his position.
Each word names a plain, physical hardship: no food, no drink, poor clothing, blows to the body, no home. Older translations render the third word "naked", where the ESV has "poorly dressed".
As to circumstances, the Corinthians were "full" and "rich" (verse 8), but these devoted apostles had to face "hunger and thirst". At times they were naked and buffeted by the storms of life. They had to "wander without a home", and labour, working with their own hands to meet their needs.
Another writer reads the list as a choice, not just a fate.
To make the precious truth of God known, the apostles were willing to sacrifice every earthly advantage. They went as far as hunger and thirst, lack of clothing, hard knocks, and having no settled place to live.
Paul did not go looking for suffering. It found him on the path of his service, and it made him resemble the One he served.
Hardship and mistreatment came upon him; not because he sought them, but because they met him in the path of his devoted service. The world which had persecuted the Master did not spare His zealous follower. In doing His Father's will, the Son of God knew both thirst and hunger. Poverty was His usual condition in the world which He had made. And Paul resembled Jesus, in the way a vessel of divine grace can copy the Fountain which has filled it.
God's own apostles lived like this. So comfort and wealth prove nothing about anyone's spiritual health, then or now.
They were a spectacle to the world for their sufferings, and to angels as well as men. How false a test, then, of a Christian's condition, is what men would call his prosperity! As to the Church in general also, how false a test this would be! The Church at large has, as we know, followed the Corinthians in this way. It is reigning far more than suffering… Are we in communion with the apostles or not? They remained, as we know, until their end in martyr deaths, for the most part, in exactly the condition the apostle describes here.
Another writer applies it to every generation since.
What a crushing contrast — not for the Corinthians of that day only, but for the still more selfish and empty state of our own time, and in fact ever since!
Reigning is real, but it belongs to a set day. The apostles' own lives show that day had not yet come.
No thrones for the apostles until the day of Christ. In this world they hungered and thirsted. They were naked and buffeted, reviled, persecuted and defamed. They were treated as the scum of the world, the refuse of all things (1 Cor. 4:11-13). So where do the thrones come from that the boasted "successors" of the apostles now sit on?
- Now — "to the present hour" means Paul was hungry, exposed and homeless as he wrote. This was his settled position, not an old story.
- Ordinary — no food, no drink, poor clothing, blows, no home: real losses the apostles accepted to make God's truth known.
- Unsought — Paul never chose these hardships. They met him on the path of service, and they made him like a Master who Himself knew hunger and poverty.
- Test — God's own servants lived this way, so prosperity is a false measure of a Christian's state. The real question is whether we share the apostles' path.
- Later — thrones belong to the day of Christ. Corinth reigned too early, and the church at large has followed them ever since.
and labour, working with our own hands. Railed at, we bless; persecuted, we suffer [it];
Paul has just put himself and the other apostles last of all, on public display as sufferers, while the Corinthians sat in comfort. Verse 12 shows what that low place looked like day by day: hands busy at a trade, and a mouth that answers abuse with blessing.
The words "working with our own hands" point to a trade. Paul earned his own living while he was in Corinth, and one writer sees God's own hand in that.
It pleased God to arrange things so that the great apostle worked at an honest trade to meet his needs, and did so in the wealthiest and most luxurious city of Greece. What a death-blow that is to clericalism on one side and to worldliness on the other! Yet, given the circumstances of both Paul himself and Corinth, this was exactly the course that was worthy of the gospel of the grace that sent it out.
The Corinthians were not impressed. One writer reads their unspoken complaint like this.
They thought it far beneath a Christian minister to work with his hands from time to time — often poor, sometimes in prison, knocked about by crowds, and so on. They put it all down to bad judgment, and thought he could have avoided it. They wanted a servant of Christ to be respectable, in public and in private.
The verse pairs each injury with an answer that reverses it.
As to the treatment they received from the world, they were "reviled", "persecuted" and "insulted". Yet this treatment only drew out of them a witness to Christ. When reviled, they blessed. When persecuted, they submitted patiently. When insulted, they entreated.
One writer sets that answer beside the comfort the Corinthians were enjoying.
Paul and his companions had been treated as the scum of the earth for Christ's sake, while the Corinthians were resting in luxury and ease… Patience and meekness were their only weapons.
"When reviled, we bless" is not about having a mild character. It is a choice made against a strong instinct. The first step is to stop handling your own case.
But if we are to gain the blessing in a time of suffering, we must first give up all thought of taking our case into our own hands and getting revenge on those who wrongly oppose and abuse us. Whatever the suffering, the believer is to hold back from taking vengeance. When reviled, the flesh is always ready to revile back. When it suffers wrongly, it is ready to threaten, and it would love to take vengeance on everyone who opposes and insults us with hard words.
Silence under insult does not mean the Christian has nothing to say.
Other Scriptures make it clear that the Christian may "entreat," "exhort," and even "rebuke," but he is never to revile or threaten.
One writer told believers under attack what to do with the names they were called.
If people call you Beelzebub, you know very well why you should bear it, giving back blessing for cursing. To be like our Master is a privilege we have little of.
The Corinthians wanted the honours now. One writer points to the place God has actually given His people for the present.
Those He put first in the church (1 Cor. 12:28) He put on show last, like the prophets before them, as examples of open suffering. What could be plainer than the place of affliction, apart from the world, that God marks out for the Christian here on earth? On no point is Christendom more at odds with Christ and His word to us.
- Hands — Paul earned his own living in the richest city of Greece. God arranged it, and it strikes a death-blow at both clericalism and worldliness.
- Snobbery — The Corinthians thought work, poverty and prison were beneath a minister. They wanted a respectable servant of Christ.
- Tongue — Insults and persecution did not silence the apostles. They answered with blessing, patience and entreaty.
- Vengeance — Blessing begins where self-defence ends. The flesh wants to revile back; the believer hands the case over instead. He may entreat, exhort and even rebuke, but never revile or threaten.
- Likeness — To be treated as the world's refuse is not bad luck. It is the privilege of being like our Master, in the place of affliction God marks out for us now.
insulted, we entreat we are become as [the] offscouring of the world, [the] refuse of all, until now.
Paul ends his list of hardships with the world's verdict on him and his fellow workers: they were the sweepings, the waste that gets thrown out. He writes to a church that was comfortable, admired, and sure its glory had already begun.
The Corinthians had built a religious world of their own, with its own schools and shows. Paul answers by describing the real road that Christ's servants walk.
Clearly those who misled the Corinthians, and the saints they misled, had made the church their world. Principles of the flesh had replaced the grace of Christ for their souls. They had their own schools and spectacles, just as the Greeks outside had. The apostle writes in a burst of the finest feeling. There is sarcasm in it, but also real love that could use sarcasm for good. He sets out the true path of Christ: suffering, but victory over the world.
Paul's two words come from the rubbish heap and the scouring pot. Older translations call them "the filth of the world" and "the offscouring of all things." They also end the verse "unto this day," where the ESV has "and are still."
When people reviled them, they answered with blessing. When persecuted, they endured it quietly. When misrepresented, they pleaded rather than defending themselves in anger. The world treated them as garbage to throw out, or unwanted residue to scrape off a pot. It is worth noticing the phrase "unto this day." This treatment lasts only through the present day of grace. What a change indeed when "the day of the Lord" comes!
Slander invites a fight. Paul's answer is to plead. One writer draws a line between pleading with people and clearing your own name.
This is what the church is called on to do among enemies it cannot set aside. If we are seeking God's glory, we will not want to justify ourselves. There may be pleading — "when slandered, we entreat" — but never proud self-vindication.
The judgment ran both ways. Paul had already called the world's glories filth, the same word the world used about him. And Christ's verdict is still to come.
As far as this world is concerned, the apostle treated all its glories as loss and filth (Philippians 3:8), while the world, on its side, treated the apostles as filth and the off-scouring of all things. How blessed it is that these servants followed in the steps of their Master. In their own measure they shared in His sufferings at the hands of men. Christ weighs their faithfulness perfectly. In the day to come they will have His praise and share His glories.
The apostles were not unlucky. Their place followed the place of the One they belonged to. That is what the Corinthians forgot while claiming Him.
They were reigning as kings, these people who could boast that Christ was theirs. Meanwhile Paul and his fellow apostles, men who fully owned that they were Christ's, were the refuse of all things. That is what we learn from chapter 4 of this letter. Paul could not reign where Christ was crucified; he had to be as his Lord.
This treatment did not end with the apostles. One writer ties it to how much of the message a preacher is willing to say out loud.
Hold part of it back, make something of man, and you may be a popular preacher even in Christendom. Declare it fully — the truth of Christ's rejection, and of His glory at the right hand of God; the resulting end of man, and the judgment of the world in the cross… and you must still be counted "as the filth of the world, and the offscouring of all things."
No one can copy this life detail by detail. One writer names what alone produces it, and the comfort that keeps such people going.
As a whole this is impossible — not in this or that detail, which superstition can easily imitate, but as a whole — except through the constraining love of Christ, which makes those who follow Him like Himself. He cheers those who set out and go on in such a path with the bright comfort of reigning together with Him.
- The cause. Paul could not be honoured in a world that had crucified his Lord. The servant's place follows the Master's.
- The words. Scum and refuse picture garbage thrown out and residue scraped off a pot. That was the world's estimate of the men who brought it the gospel.
- The answer. They met reviling with blessing and persecution with endurance. To slander they replied by pleading, never by proud self-defence.
- The estimate. Paul had already called the world's glories filth; the world returned the compliment. The verdict that decides everything is Christ's, given in the day to come.
- The clock. "And are still" sets a limit. This treatment belongs to the present day of grace. The Corinthians started reigning too early; the reign comes with Christ, in the day of the Lord.