Did you know that I was personally baptized by none other than Charles Swindoll? Perhaps I should say Dr. Charles Swindoll! Yes, the same Charles Swindoll who is daily on Christian Radio and is the founder of the Insight for Living radio broadcast, who has written about 70 very popular Christian books and is probably one of the best Bible preachers of the past 50 years.
How did it happen? Well, just about 50 years ago I was part of a group of Campus Crusade students at Cal State Fullerton who attended the First Evangelical Free Church of Fullerton, which was at the time pastored by the relatively unknown Charles Swindoll. The staff director of Crusade at Cal State Fullerton suddenly realized that he hadn’t made any effort to get the students he was discipling baptized up until that time, and he arranged with “Chuck” to baptize us one Sunday night. “Chuck” even commented after baptizing me that baptizing Jim Wallace had been a unique experience. That’s because during my testimony, as I gestured a bit too and in so doing, accidentally caught some water in my hand and tossed it into the crowd.
So how about that?
How important is that! Well, who baptized me is actually not very important at all. What was important about my baptism is that I was baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And the whole reason I bring up my baptism pedigree is that it was precisely because of petty things like that which the Corinthians took pride in that there had come to be quarrels and divisions within the Church at Corinth.
And what we find this morning that is quite amazing, is that out of all the problems that plagued the First Church of Corinth, Greece, the first problem the Apostle Paul addresses was not the incest in the church that church members were proud, or the people who were getting drunk during the Lord’s Supper, or the false gospel that many were entertaining. The matter of greatest concern for the Apostle Paul, and for the Lord Jesus Christ was this whole matter of the unity, or in this case, the disunity that was infecting the church.
Now as a young believer, even as a seminary student, it never occurred to me that church unity could be such an important issue in a church’s life. The first time it was suggested to me, honestly, by my professor of pastoral ministries at Dallas Seminary, Dr. John Reed, I was somewhat surprised. But after 35 years of ministry in a local church that has unfortunately involved some disunity, believe me, I totally understand why it was such an important priority for the Apostle Paul, and why it is so important to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Why is it important? Because division and dissension commonly destroys many churches, yes even Bible-teaching churches like ours. As Jesus Himself rightly said, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” And many a church that has been divided against itself has not survived. Ours has only survived these circumstances by the grace and power of God.
Division in church, commonly known as church splits, also destroy and discourage the faith of many believers. Divisions destroy Christ-like love, and ruins relationships, which in my experience, are often never restored. They also destroy the testimony of Jesus Christ among unbelievers, who, as they watch a church fall apart because the people can’t get along, ask this question: Why would I ever want to be a part of that? They can’t even get along with each other. How could they be of any help to me?
And the final reason it’s so important is that disunity, division, and split churches is absolutely not God’s plan or will for His people. You know whose plan it is? And I thoroughly believe this: it is Satan’s plan. He is often involved with the dividing churches even as he is involved in many other nefarious and deadly activities.
So exactly what was going on in the Church at Corinth that had Paul so concerned? Well, as we have read this morning, the people in the church began to divide themselves into cliques supporting and promoting a certain teacher or leader as being better than, or themselves as being superior to others in the church. Some people followed this teacher or that teacher, and each clique began to pridefully consider itself and its leader as better than or superior to the others. It was a recipe for disaster.
What does Paul tell them: He tells them to prioritize unity and love over pride and selfish ambition in God’s family in submission to the Lord Jesus.
He tells them to stop dividing and start uniting in submission to the Lord Jesus Christ.
I Corinthians 1:10: “Now I exhort you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all agree and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be made complete in the same mind and in the same judgment.
Do you know what He’s saying here? He is saying no divisions, no cliques, and no parties are allowed in the church of Jesus Christ. And he appeals to the authority of Jesus Christ Himself in exhorting the Corinthians in this way. I exhort you brethren, in the name of Jesus Christ or in accord with the very authority of Jesus Christ Himself. He is telling the Corinthians that this directive comes from their Lord Jesus Christ Himself!
So, for a moment, perhaps we need to step back and see what Jesus’ plan for His church was.
At the most poignant moment in His relationship with his own disciples, who would found his church, the night before His crucifixion, at the Last Supper, in John 13:34-35, He made this statement after washing the feet of his disciples: “A new commandment I give you, that you love one another as I have loved you.” How did He love them? He gave his life for them. And then He said, “By this shall all men know you are my disciples, by your love for one another.”
And then a few minutes later, in his great high priestly prayer, the last prayer he would pray openly for his disciples and for us as well, He prayed this in John 17:20-22: “I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word; 21 that they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may [f]believe that You sent Me."
And so we see His design very clearly here. If His disciples would truly love one another with the same self-sacrificing servant kind of love that He had loved them with, the logical and supernatural result would be unique among human beings--they would be one with one another. They would experience a unity that would be testimony to the world that they had been invaded by the Holy Spirit of God, created as new creatures in Christ and truly had a corner on the truth about God and life and eternal life in Jesus Christ. And so God’s will, Christ’s will, Christ’s prayer for us to this day, is that we would be one even as He and the Father are one so that the world might know that Jesus came from the Father.”
So do you understand why this is such a big deal? The very testimony of Jesus Christ as the Savior of the world to the watching world depends on this becoming a reality in the church of Jesus Christ.
And this reality was being threatened in the church at Corinth. It was being threatened by the fact that quarrels and strife had erupted between the people of God in that church. Paul gives the source of the information to the Corinthians as he writes his letter, so that they know he has good reason to believe this has taken place. Verse 12: “For I have been informed concerning, you, my brethren, that there are quarrels among you.”
The people of God were fighting each other! What a tragedy! And how could this be?
Well, a church’s unity or lack of unity is a barometer of it’s spiritual health. The problem was that the people in this church were not submitted to Jesus Christ; they were not living by the power and in submission to the Holy Spirit.
Paul references this in chapter 3. Turn over to chapter three, and read verses one through three with me. “And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual men, but as to men of flesh, as to infants in Christ. I gave you milk to drink, not solid food, for you were not yet able to receive it. Indeed, even now you are not yet able, for you are still fleshly. For since there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not fleshly, are you not walking like mere men.”
Paul is telling them that they are living as “mere men”—in other words, like unbelievers, live, in accord with their fleshly lusts, the lusts of their sinful nature. He could not address them as though they were spiritual men, in tune with and submitting to the direction and power of the Holy Spirit, because they weren’t spiritual. They were fleshly, carnal, given over to the pride and selfishness of their sinful nature. This was the root cause of the conflicts and quarrels they were experiencing.
The Apostle Paul doesn’t mince words about situations like these: In James 4:1-2 we found these words: “What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Is not the source your pleasures that wage war in your members? You lust and do not have; so you commit murder. You are envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures.”
So, your problem is your sin. Repent! Follow Christ and His Word. Love as He loved. Sacrifice for one another’s welfare as He sacrificed for yours. Wash one another’s feet, and guess what, the quarrels and the strife will be washed away.
And so the unity of the church depends on our willingness to submit to Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives so that we sacrificially love one another. So the question for us if we want to experience unity, which we currently are so wonderfully experiencing, is when there’s a disagreement, is our goal to preserve unity and love or to have our way.
The big issue is, of course, is that Christ have His way in His church, and that happens when we love one another with Christ’s self-sacrificing love. When we give, rather than insist on taking.
Now the precise nature of the disunity at Corinth is described in verses 12-16. It had to do with people attaching themselves to various leaders or teachers in the church. Once they were a part of so-and-so’s clique, then they began to regard their group and their leader as superior to the other group and the other leaders.
Verse 12: “Now I mean this, that each one of you is saying, “I am of Paul, and “I of Apollos,” and “I of Cephas” (the Hebrew word for Peter) and “I of Christ.” Now we might think that this last group was right, they were the ones who were truly spiritual. But Paul lumps them altogether, it’s guilt by association, as displaying the same prideful, competitive attitude toward each other. This last group may have been the most dangerous of all—they were claiming to be the truly elite, or super-spiritual members of the church, therefore truly superior to all the others.
And so Paul asks a very relevant question at this point—verse 13: “Has Christ been divided? Paul was not crucified for you, was he? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?”
Now I can’t imagine any of them answering, “Well, as a matter of fact, Christ was divided! And that Paul was crucified for us. No, their leader, their Lord was the Lord Jesus Christ. He had become their Lord and Savior by virtue of His death, and His death alone for their sins. Therefore, if they were all truly following Jesus Christ, they would all be going the same direction; there would be absolutely no room for disagreement or dissension or division. The question and the answer that inevitably and logically followed revealed something about the people involved in these schisms or cliques. They weren’t following Jesus Christ. They were following their own prideful and self-centered desires. They had not entirely abandoned the deadly instinct of their sin natures to compare themselves with others and pridefully presume that somehow they were superior to others.
Now Paul later in the letter will reveal that He and Apollos and Peter and Christ were not the leaders whom these various cliques or groups of people were following. He had only used his own name and the name of other well-known spiritual leaders in Corinth figuratively to explain the kind of divisions that were occurring and why they were occurring. He does so in I Corinthians 4:6-7. His comments here are very helpful in understanding how to overcome selfish ambition and pride. He says there: “Now these things, brethren, I have figuratively applied to myself and Apollos for your sakes, so that in us you may learn not to exceed what is written, so that no one of you will become ]arrogant in behalf of one against the other. 7 For who regards you as superior? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?
So, Paul Himself reveals the root problem. It is pride. The Corinthians’ were taking pride in their preferred spiritual leaders or teachers on behalf of one against the other. And then he takes dead aim at human pride, their pride, in verse 7. “For who regards you as superior? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boas as if you had not received it?
First, how did they become the authority in determining who was superior, and why did their judgment then end up strangely and self-serving;y in their favor. Is there a bit a personal bias, some self-centeredness, some perversion of spirit involved here? You bet. And then what if it turned out that they were, in fact, in some way superior, that they were greatly gifted, or very intelligent? Where did those special talents and that giftedness come from? Were they responsible for it? No, those talents, those abilities and those gifts had all been exactly that—gifts from God. So why were they boasting in themselves as though they were responsible for abilities that had been given them by the grace and power and creativity of God Himself.
What absolute folly? All glory should go to God and be given to God, not men.
Paul’s point here is this: “Don’t take pride in men, but in God an the Lord Jesus Christ.”
And he goes on with respect to this matter of baptism. He has just asked the question, “Or were you baptized into the name of Paul? Obviously not! Even as I was not baptized in the name of Charles Swindoll, but Jesus Christ, who alone died for me. He’s the one who deserves the glory and who ought to be followed in love and with humble, self-sacrificing love for one another.
And then Paul tries hard to think of whom he might have baptized during his 18-month ministry in Corinth. And he says in verse 14: “I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, so that no one would say you were baptized in my name.” Now I did baptize the household of Stephanas, beyond that, I do not know whether I baptized any other."
Obviously, Paul was concerned that, given the circumstances, if he had baptized a number of Corinthians, they might have taken pride in having been baptized by the great apostle and considered themselves superior to others based on this one association with the Apostle Paul.
The antidote to pride is this: Don’t take pride in men, or God-given talents, but in Christ and Christ alone. He alone is your Creator and the provider of all you have and you are, and so there is no place for pride or self-ambition, or a competitive spirit in the Christian life, or in relationship to each other. There is only room devotion to Christ and love for Christ leaves is forself-sacrificing love for Him and for one another.
And then Paul makes one final statement: “For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not in cleverness of speech, so that the cross of Christ would not be made void."
At this point, Paul nearly overstates his case. He’s making it clear what is most important, what his real mission was. Now the fact is that Christ did commission the apostles to baptize folks as part of disciple-making in Matthew 28:18-20. However, Paul is indicating that his priority in ministry was not baptizing, but preaching the Gospel. Why, because preaching the Gospel is what gets men saved. Baptism doesn’t. Baptism simply is the outward expression of hopefully what has already happened invisibly and spiritually in a new believer's life. He has repentantly trusted in Christ’s death on the cross for salvation. The top priority and first order of business in Paul’s ministry, and truly in any minister’s ministry is the proclamation of the Gospel for salvation.
But as he brings in the matter of how he preached the Gospel, not in words of wisdom, he seems to be talking about yet another issue. And that is the priority of focusing on the cross, Christ’s work for us, rather than on human works and achievements. He seems to be saying our focus should always be on the cross, and God’s work for us, rather than taking pride in our works, rituals or accomplishments for Him.
And when we think about what the Lord of glory did for us, how He humbled himself to die for us on the cross, that should take away all our pride in our personal or spiritual accomplishments and help us to truly give credit where credit is due, or glory where glory is due—to Christ alone, rather than to humans or to ourselves as though we are responsible for anything good about ourselves.
Yes, as you’ll remember, I was baptized by none other than Charles Swindoll.
About thirty years later, when Chuck Swindoll had been lured away from the First Evangelical Free Church of Fullerton to become president of Dallas Seminary, I decidedly rather naively to give him a call and ask him a question one day.
So I called and asked for Chuck Swindoll. I found my call immediately diverted to one of his executive assistant who was obviously there for just this purpose, to divert all the calls that came from fans of Chuck Swindoll from him so he could devote himself to his work. So, after a few minutes, I asked his executive assistant if there was ever a chance that I might get to talk personally to Church Swindoll. And he told me, no, I would never be permitted to talk to my former pastor personally.
But you know what, I talk to the Lord Jesus Christ every day. He’s eager to hear from me every day, and more than that, He died on the cross for my sins. And so I agree with Paul, He deserve all the glory. And I need to prioritize practicing Christ's love and unity over taking pride in men in God’s family.
Let’s pray.
