In this message we shall consider some verses from chapter three of 1 Corinthians.
Verse 6 says, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God made to grow.” Planted, watered, and made to grow are all related to the matter of life. This indicates that the believers are God’s farm to grow Christ. The ministers of Christ can only plant and water. God is the only One who can make to grow. The Corinthian believers overestimated the planter and waterer, but neglected the One who makes to grow. Hence, they did not grow in Christ as their life.
The Corinthians were neglecting God as the source of growth. The source of their growth was neither Paul nor Apollos. Yet the Corinthians were paying more attention to them than they were to God Himself who is the source of their growth in life.
The Corinthian believers, under the prevailing influence of Greek philosophical wisdom, paid too much attention to knowledge, but they neglected life. In this chapter Paul’s intention is to turn their attention from knowledge to life and to point out that to them he is a feeder and a planter, Apollos is a waterer, and God is the Giver of growth. In 4:15 he even tells them that he is their spiritual father, the one who begot them in Christ through the gospel. From the view of life, the divine view, they are God’s farm to grow Christ. This is totally a matter of life, a matter that is utterly missed by believers who are dominated by their soulish, natural life under the influence of their natural wisdom.
In 3:7 Paul continues, “So that neither is the one who plants anything nor the one who waters, but the One who makes to grow, God.” As far as the growth in life is concerned, all the ministers of Christ, whether planters or waterers, are nothing, but God is everything. We must turn our eyes from them to God alone. This delivers us from the divisiveness which results from appreciating one minister of Christ above another.
In chapter three of 1 Corinthians, Paul was trying to turn the philosophical Greek believers from mental knowledge to life in the spirit. First he pointed out that he gave them milk to drink (3:2); hence, he was a feeder. Then he goes on to indicate that he was one who planted and Apollos was one who watered. Furthermore, Paul says that, with respect to the growth in life, neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything. God, the One who gives the growth, is everything. However, Christians often appreciate a certain speaker and elevate him above others. Therefore, we need to realize that no minister of Christ can ever be the source of our growth in life. This source is God Himself.
In verse 8 Paul says, “Now he who plants and he who waters are one, and each one shall receive his own reward according to his own labor.” This reward is an incentive to the ministers of Christ who labor by planting or watering on God’s farm.
In verse 9a Paul testifies, “For we are God’s fellow-workers.” This indicates that God also is a worker. While the ministers of Christ, His fellow-workers, are working on His farm, He is also working. What a privilege and a glory that men can be God’s fellow-workers, working together with God on His farm to grow Christ!
Verse 9b says, “You are God’s farm, God’s building.” Literally, the Greek word rendered “farm” means cultivated land. The believers who have been regenerated in Christ with God’s life are God’s cultivated land, a farm in God’s new creation to grow Christ so that precious materials may be produced for God’s building. Hence, we are not only God’s farm but also God’s building. Corporately, we as the church of God have Christ planted in us. Christ must also grow in us and out of us to produce, in the sense of this chapter, not the fruit, but the precious materials of gold, silver, and precious stones for the building of God’s habitation on earth. Thus, the building of God, the house of God, the church, is the increase of Christ, the enlargement of Christ in His unlimitedness.
According to these verses, the growth in the divine life produces precious materials—gold, silver, and precious stones—for the building up of God’s habitation. This habitation, the church, is the increase, the enlargement, of the unlimited Christ. The growth in life is altogether a matter of the continual dispensing of the divine life into our being.
It is important for us to realize what the practical life of a local church is. The practical church life is actually the continual increase of Christ in our growth in life through the divine dispensing of the divine life into our being. A few years ago a particular church may have had a small measure of the divine life. But now, through the dispensing of the divine life into the saints, the measure of Christ in that church has increased. This is the increase of Christ through the growth in life by the divine dispensing of the divine life.
In 3:10 Paul goes on to say, “According to the grace of God given to me, as a wise master builder I have laid a foundation, but another builds upon it. But let each one take heed how he builds upon it.” In Matthew 16:18 the Lord says that He will build His church; yet here Paul says that he is a builder, even a wise master builder. This indicates that the Lord builds the church not directly, but through His ministers, even through every member of His Body, as revealed in Ephesians 4:16. Although in 1 Corinthians 3:6 and 7 the apostle admits that he is nothing, he frankly and faithfully makes it clear in verse 10 that by the grace of God he is a wise master builder who has laid the unique foundation, Christ, for others to build upon.