GOD’S WORD FOR YOU
1 CORINTHIANS 4:15-16
Paul just said: “I am not writing this to shame you, but to admonish you as my dear children.” Now he continues that thought with the way that he has set a fatherly example.
15 For even if you have ten thousand guides in Christ, you do not have many fathers. For in Christ Jesus, I became your father through the gospel. 16 I urge you, then, be imitators of me.
Paul says that they had many, many “guides.” Myriads of them, you could say. A “guide” was a special slave-guardian. We almost have a similar role in our culture: the paraprofessional or paraeducator (formerly a teacher’s aide). My mom and my wife were both paras. If a child has extremely special needs, a para (or a nurse) might be needed to help in the home as well as in the school, and Greek families in the middle and upper classes created a position combining a household servant with something like our concept of a para. The para or “guide” would take the boy to school and home again, listen to him recite his memorization and his other homework, and taught him good manners, good grammar, and good diction. He might also include lessons about class or social status, and take care of the child when sick. If a guide proved to be worthless at this role, he would be replaced. But there was a big difference between such a servant-para and a father.
It was and is a father’s responsibility and duty to warn his children when they are doing wrong. He does not want to shame them, but sometimes he must scold them out of love. A father who imposes too much discipline and is too cold with his children will alienate them; they will probably grow up to be very much like him, but they will not love him. A father who loves his children and leads them into life with love and correction will be beloved by them. He will have prepared them for life.
When Paul says “not many fathers,” he is exaggerating (using hyperbole). Apollos and Silas worked with Paul there (Acts 18:5), along with another, younger man, Timothy (more about him in verse 17). And in the future they would have many other pastors. But while they had many paras or guides (even as many as there are Christians in a church), they really only had one father in the faith, and he meant himself, Paul. He is the one who laid the foundation of faith in their congregation. Paul was their father “in Jesus.” Here once again we have the remarkable Greek dative case, where the word “in” (ἐν) draws a circle or sphere around a word. The “in” plunges us inside that circle, so that we know that Paul was not anyone’s father in Corinth except in the sphere of Christ. That is to say, in all things to do with Christ, with the teaching and preaching of the gospel, the offering of the forgiveness of sins, and modeling a Christian life, Paul was just like a father to the Corinthians. He did this through the gospel, which tells us that it was not done out of compulsion, as if he was required to do such a thing, but that he did it in thanks to Christ and out of love and concern for the souls of the Corinthians. The many individual churches that are there today can all in a sense look to Paul as their ancient father, whether St. Anne’s on the west side, St. Demetrius to the east, St. Solomon in the south, or the Churches of St. Paul, St. Nicholas, St. Spiridon, and the many others on the waterfront to the north.
“So,” he adds, “be imitators, mimics, of me.” He said this to many churches (Galatians 4:12; Philippians 3:17; 1 Thessalonians 1:6; 2 Thessalonians 3:7,9), and instructed younger pastors to be such examples that could be imitated. This was to show people how to behave in a Christian way “in speech, in life, in love, in faith, in purity” (1 Timothy 4:12) and “in doing what is good” (Titus 2:7). Not that our actions merit forgiveness or eternal life, but our actions display our faith and are the way God wants us to love our neighbor and live under his will.
A minister can also model the Christian life by using language that his people will understand when he explains God’s word to them. In this way, they will be able to take what he says and use it as they explain to family or friends who wonder about the faith and most especially about the resurrection. The doctrine of the Bible that almost everyone truly wonders about is surely the resurrection. Notice how much space Paul gives it in this letter! (Chapter 15, the resurrection chapter, is about three times longer than any other chapter in the letter.) So when we use language, speech, and idioms that are understood by the people around us, we can more easily share the gospel with them. A pastor can model that in his speech with them, as he preaches sermons, teaches the children, and speaks and prays with them.
Our people, young and old, are easily corrupted by wickedness, and tend to imitate sinful behavior when they see its temporary results. As one ancient believer said: “For the fascination of wickedness obscures what is good, and roving desire perverts the innocent mind.” So a minister must model right living, “for better than wickedness is childlike vitrue, for in the memory of virtue is immortality, because it is known both by God and by mortals. When it is present, people imitate it, and they long for it when it is gone.”
To imitate righteous living is only a good thing when it is done in faith; otherwise it is useless to the one who imitates, although God might possibly bring good out of it for someone else, perhaps a believing child. But for all of us who put our faith in Christ, “We want each of you to show this same diligence to the end…. We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised” (Hebrews 6:11-12). It would be best to be an imitator of Christ, but too soon we despair, being unable to live in perfection as our Lord did. But to be like Paul! Or like my own pastor, who confesses his sins with us every Sunday, who takes communion with us because he needs it, too– this is an example I can follow, through all my trials and failures, into the grave and out of it again in the resurrection into everlasting life.
In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith
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Pastor Smith serves St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, New Ulm, Minnesota
God’s Word for You – 1 Corinthians 4:15-16 Be imitators