1 Corinthians 1:18-31

Last time we looked at the greeting and the thanksgiving portions of this letter to Corinth. We found that the letter was from the apostle Paul and Sosthenes. Paul asserted the apostolic authority that was given to him by the will of God and not of his own doing. Paul thanked God for the work that he had done in the lives of those church members at Corinth. They were saints, sanctified by Christ Jesus, and had been given grace and every gift. God had withheld nothing from them including what is needed to know God. However, there is a problem. Paul had heard that there were divisions in the church. The people were not all one in mind and judgment. Certain ideas had sprung up in the church that had begun to tear the church in the middle. The word for division literally means “a tearing”. In verse 17, Paul said that he was not sent by Christ to merely baptize but to preach the gospel. His gospel preaching was not with eloquent wisdom but it rested in the power of the cross. In verse 18, we have a continuation of this stream of thought. Paul is going to explain to us the wisdom of God and those who are called by God. By doing so he will demonstrate that there is one necessary division that will always exist in the visible church, the division between those who are saved and those who are not.