Building on Foundations

Week Five - Day 2

Today's Reading

Acts 18:18--19:22, and 1 Corinthians 1:1--3:23

We pick up Paul's travels in the Acts of the Apostles, it is the year 53 A.D. and he leaves Corinth (in present day Greece) where he had stayed for 18 months, and during which time he wrote his letters to the Thessalonians.  He sails eastward to Ephesus (in present day Turkey) along with two believers by the names of Priscilla and Aquila.  Leaving them behind in Ephesus he makes his way back to Antioch in Syria where he had first labored with Barnabas and where "the disciples were first called 'Christians'" (11:26).  After staying there a while he takes off again on what is considered his third missionary journey.

In the meantime, a man from Alexandria named Apollos arrived in Ephesus and began teaching what he knew about Jesus (Acts 18:24-26).  Apollos may have been a disciple of John the Baptist, for that is the type of baptism he was offering.  Priscilla and Aquila, who had earlier come to Ephesus with Paul, took Apollos aside and filled him in on Paul's proclamation of Jesus as the Messiah, the Christ.  Apollos then left and went to Corinth where Paul had stayed the previous year.

Paul eventually arrives back at Ephesus, possibly in the fall of 54 A.D., where he ends up staying for 3 years.  No doubt he was informed of the work that Apollos did while he was in Ephesus, and probably knew that he was now in Corinth.  If he didn't that know at first, Paul certainly became aware of Apollos' whereabouts as reports of his ministry and teaching in Corinth made their way back to Paul.  It seems the good people of Corinth are experiencing internal dissension within their community, some of it caused by members dividing their loyalties between Paul and Apollos.

So, what does Paul do?  He writes the Corinthians a letter and sends it off in the hopes of bringing peace and correction to the church.  We read the first section of this letter today, and it is an appeal for unity in Christ. "So let no one boast about human leaders.  For all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future -- all belong to you, and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God" (1Cor 3:21-23).

Makes one wonder how much the division within the Christian church of our own day has resulted from centuries of lining ourselves up behind human leaders rather than seeking to be followers of Jesus Christ?