When church discipline needs to be carried out, the leaders must be careful that they do not go too far. Not long after realizing the value there is to proper church disciple, a situation like this can develop. The church leaders see somebody doing something that they do not think should be happening. In response, they ask the person to meet with them and they say, “We don’t think what you’re doing is right. You ought not to be doing that.” The person listens to them and then replies, “Well, as I search the Scriptures I don’t see where that’s true.” The leaders answer, “Well, we’re not saying that the Bible says it. We just don’t think you should be doing that.” And because there is no biblical support for their rebuke, the person says, “It is not contrary to Scripture and I’m not going to stop.” The last action on the part of the church leaders is to inform the person that he is going to be disciplined for failing to listen to the leaders.
Now that might sound funny, but it happens. It is certainly true that discipline needs to be done, but we must not exercise discipline beyond where the Bible speaks. I might have an idea that I think is right for you, but I have no right to impose it unless the Bible says so clearly. Where the moral law of God is involved, by all means we must uphold that standard. But where there are doubtful areas or where it is a question of the will of God for your life and the Bible is not specific, we need to recognize that we are all servants of God at that point. It is before Him, and not before one another, that we stand or fall.
In the second portion of this chapter, beginning in verse 8, he makes an ironic contrast because the reason he is talking about what the ministry is, and should be, is to show that the Corinthians, in their own self-conceit, have quite a different and, therefore, unbiblical idea of what it really means to succeed spiritually. On the one hand, there are the Corinthians, whom Paul says are satisfied with themselves. They have all they want. They are rich. They are reigning. They believe themselves to be in need of nothing.
By contrast, on the other side are the apostles. How does Paul describe them? He says we have been made a “spectacle” (v. 9). What does he mean by this? It refers to the captives who came behind the conquering army as they returned home from battle. The army had gone out and captured some place, and they brought back all those who had been defeated. The vanquished came at the end of the triumphant procession, looking as a bedraggled, dreadful, discouraged, and fearful people. What was going to happen to them? Some of them were going to be sold as slaves. Perhaps some would be sent to the amphitheater, where they would be a form of entertainment for the multitudes as they were killed by the gladiators or wild animals. Paul says that is what we have become. We have been made a spectacle—and not only in the eyes of a victorious nation, but to the whole universe, including angels. People look at us and think that we are pitiful wretches.
In verse 10 he describes himself and the other apostles as “fools for Christ’s sake.” We know how Paul is using that word because of what he has said in chapters 1 and 2. Paul regards the world as looking at the apostles and remarking, “Did you ever see such stupid people as those apostles? Oh, of course we know they’re not all uneducated men. But look at these people! Apollos is a great orator. Why, just think what he could become if he would really get in with the right people. And look at Paul. He is obviously a very intelligent man. But what are they doing? They go around from village to village, and tell people this stupid nonsense about a rabbi from Judea, of all places, who was crucified out there as a political offender and about whom they actually claim, believe it or not, that He was raised from the dead. And they’re not very well received, except by others on the lower social scales. Those men are fools.” And in response to these insults, Paul says, “Yes, that’s what we are.”
But Paul also goes on to say that we are dishonored, we go hungry and thirsty, we are dressed in rags, and are brutally treated. We are homeless, we work hard with our own hands, we are cursed, persecuted, and slandered. We have become the scum of the earth, the refuse of the world (vv. 10-13). Do you think Paul was exaggerating? I do not think Paul was exaggerating at all. In 2 Corinthians 4 and 6, he spells out in greater detail all he went through for the sake of the Gospel. When you look at these words that Paul is using and you compare them with the book of Acts, you can find stories to go with every one of those sufferings and persecutions.
What a contrast that is! On the one hand, you have the church in Corinth which we would say is a nice church filled with nice people who had nice homes and came nicely dressed. They look at themselves and say, “We have everything. Isn’t God wonderful? He provides all our needs.” And then you have these apostles who are hungry, and sick, and get dysentery, and do not have enough to eat, and are beaten, and slandered, and hounded from place to place, Paul himself nearly left for dead on one occasion.
