1 CORINTHIANS 3:18–23
Therefore, let no one boast in men. For all things are yours …
(1 Cor. 3:21).
Because people can deceive themselves into thinking they are right when, in reality, they are dreadfully wrong, Paul exhorts the Corinthians to see through sin’s deceit, to stop boasting in men and to put their trust and confidence in Christ alone. For anyone to receive the wisdom of God, he must renounce his own ways and turn to Christ. “We must be empty in order to be filled,” Hodge wrote. “We must renounce our own righteousness, in order to be clothed in the righteousness of Christ. We must renounce our own strength, in order to be made strong. We must renounce our own wisdom, in order to be truly wise.”
The Corinthians had foolishly put their confidence and their trust in men instead of God. Paul fervently rebukes such foolishness when he says, “Therefore, let no one boast in men. For all things are yours …” To glory in anyone is to trust in him as the ground of one’s confidence or as the source of honor and blessedness. Thus men glory in the Lord or in the Cross because God, or Christ as crucified, is regarded as the ground of confidence and the source of blessing. To glory in men, therefore, brings the highest dishonor to God because it says that God is not good enough, that His ways are inadequate, that man’s righteousness is of higher value than Christ’s.
Paul tries to impress upon the Corinthians the folly of such thinking by saying “all things are yours.” What does he mean by this statement, which he repeats in the next verse? What he is trying to emphasize here is that as believers we have everything in Christ—the enjoyment of creation, the dignity of the church, the hope of eternal life, the destiny of the church to reign over all things with Christ, the confidence to face life and death, the assurances of future glory. Why, then, should we settle for the mere crumbs that fall from the world’s table? Men can offer nothing, but Christ offers everything. Too often Christians settle for a slave’s portion instead of dining at the banquet of their King, where they are to sit as coheirs in the kingdom and drink from the fountain of eternal life. When we realize the insignificance of men in light of the blessings of Christ, we see more clearly the folly of putting our confidence in talented teachers instead of God Himself.
CORAM DEO
Numbers 34–35
Mark 12:1–18
What is the ground of your confidence? Is it yourself, your own abilities? Money? Another person? Your job? Some Christian teacher at church, on television, or on the radio? A self-help group? A counselor? Worldly philosophy? Material possessions? Confess to God any way that you glory in worldly things instead of Christ.
For further study: Ps. 20 • Prov. 28:26 • Luke 18:9–14
tuesday
march