“At thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore” (Ps. 16: 11)
The Basket Case Chronicles #36
“Now ye are full, now ye are rich, ye have reigned as kings without us: and I would to God ye did reign, that we also might reign with you” (1 Cor. 4:8).
Paul is about to explain to the Corinthians the apostolic spectacle in which he was a participant, and he sets this explanation up by telling us how rapidly the desire for respectability sets in once a church has been established for more than ten minutes. A church is planted by a visionary, by a pioneer, by an unreasonable man. It couldn’t be done, everyone said, until the unreasonable man did it. But then, after a requisite amount of time goes by, the urbane sophisticates that now populate this church become a little embarrassed of their raggedy founder.
This is the phenomenon that happened at Corinth. Now they were full. Now they were rich. Now they reigned as kings “without” the apostles. But of course, this is all going on inside their heads and only there—they are not really reigning. Paul actually wishes that they were ready for the maturity of godly rule, for if that were the case, then the apostles might be allowed to join them. But the kind of maturity that “outgrows” the zeal of the founders is actually a deformation, and not a maturation at all.