1 Corinthians 3:5-11 Who Get’s the Credit?

1 Corinthians 3:5-11 (Evangelical Heritage Version)

5What then is Apollos? And what is Paul? They are ministers through whom you believed, and each served as the Lord gave him his role. 6I planted, Apollos watered, but God was causing the growth. 7So then, neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but it is God who causes the growth. 8The one who plants and the one who waters are united, and each will receive his own reward according to his own labor. 9For God is the one whom we serve as coworkers, and you are God’s field, God’s building.

10In keeping with the grace of God given to me, as a wise master builder, I laid a foundation, and someone else is building on it. But let each person be careful how he builds on it. 11In fact, no one can lay any other foundation than the one that has been laid, which is Jesus Christ.

Who Get's the Credit?

I.

Maybe you haven’t been to many of them. Every summer there are county fairs and sate fairs all across the country. Each one crowns a “Best in Show” for the best specimen of whatever category you can imagine: the biggest piece of produce, or the highest quality in taste.

You’ll find a blue ribbon next to the winner. There might even be a picture with the farmer standing next to the winning entry. Nobody pins the ribbon on the rain. No one interviews the soil. The sun that provided weeks of warmth isn’t even mentioned. The credit goes to the grower, every time—as if the seed, the rain, the sun, and everything else involved were just supporting actors in the success story.

In the verse before today’s reading, Paul says: “When one says, ‘I belong to Paul,’ and another, ‘I belong to Apollos,’ are you not being merely human?” (1 Corinthians 3:4, EHV). Paul calls it a very “human” reaction. Various believers in Corinth were picking sides. They were pinning blue ribbons on their favorite pastor. They were treating the church like a competition between celebrity leaders.

That still happens. There are celebrity pastors who start a church and grow it on their own celebrity. Many dream of developing a massive following.

It also happens outside the celebrity pastor realm. Members in mainstream denominations often assume that things could be better “...if we only had the right pastor,” or “...if we only had better programs,” or “...if we were only better at [this thing or that].” Church hopping becomes popular. Keep looking for the place that has exactly what you want on the menu boards. Perhaps then you will be happy sitting in the theater seats rather than in pews.

“I planted, Apollos watered, but God was causing the growth” (1 Corinthians 3:6, EHV). Real growth isn’t caused by celebrity, or the right programs, or anything else.

God says the same thing in the First Reading from Isaiah. He compares his Word to rain and snow, which water the earth and cause seeds to sprout and grow: “In the same way my word that goes out from my mouth will not return to me empty. Rather, it will accomplish whatever I please, and it will succeed in the purpose for which I sent it” (Isaiah 55:11, EHV).

There are certainly things we do as a congregation; there are things called workers do. Just like Paul and Apollos, some plant the seeds, some water, some might even fertilize, but the effectiveness is from God.

In today’s Gospel Jesus mentions different soils—or different hearts—and what happens when the seed falls there. Sometimes it’s like seeds falling on the path; with no understanding, no growth happens at all. Sometimes there seems to be growth, but the growth isn’t really all that healthy: “The seed that was sown on rocky ground is the person who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy, 21yet he is not deeply rooted and does not endure. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, he immediately falls away” (Matthew 13:20-21, EHV). That may describe many in the celebrity churches. Of course, the thorns and thistles of life also get in the way for many who hear God’s Word. The weeds come and choke them out.

II.

“What then is Apollos? And what is Paul? They are ministers through whom you believed, and each served as the Lord gave him his role” (1 Corinthians 3:5, EHV). Who gets the credit? The Corinthians had been trying to pin their version of the blue ribbon on their favorite preacher. Whole factions formed around a particular personality or style—as if the growth of their faith belonged to a man rather than to God.

Paul identifies himself and Apollos—and every other called worker—as “ministers.” Ministers are those who act as the agent to the Master—that’s Master with a capital M, because it refers to Jesus. Ministers are to serve under the Master, Jesus.

But it’s easy to fall into the same pattern as the Corinthians. We pick a favorite pastor, or author, or Christian podcast. One particular style of worship service or liturgy is the only one we approve of—everything else is inferior, at best. Maybe it’s even our own quiet pride about our Bible study habits, or years of prayer life that we pin the blue ribbon on to credit our growth. It’s easy to slide right in to crediting the messenger, or the style—or ourselves—the exterior things.

Who gets the credit? “I planted, Apollos watered, but God was causing the growth” (1 Corinthians 3:6, EHV). There was hard work involved. Planting is absolutely vital; so is watering. But the rain doesn’t ask permission from the soil. The sunshine doesn’t ask permission from the rain. As God said through Isaiah: “It will accomplish whatever I please, and it will succeed in the purpose for which I sent it” (Isaiah 55:11, EHV).

Remember Jesus’ parable about the sower. It was the same seed from the sower’s bag no matter where it fell. None of the results were on the sower’s technique. Some seed never had a chance because of the soil the sower never chose and couldn’t control.

Who gets the credit? If growth in the Kingdom depended on the skill or diligence of the one doing the work, Paul should have been at the top of the list. He is sometimes called the greatest missionary of all time. His letters still are the tools used to teach others about Christ.

But he said: “Neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything” (1 Corinthians 3:7, EHV). Paul didn’t deserve the blue ribbon. Neither will you; neither will I. No matter how many years you served faithfully in whatever capacity in a Christian congregation, no matter how hard you prayed for a family member or friend, the blue ribbon doesn’t belong to you.

Who gets the credit? Sometimes we judge ministry by visible results. Is the congregation growing? Is the pastor vibrant and well-spoken? Sometimes we might even judge God’s faithfulness among us by attendance charts, or by what happens with some of our family members, even when we have faithfully told them all about Jesus and what he has done. Sometimes—often—the statistics look downright depressing.

III.

“Neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but it is God who causes the growth” (1 Corinthians 3:7, EHV). The growth that actually matters isn’t the average attendance for this year compared to last year, or the Livestream views that get added to the attendance figures. Paul talked about what was important right at the beginning of today’s reading: “What then is Apollos? And what is Paul? They are ministers through whom you believed” (1 Corinthians 3:5, EHV). “Through whom you believed.” That’s the important part—a dead sinner brought back to life. No amount of clever preaching or persistent parenting can produce a sinner brought back to life. Only God can do that.

Who gets the credit?

I stood out on a bare patch of dirt next to the church building. The trees had been removed and things were being prepared to start putting in an addition. The man standing next to me had some experience building churches—he worked for Builders for Christ, going around to various Wisconsin Synod congregations to help them with their building. He took one look at the blueprints and said: “This isn’t going to work; if we don’t modify this, we’re going to have water running into the building whenever it rains or snows.”

How did he know, just from looking at a piece of paper and then looking at the ground around him? He knew. The plan was adjusted, and water was never a problem. Later, one could see that water would have come in, just as he had said.

Back in the old days, they didn’t just slap up a pole barn, put in stadium seating, and call it a “church.” There is a famous cathedral in Cologne, Germany. The architect’s name is never even mentioned. The foundation stone was laid in 1248. Many craftsman built on that foundation stone through the years. After 74 years, they put a “temporary” wall in place so worship could be held in part of the structure, but it was nowhere near finished.

More than 200 years later, in 1473, one of the towers was capped with a crane to assist in the ongoing work. The crane remained on the tower for 400 years while construction continued. The bells were put in the towers in the 1870's. One of the bells weighed 27 tons. It was said to not sound quite right, so they put in this slightly smaller bell—a mere 24 tons.

The whole cathedral was completed in 1880, 632 years after the project began. Who gets the credit? The hundreds, or even thousands, of craftsmen who worked on that structure? The architect who designed it? There is perpetually scaffolding on one part of the cathedral or another, even now. Perhaps the thousands who maintain the structure get the credit.

“In keeping with the grace of God given to me, as a wise master builder, I laid a foundation, and someone else is building on it. But let each person be careful how he builds on it. 11In fact, no one can lay any other foundation than the one that has been laid, which is Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 3:10-11, EHV).

The real foundation wasn’t even Paul’s work in Corinth, but Jesus’ work leading up to and culminating in the cross. Jesus is the Word that went out from the Father’s mouth and did not return empty, but accomplished the task the Father set for him.

The most important growth of your entire life—your faith in Jesus Christ—is not a ribbon you earned. It is a gift God planted, watered, and grew in you from nothing. It was all done at the cost of Jesus, his One and only Son.

Even your own faith isn’t your doing. Neither is whatever good you have managed to plant or water or fertilize in someone else’s life.

Who gets the credit? The blue ribbon goes to God.

IV.

But that’s not bad news. You don’t have to carry the anxiety of results anymore. Keep speaking to your friends and family about what Jesus has done for all, even when it doesn’t look like anything is happening. Your presentation of God’s Word will not return to him empty, but accomplish what he desires.

“The one who plants and the one who waters are united, and each will receive his own reward according to his own labor. 9For God is the one whom we serve as coworkers, and you are God’s field, God’s building” (1 Corinthians 3:8-9, EHV). No matter where you found yourself on the growth cycle, give thanks to God that he allowed you to be part of it.

When you see a harvest—a baptism, a confirmation, someone who had wandered away from God who returns—give glory to God, who caused the growth, rather than complimenting the messenger. God gets the credit. Every blue ribbon that ever mattered has already been pinned on him. Amen.