Jan 25, 2026 - 1 Corinthians 1:10-18 - 3rd Sunday after Epiphany

If I were to throw a random group of people in a room and then asked you to divide them any way you wanted, you could probably come up with a hundred or more ways to do it, if you had some time to think about it. You could divide them by men and women. You could divide them based on where they live or what their ethnicity is. You could divide them by hair color, eye color, or skin color. You could divide them by education level or income level. Favorite sports teams, favorite color, if I don’t give you any parameters, then you can find all kinds of ways to divide up a group.

There isn’t necessarily anything wrong with that. There may be perfectly good reasons for dividing people out. One of the duties of medical staff in emergency rooms is sorting out which patients are in the most critical condition. Some people just have a greater immediate need. Soldiers and policemen need to divide people, criminals from bystanders, combatants from non-combatants. Dividing people incorrectly here can be costly in terms of innocent lives.

One of the primary criticisms St. Paul levels against the Corinthian church is their divisions. Members of the church there are forming factions within the church. Some claim to be followers of Paul. Others think Peter is a better role model. Some choose Apollos. Others reject all of those guys and just claim to be followers of Christ directly.

Paul doesn’t really understand why anyone would do this. There are times when Paul calls on his readers to imitate him, but it is never because he thinks he is the greatest or the best at anything. Instead, he asks people to do like he does, which is to try and imitate Christ. He never points to himself, but always beyond himself. He directs people to the one who is greater than all, the one who came to save us.

Last week, he told the church that they had already received the gift of the Gospel and had everything necessary for salvation. It doesn’t much matter whether this gift came through Paul, Peter, Apollos, or directly from Christ himself. Christ’s forgiveness is for all who receive it, regardless of the path that message of grace took to get to you. Each person, each group thought they were better than the others because of who they associated themselves with. They had formed divisions and looked down on those outside of their group. We talked last week about how those kinds of comparisons aren’t helpful. The Corinthian church was missing what had brought them together to begin with and what gave them value in the eyes of God. They were putting the messenger ahead of the message. The messenger never spoke on his own authority, but on the authority of the one who sent him. The message he speaks carries the weight and authority of the sender. Even Jesus, in his role as a prophet, speaks the message given to him by his Father.

These divisions end up doing nothing more than turning people against each other, each claiming superiority. Each thinks they get more out of their association with a particular person than is actually true. It’s fair to say that this is a silly idea. The Catholic church makes a similar statement when it separates priests from the rest of the church and calls them superior because they have received something from the church no one else gets. But the issue is no different. Whether someone follows a bishop, the pope, or even Christ himself, the power is in God’s promise that Jesus died and rose again for you. It doesn’t matter who shared that good news with you. All are equally saved through the blood of Christ. All are equally seen as righteous by putting on Christ. All are equally made alive through the death and resurrection of Christ.

So why do they bother dividing themselves at all? Because we’re pretty good at dividing people up for no good reason at all. In order for us to feel superior to someone else, we have to find ways of separating them out. So we look for anything at all that might give us the excuse to look down on someone else. We create divisions about things that don’t matter, all to feed our selfish desire to be better than other people. We invent ways of putting others down just to increase our reputation and feeling of self importance. In worldly affairs or spiritual ones, we want to be better, or at least be seen as better than someone else. Climbing to the top in this way necessarily means shoving others back down.

St. Paul reminds them that this is not what brought them salvation. It is not what gives them life. These divisions are a mark of sinful pride and can only tear down the church. He calls for them to remember what brought them together, the Gospel of Christ’s death and resurrection. Christ is not divided, nor are they given differing amounts of his grace. No one else can save. No one else can bring life. They are all baptized into Christ.

The problem of divisions is one that plagues the Corinthian church and causes problems that they don’t even realize until St. Paul points them out. While our little congregation is generally free of major conflicts and, at least as long as I’ve been here, the kinds of factions that cropped up in the Corinthian church haven’t been there. But, just because they haven’t been here in recent memory doesn’t mean they can’t and won’t rear up in the future. An overly competitive nature, a desire to prove yourself as more worthy to be here, a desire for more respect, or perhaps a need to work off some guilt that still clings to you, whatever it may be, there’s always something that threatens to create divisions in the church. Perhaps you’re the one that starts them or you may just be one who supports them. However it happens, divisions are always caused by sin in one way or another.

While divisions are a problem that we often overlook, there are times when we should be paying more attention to them. As the Reformation was hurtling toward its inevitable conclusion, Luther was saddened at the prospect that his actions might end up dividing the church again. He came to the conclusion that, while division is always a bad thing, sometimes it’s the least bad thing you can do. If the only options are to either stay united and prevent any Christian from hearing that Christ truly had forgiven all their sins, or to break off and make a place where at least some would know their sins had been completely paid for, neither is a good option. But, this way some would come to know what Jesus had done for them and would be able to confidently trust in his grace, something few Catholics who take their church’s teaching seriously are able to do.

In the centuries that followed, the Christian church has further splintered into so many church bodies that they can hardly be counted. Some are still quite large, like the Southern Baptist Convention, some are only have a handful of congregations, and numerous others, especially the non-denominational churches, only represent a single congregation. While the Missouri Synod is still dedicated to finding common ground with other church bodies and working out our differences, our guiding principle is still what drove Luther all those years ago. The world needs to hear the good news that Jesus died for the sins of all people and that he freely gives his forgiveness to all who will receive it. That can’t be compromised without losing the very thing that brings you salvation.

As a pastor, I’ve seen it on numerous occasions. So many Lutherans, despite going through confirmation and even being Lutherans all their lives, have such little understanding of why we teach what we teach and why we do what we do. For many others, the teachings don’t really matter at all. For many Christians, the priority isn’t on being in a church that preaches and proclaims the good news of God’s free gift of forgiveness, it’s on being in a church that I like. The reasons I might like one church over another could be just about anything, and I’ve heard many that were quite baffling to me. Young or old, it didn’t matter. People would float between church bodies as if there was no difference between them at all and, in so doing, we say with our actions that every church is basically the same.\

The gospel matters. The law matters. Properly understanding each is the only way you’ll come to a knowledge of sin and the magnitude of Christ’s sacrificial love for you. Properly understanding God’s work throughout history is the only way you’ll understand what your purpose in this life is and where you’re going when this life is over. It’s the only way you’ll see how broken this world is and how much God is doing to begin restoring you and the world around you now.

We create divisions over things that don’t matter and we don’t care about divisions where we should. Both speak to our own selfish lack of concern over things that don’t feed our pride, our desire for comfort or self importance. Christ is not divided. If we do have divisions in this world, we must make very certain we understand why they are there. No division between people should be made frivolously, and that is especially true in the church. We are all equally saved through Christ and not through any merits or works any of us have done. We are all equally sinners and are equally condemned unless Jesus steps in to take our penalty for us. We are all equally made alive again by the actions of Jesus, who loves us in spite of who we are and what we have done, a message that is folly and foolishness to the world, but is a declaration of our salvation.

The divisions we do have, at least the ones that we have had to make for ourselves in this world, are created with the knowledge that, in Christ, all divisions will one day cease. We deal with this world’s sin as best we can and we ask for forgiveness for the divisions we are forced to make to preserve his saving message of salvation. We look forward to the day when those divisions will be wiped away, as all come to a full and complete knowledge of the truth.

We gather around God’s table, celebrating the holy meal together as a family, as the community of believers. Here at the rail there are no divisions. We all come forward only at his invitation and we are only worthy to be here because of his forgiving and cleansing grace. We gather together and see here in our little church what will one day be seen by all Christians all at once, one united church gathered around the throne of God, celebrating his victory for all eternity. We pray that God grants us forgiveness for our divisions and that he grants us the strength and wisdom to live out this unity now until we see that unity in its fullness on the last day.