FROM CARNALITY TO SPIRITUAL MATURITY

“And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to SPIRITUAL people but as to CARNAL, as to babes in Christ” – 1 Corinthians 3:1

God nurtures and transforms His children FROM CARNALITY to SPIRITUAL MATURITY: “And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to SPIRITUAL people but as to CARNAL, as to babes in Christ” (1Cor.3:1). The Corinthian Christians, though saved, were manifesting carnality. The church was full of factions, divisions and splits. They loved the wisdom of men, and proudly displayed eloquence, erudition, and worldly knowledge, without commensurate transformation. Human wisdom often reflects various viewpoints; hence, the divisions, boastings and glorying in human leadership. Paul had plainly differentiated carnal human wisdom from spiritual maturity based on God’s hidden wisdom as revealed by the Spirit (2Cor.2: 12-16).

These represent two mutually exclusive ways of life, without a compromise between them. The natural man and worldly thinking is limited, confused and uncertain in its judgment. The spiritual man, has been given the mind of Christ, and demonstrates comprehensive, authoritative, and realistic thinking. The Corinthian Church was however still operating on natural philosophy, and had brought the thinking and practices of the world into the church. Today, people try to run the church like a religious country club – merely for the benefit of members, or as a democracy. Few give regard to the purpose of the Church as God’s instrument to reach a degraded, discouraged and defeated world.

Worldly thinking has infiltrated the thinking of the church, with many Christians thinking mainly in terms of money and numbers. People are “bribed” to come to church, just to build up the numbers. Thrice in verses 1-4, Paul portrayed the problem at Corinth with the term “carnal,” “fleshy” or “of the flesh.” He began to preach to them where they were. Even after coming to Christ, they had not advanced far beyond babyhood – the normal, natural outlook of flesh and blood. He called them “brethren” and “babes in Christ”! They were in Christ – not unregenerate, but remained babies: controlled, ruled, or dominated by the flesh – lusts and appetites of the sinful nature. They gave unrestrained expression to every base desire and impulse, like animals in the jungle!

There is nothing wrong with babies; everyone starts out that way. Babies are delightful, up to a point; but they are messy and demand a lot of care. Someone described a baby as an alimentary canal with a mouth at one end and no responsibility at the other! This is all-right when babies are little; but that condition of diapers becomes disgusting if it continues for long. Prolonged spiritual babyhood that requires milk instead of meat is undesirable. The Hebrew Christians faced similar plight of arrested development (Heb.5:11-6:8). Milk – evangelistic preaching and elementary doctrines – gets babies started in the Christian life. Meat or strong food – unfolding the full riches and magnificence of the gospel – is required to build maturity.  We are to “no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about every wind of doctrine” (Eph. 4:14).

The main marks of carnality or prolonged spiritual babyhood are: desire for abnormal diet; and sense of competition and rivalry – “envy, strife, and divisions” (vv.3-4) instead of complementing our uniqueness as “God’s fellow workers” (vv.5-10).  The carnal person is one who is still thinking like a natural man, even after being possessed by the Holy Spirit. We can choose to not “walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit” (Rom.8:1). “For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God” (Rom.8: 6-8). Choosing to walk in the Spirit

If we must grow spiritually, carnality must be dealt with like a sickness or severed like a cancer. The Believer must become more and more consistent in walking in the Spirit: “Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh” (Gal.5:16b). Whatever the extent of our growth in Christ, may the Lord perfect our transformation from Carnality to Spiritual Maturity!