Are you a carnal Christian? According to 1 Corinthians 3:1-4, we find Apostle Paul rebuking the carnality of the church in Corinth. How does the Bible define carnality? A carnal Christian is one who remains a babe in Christ and is worldly in behaviour (eg: envious, striving, divisive, etc).

As born-again believers, we begin our Christian life as babes in Christ. However, we do not remain as babes. We grow and we keep growing. If we are not growing, something is wrong. That was what Apostle Paul was dealing with. The Corinthian church had stopped growing. They remained babes in Christ. This lack of spirituality is different from one having a child-like faith. A child-like faith is one who simply trusts in the Lord without any doubt. It is like a child who simply trusts his parents, having no doubt that they would feed him, clothe him and provide for him. That is child-like faith. We must continue to cultivate this child-like faith towards God. Apostle Paul was not against believers having a child-like faith. He was against those who ought to have grown in their spiritual maturity but did not. They were still babes in Christ when they should have the maturity to behave as growing Christians taking meat instead of milk. Milk refers to the basic gospel of Christ which is the foundation that every Christian must begin with in the beginning stage of their Christian life. They must know how they are saved, why they are saved and who saved them. Apostle Paul had already given them a strong foundation of the gospel. Having used the Word of God to build up their foundation for one-and-a-half years, surely their foundation was strong. What was the problem then? The problem was that they did not grow from the foundation. The problem was not with the foundation. The problem was that they had not applied the lessons into their own lives. As Christians, they ought to be living as Christians, but they did not.

They were not growing spiritually because they had done that which was displeasing to God. In 1 Corinthians 3:3-4, Apostle Paul addressed the issues they had: “For ye are yet carnal: for whereas there is among you envying, and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men? For while one saith, I am of Paul; and another, I am of Apollos; are ye not carnal?” This is a problem of not just one individual member but the whole church, including the church leaders. Apostle Paul was speaking to the leaders as well as he addressed the problems of the Corinthian church. Godly people need to be led by sound and godly leaders. If not, the people will be led astray. They will not be led to God’s pasture, with God’s protection. They will be in great danger in the world. According to Paul, the first in the list of problems due to their carnality was envying. The believers in Corinth had followed their favourite leaders and not the Lord of their leaders. They bad-mouthed one another and envied one another. Strife refers to a strong disagreement with one another that leads to quarrel, unhappiness and verbal attacks of one another. When a house is always full of quarrelling, that makes family members dread coming home everyday. The house of God in Corinth had become a place of contention. The church was not where people looked forward to going. That was a very sad state. Division was the result of their envy and strife. All these displease God. Why did they not realize it? Maybe they did, but pride stood in their way and they could not let go of it. Each group thought they were better. Where was Christian love? Surely the Corinthian church was divided with all these envy and strife.

No wonder Apostle Paul called the church “carnal.” They were still walking as men, “natural” men. Positionally, they were not natural men anymore. But practically they behaved in a manner that was no different from natural men. That was serious! Are we like that too? If so, let us repent immediately. Let not carnality be named among us. Let us yield ourselves to God's Word and His Spirit so that we may grow spiritually. May God help us. Amen.