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The Church has not always treated its ministers rightly. The attendants on a Christian ministry may be divided into —

1. Those who esteem the doctrine because of the teacher. Paul seems to have had those in his eye when he wrote this chapter. This is a mistake, as bad as it is prevalent.

2. Those who esteem the teacher because of his doctrines. A man who preaches to them, they feel, is estimable only as he embodies and propounds the true doctrines of the gospel. The impropriety of glorying in teachers, rather than in their doctrines, is strikingly illustrated by three things in the text.

I. THE UNIVERSE IS FOR THE CHURCH. "All things" — not some things.

1. The ministry. "Whether Paul, or Apollos." In every way it serves man — intellectually, socially, materially. Rut its grand aim is to restore the human spirit to God. Now this ministry, in all its varieties, is the property of the Church. Why, then, should it glory in any one form?

2. The world. In the sense of legal possession the world of course is not the property of Christians, nor of others. Yet in the highest sense it is the property of the Christian. He feels an intense sympathy with God who created it; he rejoices in it as the workmanship of a Father's hands, as the expression of a Father's heart, the revelation of a Father's wisdom and power. Spiritually he appropriates the world to himself, he gathers up its truths, he cherishes its impressions, he drinks in its Divine spirit.

3. Life. There are certain conditions in which men cannot be said to live. The prisoner under the sentence of death; his life belongs to the avenging justice of his country. There are others whose faculties are so paralysed they can neither speak nor move. Life is not theirs. Morally man is dead in trespasses and in sin; his life is not his. But life is the Christian's. His sentence of death is removed; his moral infirmities are healed, and he is enjoying the right of life, he is prosecuting the mission of life, he is answering the grand purpose of life.

4. Death. It delivers from all that is incompatible with our peace, safety, and advancement; and introduces us into the scenes, the services, the society of a blessed immortality. It is ours; the last step in the pilgrimage, the last storm in the voyage, the last blow in the conflict.

5. General events. "Things present," whatever their character — painful or pleasant — are ours. "Things to come." What things come to us in a day! What things, therefore, are to come in eternity!

II. THE CHURCH IS FOR THE REDEEMER. There are two very different senses in which Christian men are Christ's. They are His —

1. By His relationship to them. He is the Creator of all. "By Him were all things created, visible and invisible," &c. He is the Mediator of all. "Ye are not your own; for ye are bought with a price," &c.

2. By their pledge to Him. They have pledged themselves to Him as their moral Leader.

III. THE REDEEMER IS FOR GOD. Christ is —

1. God's Revealer. He reveals Him —

(1) In creation. God's creative plan was wrought out by the hand of Christ; He, as the builder of the universe, revealed the mind of the infinite Architect.

(2) In His personal ministry. He was the Image of the invisible God, the brightness of His Father's glory.

2. God's Servant. He came here to work out God's great plan of saving mercy. Christ is God's Revealer and Servant in a sense in which no other being in the universe is, and therefore to Him men should give their undivided attention.Conclusion: Learn —

1. The infinite worth of Christianity. It gives "all things" to its true disciples. None of the "all things" specified here are possessed by those who are not His genuine disciples.

2. The contemptibleness of religious sectarianism.

(D. Thomas, D. D.)

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KJV: Therefore let no man glory in men. For all things are yours;

WEB: Therefore let no one boast in men. For all things are yours,