1Cor 4:3-4 - The Opinion That Truly Counts

3-4 But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by any human court. In fact, I do not even judge myself. 4 I am not aware of anything against myself, but I am not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me.

The line of thought moves towards a lesson drawn from the reality that what mere human beings think - how they weigh the relative value of their teachers - pales in importance next to what God thinks of the faithfulness of His messengers. Paul rightly sees His mandate as from God and all that he does is done in the light of the fact that he must answers to His Master. So what men think is, in this respect, unimportant.

This is why a faithful preacher will speak the truth regardless of the climate or opinions of the congregation. He is there to please God and not to please men. And God will be the judge. In fact, if he starts out trying to please men it will be a death of inches for all involved. Yet he is not to go completely over to offense for the sake of it. He is to give the Word that God lays on his heart which may be, or may include, warning, rebuke, exhortation or encouragement. He is to turn neither to the right hand nor to the left, but keep to the narrow way in order that others will stay in it, too. If he is reflecting Christ, then he will look like Christ - who was tender and stern, gentle and enraged, reflective and outspoken, pastoral and polemical, depending upon the leading of the Spirit and the providential circumstance.

Paul himself knows that God is His judge and the opinions of men, especially those of himself, regarding what he does bear no weight compared to the ineffable, wise and infallible judgement that is to come. Paul fears God and not men. He looks upward for authority and wisdom, and outward for the effects, but never to other men for approval, nor inward for credit. This is the simplicity of the Christian life - a simplicity that we tend to make complicated by our sin and especially by our sin of disbelief.