Teachers Are Only God’s Servants

3 Brothers and sisters, when I was there, I could not talk to you the way I talk to people who are led by the Spirit. I had to talk to you like ordinary people of the world. You were like babies in Christ. ² And the teaching I gave you was like milk, not solid food. I did this because you were not ready for solid food. And even now you are not ready. ³ You are still not following the Spirit. You are jealous of each other, and you are always arguing with each other. This shows that you are still following your own selfish desires. You are acting like ordinary people of the world. ⁴ One of you says, “I follow Paul,” and someone else says, “I follow Apollos.” When you say things like that, you are acting like people of the world.

⁵ Is Apollos so important? Is Paul so important? We are only servants of God who helped you believe. Each one of us did the work God gave us to do. ⁶ I planted the seed and Apollos watered it. But God is the one who made the seed grow. ⁷ So the one who plants is not important, and the one who waters is not important. Only God is important, because he is the one who makes things grow. ⁸ The one who plants and the one who waters have the same purpose. And each one will be rewarded for his own work. ⁹ We are workers together for God, and you are like a farm that belongs to God.

And you are a house that belongs to God.

¹⁹ We love because God first loved us. ²⁰ If we say we love God but hate any of our brothers or sisters in his family, we are liars. If we don’t love someone we have seen, how can we love God? We have never even seen him. ²¹ God gave us this command: If we love God, we must also love each other as brothers and sisters.