1 Cor. 3:10-15 - Christian workers and the day of fire

In his discussion of purgatory, paradise and hell in Surprised by Hope Tom Wright is at pains to deny that there are any ’category distinctions between different Christians in heaven as they await the resurrection’. He considers in this connection 1 Corinthians 3:10-15 - the ’only passage in the New Testament which makes any kind of distinction at this point’ - and argues that both groups of Christian workers will arrive at the same destination; the difference is that some will ’arrive gloriously’, others ’by the skin of their teeth’ (181).

I think that this misses the practical eschatological point of the passage. I would suggest that when Paul speaks of a coming ’day’ of fire which will ’test what sort of work each one has done’, he has in mind not a final metaphysical judgment of Christian workers but a historical day of persecution in the not too distant future that will severely test the spiritual quality of the community (cf. Re: Mission, 142-143). It is not difficult to hear the note of eschatological urgency in 1 Corinthians: they wait for the ’revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ’; they are sustained by him ’to the end’ (1:7-8); a ’day of the Lord Jesus’ is approaching when God will judge ’those outside’ (5:5, 13); a time of distress is coming, the ’present form of this world is passing away’ (7:26, 31); they are warned not to put the Lord to the test because the end of the ’end of the ages’ has come upon them (10:9-11); if they abuse the Lord’s supper, they risk being condemned along with the world (11:32); speaking in tongues is a sign of coming judgment (14:21; cf. Is. 28:11-12).

The overriding task of the apostle, therefore, is to build communities that will survive this foreseen testing. They must be established on the foundation of Christ because he is the one who faced suffering and death and overcame it; and they must be built out of materials that will resist the destructive power of the fire of persecution. What Paul does in the letter as a whole is define the qualities of communal life that will meet this criterion: centred on the cross as the basis for hope of victory over persecution (chapters 1-2), intolerant of idolatry and immorality (5-6), socially prepared for a time of distress (7), supportive of the weak (8-9), united as one body in love (12-14), confident in their belief in the resurrection of the dead (15). These are the survival skills that the church will need when it passes through the fire of persecution. If the community is not burnt up, those who built it will receive a reward - Paul does not specify in what sense, but presumably it will consist of recognition on the day of Jesus’ ’coming’ (cf. Phil. 2:15-16; 1 Tim. 6:14-15; 2 Tim. 4:7-8). If the community is destroyed, the ’church workers’ will experience the consequences of that failure - perhaps in a quite realistic sense.