1Cor 4:14, Col 1:28 | Barnes | STEP | Verse 14. To shame you . It is not my design to put you to shame by showing you how little you suffer in comparison with us. This is not our design, though it may have this effect. I have no wish to make you ashamed, to appear to triumph over you, or merely to taunt you. My design is higher and nobler than this. But as my beloved sons . As my dear children. I speak as a father to his children, and I say these things for your good. No father would desire to make his children ashamed. In his counsels, entreaties, and admonitions, he would have a higher object than that. I warn you . I do not say these things in a harsh manner, with a severe spirit of rebuke; but in order to admonish you , to suggest counsel, to instil wisdom into the mind. I say these things not to make you blush, but with the hope that they may be the means of your reformation, and of a more holy life. No man, no minister, ought to reprove another merely to overwhelm him with shame, but the object should always be to make a brother better; and the admonition should be so administered as to have this end, not sourly or morosely, but in a kind, tender, and affectionate manner. (|) "sons" "children" (e) "I warn you"

1 Corinthians 4:14

Verse 14. To shame you. It is not my design to put you to shame by showing you how little you suffer in comparison with us. This is not our design, though it may have this effect. I have no wish to make you ashamed, to appear to triumph over you, or merely to taunt you. My design is higher and nobler than this.

But as my beloved sons. As my dear children. I speak as a father to his children, and I say these things for your good. No father would desire to make his children ashamed. In his counsels, entreaties, and admonitions, he would have a higher object than that.

I warn you. I do not say these things in a harsh manner, with a severe spirit of rebuke; but in order to admonish you, to suggest counsel, to instil wisdom into the mind. I say these things not to make you blush, but with the hope that they may be the means of your reformation, and of a more holy life. No man, no minister, ought to reprove another merely to overwhelm him with shame, but the object should always be to make a brother better; and the admonition should be so administered as to have this end, not sourly or morosely, but in a kind, tender, and affectionate manner.

(|) "sons" "children" (e) "I warn you" 1Thes 2:11

Colossians 1:28

Verse 28. Whom we preach, warning every man. This does not mean warning of danger, but "admonishing all of the claims of the gospel to attention." Our word warn is commonly used in the sense of cautioning against danger. The Greek word here means to put in mind; to admonish; to exhort. The idea of the apostle is, that he made it his great business to bring the offers of the gospel fairly before the mind of every man. As it had the same claims on all, as it might be freely offered to all, and as it furnished the only hope of glory, he made it the object of his life to apprize every man of it, as far as he could.

And teaching every man. Paul made it his business to instruct men, as well as to exhort them. Exhortation and warning are of little use where there is not sound instruction and a careful inculcation of the truth. It is one of the duties of the ministry to instruct men in those truths of which they were before ignorant. See Mt 28:19, 2Ti 2:25.

In all wisdom. Mt 10:16 Col 1:9. The meaning is, that he and his fellow-labourers endeavoured to manifest true wisdom in the method in which they instructed others.

That we may present every man. When we come to appear before God. 2Cor 11:2. Paul was anxious that no one to whom this gospel was preached should be lost. He believed it to be adapted to save every man; and as he expected to meet all his hearers at the bar of God, his aim was to present them made perfect by means of that gospel which he preached.

(f) "warning" Acts 20:28,31 (a) "every man" 2Ti 2:24,25 (b) "we may present" 2Cor 11:2