1 Corinthians 16:10–12

1 Corinthians 16:10 — "See that he is with you without fear"

The Greek verb for "see that" (βλέπετε, blepete) is a sharp imperative addressed to the whole community: the Corinthians bear a corporate responsibility for how visiting ministers are received. That Timothy might arrive "without fear" (achobōs) is a telling detail. Timothy was young (cf. 1 Tim 4:12), and Corinth was a fractious, contentious church — one that had already divided into personality cults around Paul, Apollos, and Cephas (1:12). Paul's concern is not for Timothy's personal anxiety but for the community's treatment of him. The Corinthians must not exploit Timothy's youth or his status as Paul's delegate to demean or dismiss him.

The ground of Paul's commendation is precise and theological: Timothy "does the work of the Lord" (to ergon Kyriou ergazetai). This phrase directly echoes Paul's earlier exhortation, "always abound in the work of the Lord" (15:58), the climax of the resurrection chapter. By applying it to Timothy here, Paul draws a straight line between the resurrection hope that grounds all Christian labor and the concrete ministry of a particular co-worker. Timothy's mission is not Paul's errand — it is the Lord's work.

Paul then adds "as I also do," a phrase that is simultaneously a commendation and a leveling: Timothy and Paul are engaged in the same apostolic labor. There is a hierarchy of mission (Paul is the Apostle who founded the church), but not a hierarchy of dignity in the work itself.

1 Corinthians 16:11 — "Let no one despise him"

The verb "despise" (exoutheneō) has sharp resonance in Corinthians. It is used elsewhere to describe how worldly wisdom dismisses the foolishness of the cross (1:28; cf. 6:4). For the community to despise Timothy would be to replicate the logic of worldly contempt — the very logic Paul has spent sixteen chapters dismantling. The community is instead to "set him forward on his journey in peace" (propempsate en eirēnē), a formal act of provision, protection, and blessing that was standard in Hellenistic letter-writing but which Paul fills with theological weight: eirēnē is not a farewell courtesy but the shalom of the kingdom, the peace of a community at one in Christ.

"For I expect him with the brothers" — the "brothers" here are likely Paul's wider co-worker circle, possibly including those with him in Ephesus (cf. 16:19). This detail underscores the networked, collegial nature of Pauline mission: Timothy is not a lone envoy but moves within a web of fraternal relationships.

1 Corinthians 16:12 — "It was not at all his desire to come now"

The case of Apollos is theologically richer than it first appears. Paul had "strongly urged" (parekalesa polla) Apollos to make the journey — the verb parakaleō is Paul's standard word for apostolic exhortation (cf. Rom 12:1; 2 Cor 5:20). Yet Apollos declined. The Greek is emphatic: pantōs ouk ēn thelēma — "it was absolutely not his will." Some manuscripts read "the will of God," and while the simpler reading is Apollos's personal will, the ambiguity itself is instructive.

Paul reports this refusal without a trace of censure. In a letter where Paul has vigorously defended his own apostolic authority (chapters 1–4, 9), his equanimity here is striking. He neither overrides Apollos nor apologizes for him. He simply states: "he will come when he has an opportunity." This is not passive indifference but theological confidence — the same God who works through Paul's missionary journeys governs the timing of Apollos's. The kairos of ministry is not Paul's to command.

The Spiritual Sense

Typologically, the sending of Timothy recalls the patriarchal pattern of the trusted envoy — Abraham's servant sent to find a bride for Isaac (Gen 24), Joseph sent ahead into Egypt (Gen 45:7-8) — where the sender's authority and the sent one's vulnerability are simultaneously in play. At a deeper level, every apostolic co-worker is a figure of Christ, "sent" (the literal meaning of apostolos) by another, vulnerable to rejection, doing the Father's work.

Catholic tradition draws rich teaching from these three verses at the intersection of ecclesiology, authority, and fraternal charity.

On Hierarchical Communion and Collegial Mission: The Second Vatican Council's Lumen Gentium (§22) teaches that the episcopate exercises authority not in isolation but in collegial union. These verses are a primitive instance of that principle: Paul, the Apostle, does not act as an autonomous sovereign but as the center of a network of co-workers — Timothy, Apollos, "the brothers" — whose relationships are governed by mutual accountability and respect. The Catechism affirms that "the Church is essentially missionary" (CCC §850), and this passage shows that mission is always collaborative in form.

On Respecting the Freedom of Co-Workers: St. John Chrysostom, in his Homilies on 1 Corinthians (Homily 44), marvels at Paul's deference to Apollos: "See how he [Paul] does not force him, nor drag him against his will, showing that he himself was free from ambition." This patristic observation touches on a perennial Catholic principle: pastoral authority serves and does not coerce. Pope St. Gregory the Great, in his Pastoral Rule, insists that the good shepherd adapts to the freedom of souls — a principle Paul embodies here with Apollos.

On the Ministry of Reception: That Paul charges the community to receive Timothy well is an overlooked dimension of Catholic ecclesiology. The faithful are not passive recipients of ministry but active participants in its fruitfulness. St. Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologiae II-II, Q.3, a.2) speaks of the "disposition of the recipient" as affecting the efficacy of spiritual gifts. The Corinthians' reception — or rejection — of Timothy would shape the very fruitfulness of Paul's apostolic labor among them.

These verses speak directly to the contemporary Catholic parish and diocese navigating the very Corinthian problems of personality, status, and faction. Many parishes are quick to "despise" visiting priests, deacons, or lay ministers who are young, unfamiliar, or stylistically different from a beloved predecessor. Paul's command — "let no one despise him" — is a rebuke to the consumerist approach to ministry that treats clergy as service providers to be evaluated rather than servants of the Lord to be supported.

For those in leadership, the Apollos case is a school of humility. Paul "strongly urged" and was refused — and recorded the refusal without shame. Pastors, bishops, and ministry leaders who discover that gifted co-workers cannot be deployed on demand, whose gifts move according to their own discernment and God's timing, are in good Pauline company. The freedom of Apollos is not a failure of Paul's authority; it is its mature expression.

Finally, the phrase "the work of the Lord" invites every Catholic to examine their own labor — professional, domestic, parochial — under this title. Is what I am doing today recognizable as the work of the Lord? That is the one credential that commands the community's respect and protection.