Verse 2: “Moreover it is required in stewards that one be found faithful.”
During the 2016 Presidential election, I heard a term that I was not familiar with: faithless elector. I was familiar with the term elector and the Electoral College, whose votes are the ones that determine the presidential and vice-presidential election. However, I had never heard of a “faithless elector”. According to Wikipedia:
“In United States presidential elections, a faithless elector is a member of the United States Electoral College who does not vote for the presidential or vice-presidential candidate for whom they had pledged to vote. That is, they break faith with the candidate they were pledged to and vote for another candidate, or fail to vote. A pledged elector is only considered a faithless elector by breaking their pledge; unpledged electors have no pledge to break.
Electors are typically chosen and nominated by a political party or the party’s presidential nominee: they are usually party members with a reputation for high loyalty to the party and its chosen candidate. Thus, a faithless elector runs the risk of party censure and political retaliation from their party, as well as potential legal penalties in some states. Candidates for elector are nominated by state political parties in the months prior to Election Day.” I found this at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faithless_elector .
Paul was stating here that Christian leaders should be considered “servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God”. (verse 1) Paul then stressed that stewards need to be found faithful. According to the Holman New Testament Commentary on I & II Corinthians, page 60: “Stewards were high-ranking servants entrusted with the oversight of households. They were especially responsible for the management and distribution of household resources.” Paul used this office as an analogy for church leadership because both stewarded the secret things.”
You definitely would want someone trustworthy and faithful to be in charge of your affairs, especially your most closely-held and prized things. So, imagine how hurt a person is when they find someone that they trusted is faithless. I’m sure faithless electors have “lost the trust” of those people who thought that the electors would vote the way that they were elected to (whether that was the right choice or not…this isn’t a discussion about electors, per se). Imaging the brokenness of someone who is not faithful to someone else as they are supposed to be (marriage is the perfect example…the hurt that is felt when that trust is broken).
Thus, Paul’s stressing that a steward should be faithful is the point he makes here to the Corinthian church. Those Christian leaders had been faithful to the cause of Christ, and he wants the church to emulate that same type of faithfulness to Christ, too.
Something to think about, today as well. Like the song states “may all who come behind us find us faithful”.
Combing The Word 