15 It is true that some preach Christ out of envy and rivalry, but others out of goodwill. 16 The latter do so out of love, knowing that I am put here for the defense of the gospel. 17 The former preach Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I am in chains. 18 But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice.
In this passage, we have the first hint of problems, for there are people who preach the gospel from bad motives. They are spiteful and ambitious and are happy to see Paul in trouble. Some even seek to make his situation worse. This may seem strange to us since Paul is universally admired among Christians today, and his writings are part of the New Testament. But the later reverence felt for him was clearly not always the case during his lifetime. However, in verse 18, Paul is dismissive of their attitudes and doesn’t seem to care that they hate him. As he puts it “but what does it matter?” He doesn’t really care whether people like him or admire him. The only thing that matters to Paul is that gospel is preached, and, even if these people are hostile to him, they are preaching the gospel. And, of course, there was a lot of hostility to Christ during and after his lifetime.
Obviously, it is much better if the gospel is preached from love, and some people do so. However, even those who preach it and hate Paul can still have a positive effect. For one thing, hating Paul does not mean that they hate Christ, and they may sincerely be seeking to spread the gospel. It’s just that they rejoice in Paul’s downfall and probably see his imprisonment as a punishment. They may applaud themselves because things are going so much better for them. They also may be ambitious and think that Paul’s problems will improve their position in the Church.
There have been lots of theories about the identities of these rival Christians, but we honestly don’t have a clue. Some people think they may be Jewish Christians for we know there was a lot of rivalry between Jewish and Gentile Christians. Many Jewish Christians insisted that one had to be a Jew to worship Christ, and Paul combatted them fiercely. He believed that there was no point to Christ’s death if one needed the Torah for salvation. But Paul also preached tolerance between different groups of Christians. In Galatians, Paul attacks the Jewish Christians who doubted that Christ was the only thing necessary for salvation, but here he is extremely mild in criticizing his enemies. The situation seems different, and Paul does not see the gospel message as compromised. Whatever their faults, they were helping to spread the true gospel.
Throughout his writings, Paul believes that Christians may differ on some points of doctrine and yet be tolerant of each other, as long as the basic message of the gospel is not compromised. So, although he may feel hurt at their attitude, he still rejoices that they are spreading the gospel. He has no problem with opposition if it furthers his basic goal of making Christ known. There’s an important lesson for us here, for we often see our own denomination or theology as the only correct one. This is not what the bible tells us. However much we may disagree with other Christian groups, they are our sisters and brothers. They too are being used by God to spread the good news. As Bonnie Thurston and Judith Ryan put it: “Evangelism is more important than the evangelists, and judgment is best left to God.”
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