Verse 9
Paul’s confidence that his readers would one day stand without guilt before the Lord did not rest on the Corinthians’ ability to persevere faithfully to the end. It rested on God’s ability and promises to preserve them. God had begun the good work of calling them into fellowship with His Son, and He would complete that work (cf. Philippians 1:6; 1 John 1:1-4).
". . . God is the subject of all the actions of the thanksgiving. And in every case that work is mediated by or focused on ’his Son Jesus Christ our Lord.’ Thus the christological emphasis that began in the salutation is carried through in an even more emphatic way in this introductory thanksgiving. Everything God has done, and will do, for the Corinthians is done expressly in ’Jesus Christ our Lord.’
"His concern here is to redirect their focus-from themselves to God and Christ and from an over-realized eschatology to a healthy awareness of the glory that is still future." [Note: Fee, p. 46.]
An over-realized eschatology is an understanding of the future that stresses present realities to the exclusion of related future realities. For example, an over-realized view of the resurrection emphasizes the believer’s present spiritually resurrected condition to the exclusion of his or her future physical resurrection.
The apostle’s confidence in God as he expressed this in these verses (1 Corinthians 1:4-9) enabled him to deal with the problems in the Corinthian church optimistically and realistically. God was for the Corinthians. Now they needed to orient themselves properly toward Him.
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