*[[1Co 3:3-9]] KJV*
3 For ye are yet carnal: for whereas there is envying, and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men?
4 For while one saith, I am of Paul; and another, I am of Apollos; are ye not carnal?
5 Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed, even as the Lord gave to every man?
6 I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase.
7 So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase.
8 Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one: and every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labour.
9 For we are labourers together with God: ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building.
The question of why are there so many denominations and which is correct is not uncommon. It is posed by men who approach the problem from three distinct directions.
The worldly man sees the divisions as proof that he is just as right to not believe or make up his own way. Like Pontias Pilot he ask what is truth as if it can not be known.
The religious man takes the matter much more seriously. He like the rich young ruler who came to Jesus asking what must I DO to gain eternal life. He believes the right one or combination of teaching will show him how to be acceptable to God.
The third is a believer who sees a great difference between what is and what is in the scripture.
Paul dealt with this problem in the first book of Corinthians and he would later say, before his passing, that when he and the other apostles were gone men would rise up within the church seeking to draw away disciples unto themselves.
This is the basis of the problem of all the divisions within his church.
It is the carnality of men that makes them strive and fight to draw all men to their side, into their teaching, to their understanding.
We are told in scripture that we may have ten thousand men who attempt to instruct us in Christ but few fathers.
Their is a great difference. An instructor wants to teach you; a father wants you to learn. An instructor wants you to obey; a father wants you to mature. An instructor wants to show you how you should; a father wants you to know why you would. In short an instructor draws you to himself but a father commends you to God.
Paul is very clear that no man, including himself, was crucified for you.
*[[1Co 2:1-5]] KJV*
1 And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God.
2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
3 And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling.
4 And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power:
5 That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God
That when we come to Christ it is Jesus who gives us the Spirit of God, the same Spirit that teaches us all there is.
We are also told that it is by the foolishness of preaching that God has chosen to spread his gospel. So a man may deliver the seed or water the seed, but it Is God who has tilled your heart, made the seed to grow, given it fruit and God who will harvest the same.
So though his teaching was correct Paul says you ate not of me but Christ. We are God's building and we are his husbandry. It is him that is making us.
*[[1Co 2:9-13]] KJV*
9 But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.
10 But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.
11 For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.
12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
So the answer to the question is; carnality and leaven within men is what has caused us to be so divided.
Sadly even those who can see that all believers should be unified; when we try to come together make special promises that we will not try to dissuade someone for one church or another. How can we find unity if we support the division; "a house divided can not stand"
We make ourselves false when we do not encourage and strengthen our brethren with Christ in them; the expectant desire of Gods glory. Do we not also make our Lord the minister of sin when we tell those who walk in darkness they have fellowship with the light. Any teaching must be judged as from men or from God, Until we are ready to have a unity of being one with God we will never break the bondage of men's darkness from our lives.
Our master and brother warned us if the light in us becomes darkness How great is that darkness. He is the light of the world if our trust is based on what a man has taught we are doubly blind and how great is our darkness.
