What Does 1 Corinthians 3:6 Mean?

I planted, Apollos gave to drink, but God made it grow.

1 Corinthians 3:6 · SDV

Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.

Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.

This verse in the King James

King James wording

King James Version

I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase.

THE KEY

Human hands can plant and water, but the increase is life growing by God’s gift.

THE MEANING

Your work can plant and tend what is growing, but it cannot command the growth. God gives the increase as living growth beyond the workers’ control. Human tending and divine life meet here without becoming the same thing.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

The lie this undoes is that every outcome depends on your effort alone; growth exceeds what the workers can produce.

THE ROOT

ηὔξανεν

ēuxanen

GROWS FROM

αὐξ-

aux-

grow, increase

“made it grow” in this verse is ēuxanen. The Greek verb ⁨ηὔξανεν⁩ (ēuxanen, “was causing to grow”) keeps the living process in view. Planting and watering matter as tending, while the growth itself exceeds what the workers can produce.

ALSO GROWS

auxanō: to grow, increase

αὐξάνω

This is the verb’s dictionary form, naming growth as an unfolding process.

auxēsis: growth, increase

αὔξησις

This related noun names the growth itself; Colossians 2:19 uses it for the body’s growth from the Head.

THE PATTERN

Life grows through human tending, while its increase is given by God.

So then neither is the one who plants anything, nor the one who gives to drink, but God, who makes it grow.

1 Corinthians 3:7 · SDVThe next verse makes explicit that planting and watering do not produce the growth; God does.

and he sleeps and wakes night and day, and the seed sprouts and stretches up, and he does not know how.

Mark 4:27 · SDVThe seed grows beyond the sower’s understanding, even while the sower tends the field.

and not gripping the head, from whom the whole body, being fed through its joints and bonds, and being joined together, grows with the growth of God.

Colossians 2:19 · SDVThe body grows through its connection to the Head, with its increase described as God’s.

THE THREAD

and he sleeps and wakes night and day, and the seed sprouts and stretches up, and he does not know how.

Mark 4:27 · SDV

Mark’s seed “grow up” belongs to the same Greek verb family, ⁨αὐξάνω⁩ (auxanō, “to grow”), as “gave the increase” here. The sower tends the seed, but its hidden growth unfolds beyond his control.

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