Soon after the founding of the Corinthian church under Paul’s leadership, the church in Ephesus sent Apollos to Corinth. For a time Apollos greatly helped the Corinthian church with his knowledge of Scripture and his powerful reasoning skills (Acts 18:24–28).

By the time that the Corinthians’ letter reached Paul, Apollos must have been back in Ephesus. In their letter the Corinthians asked Paul to appeal to Apollos to come to them. They wanted Apollos to join the other brothers (that is, Stephanas, Fortunatus, and Achaicus; see 1 Corinthians 16:17), when the latter returned to Corinth. Perhaps they were hoping that he would come and pastor them on a more permanent basis.

As before (see 1 Corinthians 7:1, 1 Corinthians 7:25; 1 Corinthians 8:1; 1 Corinthians 12:1; 1 Corinthians 16:1), the introductory phrase now concerning shows that Paul is responding to a matter that was raised in the Corinthians’ letter. In responding he tells them that he strongly urged Apollos to go to them.

Although there was a tendency among the Corinthians to pit one leader against the other (1 Corinthians 1:12), Paul and Apollos simply viewed themselves as fellow servants of Christ (1 Corinthians 3:4–9). Paul did not feel threatened by Apollos’ popularity. Here he affectionately calls Apollos our brother.

Yet, for unknown reasons, Apollos did not yet want to visit Corinth. Perhaps he had other urgent work, or perhaps he did not want to interfere with the work that Paul was doing through his correspondence with the Corinthians, his sending of Timothy, and his planned visit. Yet Apollos would be willing to go at the right time in the future. The fact that Paul speaks of Apollos’ decision in the past tense shows that Apollos is no longer with him in Ephesus.