Paul has given the Corinthians rules for tongues, prophecy, and their meetings, and he has appealed to what is done "in all churches of the saints" (1 Corinthians 14:33). Now he asks them to remember where they stand. The first question asks whether the word of God started with them. The second asks whether it reached them alone. Both expect the answer no.

Barnes hears a check on presumption: "Is the church at Corinth the 'mother church?'" He and Gill both tie the question to the practice Paul has just addressed, women speaking in the assembly (1 Corinthians 14:34-35). Matthew Henry reads it more broadly, as a "rebuke of the Corinthians for their extravagant pride and self-conceit," a church ready to depart from the usages of others "to make ostentation of your spiritual gifts."

The answer is plain: no. The word of God came to Corinth from outside, and it had gone to many others too. Paul follows at once with a claim on their obedience: "If any man think himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord" (1 Corinthians 14:37). Then he sums up the whole chapter: "covet to prophesy, and forbid not to speak with tongues. Let all things be done decently and in order" (1 Corinthians 14:39-40).

The Corinthians had not discovered the gospel on their own. Paul had stayed in Corinth "a year and six months, teaching the word of God among them" (Acts 18:11). Gill reminds readers that "the word of the Lord came out of Zion," that is, out of Jerusalem through the apostles, not out of Corinth. In Greek the verse opens with ē, "or," which the KJV renders "What?" The second question uses monous, "only," and katēntēsen, "came" or "reached." Barnes draws the lesson Paul intends: "Should you not rather be conformed to them, and observe the rules of the churches which are older than yours?"

The word of God has a source, and it is not the church. It came to Corinth as a gift, carried by others. That puts every congregation under the word rather than over it. Paul makes the same appeal elsewhere in this letter: "we have no such custom, neither the churches of God" (1 Corinthians 11:16).

Paul is not telling the Corinthians that their gifts do not matter. In the same breath he tells them to "covet to prophesy" (1 Corinthians 14:39). The problem is not the gifts but the pride that sets one church above the rest. Behind the rules stands the character of God Himself: "God is not the author of confusion, but of peace" (1 Corinthians 14:33).