‘Or do you not know that God's people (‘the saints') will judge the world? And if the world is judged by you, are you unworthy to judge in the smallest matters? Do you not know that we will judge angels? How much more things that pertain to this life?'
But the church's expertise in such matters may be questioned, so Paul points out that Christians are destined to be judges in the spiritual world. They will share with Christ in His judgment of the world (Revelation 20:4; Daniel 7:27). Thus they should surely be seen as fit people to pass judgments on earth. The latter judgments referred to are, of course, relating mainly to disputes between Christian parties. These should be settled privately without drawing the world's attention to them.
In the present day much harm has been done by such disputes between so-called Christian leaders. Established Christian bringing established Christian to court has resulted in mockery of the name of Christ and a spoiled witness in the eyes of the world. ‘So this is what Christians are like', they say, and turn away, or mock. Paul was, however, talking about a situation in which ‘the church' in a certain place was united in its leadership, although by necessity split into different subsections within the place where they were. (Slaves had limited freedom and could not go where they liked). Thus there would be central leaders with the experience to act in such matters. And there was a close bond of fellowship in the churches then, as there should be now.
Jesus taught a similar principle from a slightly different viewpoint when he warned against going before judges with a contentious matter because the case might go against you and the consequences be more serious than they needed to have been (Luke 12:58; Matthew 5:25-26). It is far better to solve a matter in a friendly way rather than risk potential problems.
Of course in modern society there are certain things which have to be dealt with in court because they have legal consequences, but the point is to use the courts only where strictly necessary. Indeed experience of courts often produces a realisation that they do not deal with such things satisfactorily because of limits on time and cost. Thus they come to arbitrary judgments in smaller matters, judgments not based on all the facts.
‘Do you not know that we will judge angels?' This is presumably because in some way we will participate in the great judgment when angels too will be judged (Isa 24:21-22; 2 Peter 2:4; Jude 1:6).