Sunday, June 5, 2016

Not Mere Humans



I Corinthians 3:1-9 
Good morning and welcome to I Corinthians chapter 3!  That is where we are in our series titled “Broken but Indispensable.”  In today’s passage, Paul is going to make some rather firm statements to the Corinthian church and likely to some of us listening.  Before we dive into our verses in chapter 3, let’s go back to see where we have come from, giving special attention to how Paul opened this letter.

In his regular fashion, Paul first introduces the writers of the letter:  himself and Sosthenes.  He states his intended recipients:  the Corinthians, of course, but he is also writing to “all who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ” which includes us as well.  Paul describes his audience as “those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus” and “saints by calling.”

Paul continues, saying, “I thank my God always concerning you.” (I Cor 1:4-9)  He goes on to say, “You’ve got it!”  You have been given the grace of God in Christ.  You have been enriched in everything in Him:  in all speech, in all knowledge.  You are not lacking in any gift.


He offers further encouragement.  The testimony concerning Christ was confirmed in you.  The Lord Jesus Christ will confirm you to the end, blameless.  God is faithful.  You have the proof of these things because of your fellowship with Jesus.  This is good news.  We should take time to pause and reflect.  We should take care not to move on too quickly.

In my job, one responsibility I have is to give people annual performance reviews.  I’ve been doing it for a while, more than ten years.  In that time, I’m confident I’ve given well more than 50 reviews.  I think nearly every person is either itching to know or quietly loathing the section that we call “Opportunities for Improvement.”  This is often to the exclusion of the part we call “Strengths” or the evaluations of how we performed according to specific goals for the year.  The good news can get overlooked because of the anticipation of the correction. 

Maybe I’m weird, but I hope to get “opportunities for improvement” whenever I get reviewed by my boss.  It’s not that I want to get bashed, but I know that I have shortcomings.  I know that I can get my focus on the wrong thing.  I want to know if I’m going in the wrong direction.  Please tell me.  Don’t just watch me wandering around and shake your head wondering when I’m going to “get it”.

The danger is that in anticipation of the “opportunities for improvement,” whether we have a constructive view or a fearful view, we miss out on the positives that are being shared, too.  Paul has just said remarkable things about us.  We need to grab onto those things and hold on to them for dear life.  Our attitude should be filled with the confidence that God is faithful.  He is true to His Word. 

Let’s thank God for these truths together.

Lord Jesus, thank You for what You’ve done for us.  Thank You that You have changed our identity from striving on our own to being Yours.  Thank You that You have enriched us with everything that is in Christ.  Thank You that we have been given Your grace.  Thank You that we are not lacking any gift.  Thank You that You have confirmed these truths in us now and You will confirm them until the end.  Thank You that You find us blameless.  Thank You for the ongoing proof of these things through our relationship with Jesus.  Amen.

When you stumble, when you doubt, keep coming back to Jesus.  Allow Him to correct things that are not right, but know that He has placed you securely in Him.  Write these truths on Your heart and believe them.

Paul goes on to make one of his primary points of correction for the Corinthians … I Cor 1:10 … “I urge you that there be no divisions among you” … if we believe in Jesus, we should be united in Him.  We talked about this a couple of weeks back.

Paul then warns us … he urges … stop thinking like the world does … it will only lead you down the wrong path. (I Cor 1:21) He quotes from Jeremiah 9:23 saying, “Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord,” not in Apollos or Paul or Cephas or anyone else.  (I Cor 1:31)  Do not be divided.

Then, in chapter two, he exhorts us, giving his own example: “I did not come with superior speech or wisdom.  Yet we do speak wisdom among the mature.”  What is that wisdom?  It is not the wisdom of this age or its rulers.  It is the knowledge that Jesus is the Christ.  This is confirmed by the Spirit of God in us which shows us the things freely given to us in Christ.  What things are freely given to us?  All things according to 1:4-9 and 3:22.

Chapter 2 concludes with a somewhat mysterious verse and an amazing promise.  In the NAS version, it says the one who is spiritual (or mature) should appraise all things but not be appraised by others?  The ESV says to judge but not be judged?  The NIV says make judgments but not be subject to judgment? 

This word that gets translated here as appraise or judge is used several places in the New Testament.  In Acts, it’s the word that is used to describe the Bereans and their investigation of the Old Testament to see if the message Paul preached to them was in fact true.  Their behavior was strongly praised.  (Acts 17:11)  Other places it is used in the sense of a court of law, the questioning in order to render a verdict.

Here in I Corinthians 2:15 it says that mature, Spirit-filled believers should be examining the messages they encounter and making judgments even to the extent of judging all things.  There is a tension here with the potential for a contradiction with the words of Jesus.  In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, “Judge not, lest you be judged.” (Matthew 7:1) Greg Koukl in the book Tactics (pp. 185-186) does a good job explaining the differences between types of judgment.  Jesus went on to qualify His command to judge not when he said that we should first take the log out of our own eye. (Matthew 7:3, 5) Jesus was not condemning all judgments, he was condemning hypocritical judgments, the kind of judgments that are arrogant and often characterized by disdain and condescension (the kind of judgments that the Pharisees were very accomplished at rendering).  Since not all judgments are this kind, not all judgments are condemned.

Jesus in fact encourages a different kind of judgment once we deal with our hypocrisy, once the log has been removed from our eye.  Scripture commands at least two types of judgments.  There are judgments that are judicial.  Church discipline would be this kind of judgment. (Matthew 18:15-20, Galatians 6:1) Paul will warn later in I Corinthians that we should not use this type of judgment of unbelievers. (I Corinthians 5:12-13) God reserves that judgment for Himself.  The second type of judgment Scripture commands is assessment, appraisal of what is “right or wrong, wise or foolish, accurate or inaccurate, rational or irrational.”  Jesus talks of this in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 7:6) when He says, “Do not give what is holy to dogs.”  We must evaluate what is holy and who are “the dogs.”  I Peter 4:7 says that we should “be of sound judgment.”  (Ephesians 5:11, John 7:24, Luke 12:57)

We’ve discussed three types of judgment here:  judicial action (guilty/not guilty), appraisal or assessment (right/wrong), and hypocritical arrogance (I’m better than you).  Only the last one (hypocrisy) is disqualified by Jesus’ words in Matthew 7.  The other two in their proper place are actually virtues commanded by Scripture.  The second one, appraisal or assessment, seems to match most closely with what Paul is describing in I Corinthians 2:15.  This calling is given to the spiritual person for two reasons.  One, the subject under consideration is spiritual.  Paul had already said that the natural man cannot understand spiritual things, so how could the natural man judge spiritual things.  Second, the spiritual person is mature enough to be guarded from the false judgment of hypocritical arrogance.  If you can’t judge “in the Spirit”, then leave off judging and give the situation a wider berth.  Galatians 6:1 says that we should seek to restore a believer who is caught in a sin, but we are to look to ourselves so that we will not be tempted. 

What then of the concluding remark that the spiritual person is not to be judged?  Two thoughts on that:  First, the spiritual person is not to be judged by the natural person (unbeliever).  Why not?  Well, on what basis would the unbeliever judge spiritual things if they don’t understand them?  Second, the spiritual person is subject to judgment but rather from the Spirit.  Paul says over in I Corinthians 4:3-4 that he doesn’t even judge himself rather it is the Lord who examines him.

How then are we judged by the Spirit?  We can be judged from within.  The Spirit can speak to us in our hearts telling us that something we are doing or have done is wrong.  We can be judged by the Word, the Bible.  When we read, we can learn or be reminded of things we need to change or do (Hebrews 4:12).  We also can be corrected by other believers.  We then can evaluate what they have said against Scripture and what the Spirit in us is speaking.

The amazing promise that ends chapter two is, “We have the mind of Christ.”  When we have trusted Jesus, we have within us the necessary understanding to make these spiritual assessments and to hear and take to heart the message of wisdom.

That brings us (finally) to today’s passage, I Corinthians 3:1-9:

Brothers and sisters, I could not address you as people who live by the Spirit but as people who are still worldly—mere infants in Christ. I gave you milk, not solid food, for you were not yet ready for it. Indeed, you are still not ready. You are still worldly. For since there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not worldly? Are you not acting like mere humans? For when one says, “I follow Paul,” and another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not mere human beings?

What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe—as the Lord has assigned to each his task. I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow. So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow. The one who plants and the one who waters have one purpose, and they will each be rewarded according to their own labor. For we are co-workers in God’s service; you are God’s field, God’s building.  –I Corinthians 3:1-9

Paul starts chapter 3 with a sad statement, essentially telling the Corinthians, “All the spiritual stuff I’ve addressed is not something you can understand right now.”  Why not?  Well, they are still worldly.  Literally, it says that the Corinthians are fleshly.  They have the Spirit, but they are not living by the Spirit.  They are trying to survive by their wits and their emotions alone.

Paul then goes on to explain why he knows this.  He knows because of jealousy.  He knows because of quarrels.  He knows because there is division.  People are taking sides that don’t even exist.  There was no division or competition between Apollos and Paul.  Yes, they are distinct individuals, but they are working together toward a common goal.

Paul describes himself and Apollos as servants.  They are not seeking a high position.  He says neither he nor Apollos is anything.  Neither of them “owns” the church at Corinth.  It’s not Paul’s church or Apollos’ church.  Isn’t that interesting?  How many churches are known by their pastors today?  How often we see signs outside churches which prominently display the name of the pastor?  We have pastors who are celebrities today.  (I’m not seeking to make judgment here—I just find it interesting in light of this passage.)  Paul is “proud” of the church, not the other way round.  It ultimately is a boasting in the Lord.  Look at what God has done, not look at what I have done.

There are definitely common themes with the parable Jesus shared in Mark 4:26-29.  In this parable, Jesus said that the kingdom of God was like grain growing in the fields.  A man scatters some seed, and then the seed sprouts and grows whether or not the man understands how, the plants mature and then the head matures and the grain ripens.  At this point the man harvests the grain because the time has come.  It is not the one who plants or tends, it is the One who makes things grow.  Paul and Apollos are working in God’s service.

Unfortunately, the immaturity of the Corinthians has caused them to miss this completely.  Wrong thinking is like this.  Walking in the flesh instead of in the Spirit is like this.  The amplified version says in verse 4, “Are you not [proving yourselves unchanged, just] ordinary people?”

While considering this verse, I thought of a couple of alternative titles for this message.  One was “Still Worldly” or “Still Fleshly” from verse 3.  The other was “Unchanged”.  The actions of the Corinthians proved to Paul that they were in large measure unchanged outwardly.

However, notice that Paul did not question their salvation.  He did not say, “The Spirit is not in you.”  What he did say was, “You are living as if what Jesus has said and done is not true.”

We made a quick trip to visit my parents at the first part of this past week.  As we were nearly there, we passed a church with a sign out front.  It said, “It is easier to give ten sermons than to live one.”  As one who obviously has the opportunity to give messages in front of the church a few times a year, let me be the first to say, “AMEN!”  (James 3:2 gives a similar thought, “We all stumble in many ways.”)

It reminded me of a story from the book The Same Kind of Different as Me.  That book is the telling of the real life stories of Ron Hall and Denver Moore, a wealthy white art dealer and a homeless black man, and the startling relationship which has developed between them.  It is worth reading if you have the time. 

Moore grew up illiterate and in virtual slavery in 1960’s Louisiana.  Even still, among his many hardships, his family attended a small all-black church in their community.  The preacher was a traveling preacher, so he wasn’t able to come to their church every Sunday.  There was a man in the community who would preach in his place when the traveling preacher was not there.  This man would preach the same sermon over and over again.  The people not surprisingly got tired of the repeated message and questioned the man on why he would only preach one sermon.  His answer was a simple one, “When you are able to follow this one message, then I’ll preach something else.”

Fast forward to my experience growing up going to an all-white church in North Carolina.  It was a rather large church with over 1000 members.  The church had a staff of three and sometimes more pastors to support such a large flock.  One of the associate pastors was a man named Charlie Hause.  Charlie had worked in the furniture industry in North Carolina for years, but decided to respond to a call from God by attending seminary and becoming a full-time pastor.  Charlie was a faithful witness for Jesus Christ.  Whenever he got into the pulpit, which wasn’t too often, just a few times each year, he was committed to share the good news about Jesus and the way of salvation.  As a result, even though his sermons were not frequent, people became “tired” of Charlie’s message.  They wondered why he always seemed to say the same thing.  Couldn’t he talk about something else? 

Interestingly, Charlie was a gifted speaker.  His messages were in fact different.  He used many techniques and even props to point people to Christ.  At the same time, it was true that the heart of the message was always Jesus.

I think Charlie was a lot like that old black man in Louisiana.  He wanted to make sure that every person caught the most important message of all.  There are lots of things we can learn and apply by studying the Bible.  You can put into practice a lot of the principles for how to get along with others and live a better life in this world.  But if you took every good thing out of the Bible and missed Jesus that would be the greatest tragedy of all. 

Do you feel a tension in your life?  Do you ever feel like you live a Romans 7 kind of experience?  “What I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.” Do you feel like you’re caught up in some of the struggles the Corinthian believers were dealing with?  Do you sometime forget the things that Paul said at the beginning of the letter?  Things like: 

You have been given the grace of God in Christ.  You have been enriched in everything in Him:  in all speech, in all knowledge.  You are not lacking in any gift.  You have the mind of Christ.  You have all things in Christ.  The testimony concerning Christ is confirmed in you.  The Lord Jesus Christ will confirm you to the end, blameless.  And, you have the proof of these things because of your fellowship with Jesus.  (I Corinthians 1:4-9, 2:16, 3:21-23)

Or do you disregard these things, thinking, “I don’t believe that.” or “It can’t be true.”

I go through seasons like that.  Sometimes, I think I can pin it on a very specific event.  Something happens to shake my faith, then I start walking in the flesh.  (Usually, it’s me doing the shaking.  The shaking I do is to mess up and sin in some way.)  I stop evaluating things spiritually and start evaluating them naturally.

A funny thing happened on the way to work Thursday.  About halfway here, I saw a car ahead of me which was driving slowly maybe 25-30 mph.  As I was driving between 40-45 mph, the distance between us was closing rapidly.  I happened to be coming down one hill and the car was ascending the next, so there were a few moments in which I could observe the car, wondering what was wrong.  No smoke or smell, so likely not an engine problem.  Then, that car began to veer across the double yellow line even though there were three cars coming the other direction.  (I winced fearing the worst was about to happen.)  No one had to drive off the road to avoid a collision, but you could tell the other drivers were reacting, moving over as far as possible.  Then suddenly, the slow moving car made a right turn and drove into a ditch leaving the rear bumper up in the air, thankfully just clear of the road.  At that point, I thought that surely the person in the car was incapacitated, so I decided to stop and check on them.  When I came up on the car, I was even more surprised that the car had ended up in the ditch because turning a few feet sooner, the car would have been able to drive into a driveway.  Waiting just 20 feet further, the car could have driven safely into the grass where I ended up parking my car.  I was now even more concerned, wondering what rudimentary first aid skills I would be able to produce if the person were suffering from a seizure or cardiac arrest.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that the driver was a young woman who was a little dazed but uninjured.  She was able to communicate with me clearly.  She seemed embarrassed, and kept telling me she had a flat tire.  This was evident, as the front driver side tire at the bottom of the ditch was completely flat.  However, each time she repeated the fact of the flat tire, I couldn’t help coming back to the same observation in my mind: “Yes, you have a flat tire, but that is not your biggest problem at the moment.  The real problem is that your car is stuck in a ditch.  If you had a flat tire only, I could help to change it.  However, the car is stuck, and a truck or tractor is needed to pull it out of the ditch first.  Until then, the flat tire can’t be addressed.”

After making sure the woman was okay, learning that she knew the people who lived in the house where she had stopped, and knowing I really couldn’t do anything else productive at that moment, I made my way to work.  I can only assume that the woman had been frightened by her flat tire and subsequent swerve into the left lane.  She experienced the difficulty of turning the wheel with a flat tire and was likely thinking only to get off the road as quickly as possible, ditch or no ditch.  There were underlying reasons which had brought about the situation as it occurred.  But still, her biggest problem at that moment was her car, flat tire notwithstanding, was stuck in a ditch.

This situation caused several different thoughts to run through my mind over the remaining 15 minutes it took me to get to work.  Mainly, I was thinking about how we, people in general, often focus on a smaller problem to the exclusion of a more serious problem. 

I think that’s what happens to me when I get into a “spiritual funk” or I start living in a fleshly, worldly way of thinking.  I focus on the little things like why things at work don’t go the way they should.  Why does my car keep acting up?

A.W. Tozer wrote, “The driver on the highway is safe not when he reads the signs, but when he obeys them.”  The reality is that in and of ourselves, we do not possess the ability to be spiritual or mature successfully on our own.  We’re like the young woman with the flat tire.  We find it hard to keep the car in our lane even though we know the rules of the road.  There is something which prevents us from driving straight and true.  We need an external remedy to our inability or we will eventually find ourselves in the ditch.  It is only a matter of time.  That external remedy is the person of Jesus Christ.  He’s the only one who can pull any one of us out of the metaphorical ditch we’re either in or keep us away from the one we might be headed for.

Isn’t this the meaning of “spiritual things,” the wisdom which can only be spoken among the mature, the solid food?  Is it not the amazing truths of what we have in Christ, things Paul told us in 1:4-9?  The things we’ve heard over and over in this message

Is it that we need to be simpler in our thinking?  David Guzik in his commentary on this passage likened it to eating too much junk food.  If you eat a lot of sugar, your body adapts to that diet and then wants to eat sugar and drink sugary drinks.  He said that was kind of what the Corinthians were up to.  They were trying to get all kind of neat eloquent worldly wisdom, but at the same time, they were falling into all kinds of behavior which were not consistent with being pure and holy.  Do we need to simply confess our sin, repent, and return to Christ?

Or do we need to humble ourselves?  I found this quote from Os Guinness in the book Tactics, “Followers of Christ flinch at times from the pain of wounds and the smart of slights, but that cost is in the contract of the way of the cross.”  Jesus said in John 16:33, “In this world you will have trouble.”  In different translations, the word trouble is translated:  tribulation, many trials and sorrows, suffering, oppression, distress.  Are some of the things which I allow to cause me to be focused on myself just part and parcel of the pathway of being a follower of Christ?

We’re not being abandoned by God through hardship or uncertainty we may face.  God is right there with us in the storm.  Jesus has seen it all and undergone the deepest pain and trauma as well.  In John 16:33, Jesus also said He was telling us about the trials and tribulation so that we would not be surprised and that we would have peace ultimately encouraging us, “Take heart, be of good courage, I have overcome the world.”

This is a rather simple example, but it has the advantage of being recent.  I had a busy day on Friday at work.  I had a monthly report due a week earlier than usual because of an audit of sorts coming up this week.  In order to get it done, I had to work on it every free minute I could spare.  I finally got done about 5 pm.  On top of that, I have a supplier visit on Monday starting at 8:30 am.  A big part of their visit is reviewing our warehouses where their materials are stored while on consignment.

I’m supposed to have people supporting me with the warehouse tour on Monday, but I don’t like surprises.  (I’ve been burned before.)  I don’t go to the warehouses often and thankfully because most of the time things work like they should.  Parts come in, they get stored correctly, they get delivered to the line on time, and that’s that.  I don’t have to “do” anything.

During my trip to the warehouse, I am telling myself, “I should have done this earlier in the day” (even though like I’ve explained I didn’t have time for it).  I am worried because if I have any questions or find any problems, I’m thinking I’m not going to have anyone to ask.

To make a long story as short as I can, there’s only one guy in the warehouse.  He immediately asks if he can help me, then he proceeds to explain everything in far more detail that I could possibly have hoped but at the same time in the most efficient manner possible.  In not more than 10 minutes we’ve walked the whole warehouse, looked at every location individually, and he’s described the whole process from receiving to delivery even though receiving is done in a different building.

At the end, I shake his hand and ask his name.  He tells me his name is David and the reason he knows the process so well is that he’s recently changed to a weekend shift in order to go back to school.  Prior to that, he was working in the other building, so he had experience with all the processes.

I can tell more details involving my trip up to the other building, but in a total of 15 minutes, I had exactly what I needed and definitely more than I could have gotten in that short a time period had I tried to take care of it earlier in the day.  God knew in advance what I needed.

On my way back, I was berating myself saying, “God why do I doubt that you are in charge?”  He guards my going out and my coming in.  He owns the cattle on a thousand hills.  Nothing is too difficult for Him.  I have the confidence of promise on top of promise.

One of my favorite promises from God is a promise about promises.  This is II Corinthians 1:20,

For no matter how many promises God has made, they are “Yes” in Christ. And so through Him the “Amen” is spoken by us to the glory of God.  II Corinthians 1:20

An interesting example of this happened when we went to Tina’s dance recital last night.  First of all, just guess how many girl dancers there were to boy dancers.  Ten to one? A hundred to one?  I was thinking more like a gazillion to one, myself.  Anyway, there were four boys, and two of them were really little, and two were about 8 or 10 years old.  So, in the second half all the girls are out dancing pieces and there was one dance where the boy picked up the girl and moved her about 3 or 4 feet.  My heart just soared when I saw it, I don’t know why, but it was so encouraging to me to see that complementary effort.  Later, the guy instructor who teaches modern dance came out and did a performance, twirling all around, bending all these different shapes, it was amazing.  Then a girl dancer came out on stage with him and instantly he became almost like nothing.  (Have you ever noticed how guy dancers dress in dark clothes, almost like they’re saying, “Hey, I’m not here, don’t look at me!”)  He had started dancing in the dark in dark clothing, and I was really impressed, but I would have been even more impressed if I actually see him!  But then, the girl dancer came out wearing a lot of color and he was lifting her around and it looked like she was flying, it was so cool, and it was a totally different dance. 

Anyway, you are the bride of Christ, and God delights in lifting you up and making amazing things happen to His glory.  He’s like that dancer—He’s behind the scenes, not out in front, but still everything is declaring the glory of God, and He takes pleasure in working through us.  In this way, all His promises are true, they are “yes” in Christ Jesus.  God glories in us.

We are most spiritual when we abide in Christ.  It is a simple and narrow path.  If you find that you are not feeling “spiritual,” if you feel like you don’t know what you should be doing, please take some time to get away alone with God and just talk to Jesus.  Take your Bible, and read and listen.  Ask Him to be the bright Morningstar of your life.  Take His yoke, His authority upon your life anew.

We are God’s field, God’s building. (I Corinthians 3:9) It is God’s business to build us up.  Let us encourage one another to persevere and to abide in Christ.  Only in Him, will we escape jealousy, quarrelling, and division.

Let’s pray:

Father God, help us to see the pathway You have planned out for each one of us here.  I pray for rest for those who are tired.  I pray for direction for those who feel lost.  I pray for strength for those who feel weak.  But I pray that all those things will be found in and remain in You.  We don’t seek You so that we can be filled up for a time so that we can go our own way apart from You.  We seek You and we want to keep seeking You to get closer and closer to You.  There is nowhere else we need or want to go, only You have the words of eternal life.  Thank You, Jesus.  Amen

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