Jesus Sleeping with Prostitutes

 Read 1 Corinthians 6

 

We begin this message where we will conclude in the second service. That shouldn’t be a problem for us. We know that the last will be first and the first will be last. So, let’s go.

Because of God’s great love for us that we know in his holy word and in Christ Jesus, the Word made flesh, we don’t fear hell. That’s some cool stuff right there.

That’s some powerful love right there. Hell has been taken off of the table for us. We cannot out sin the grace of God.  Grace is more powerful than our worst sin.

That’s fantastic! That’s incredible! That is more than we can handle on our own as our human spirit starts thinking, “Man, can I get away with some stuff now.”

Let’s see what you remember from the years of Bible reading gathered here.  Give me the chapter and verse, or just the chapter if that’s all you remember, when Jesus met with and slept with the prostitutes.

It’s the House of the Rising Sun story. It took place in Gaza. I guess that place will get torn down when they build the New Dubai in present day Gaza.

Anyone remember the chapter and verse? 

What do you mean you can’t find it. What do you mean it’s not there? What do you mean that Jesus would not and did not join his body with a prostitute?

If you did find it in your Bible, I would like to give your version a once over. Jesus did not join his body to a prostitute!

So why do we?  Why do we what?

Join the body of Christ to a prostitute or put heroin into it?  Why do we make our Lord into a glutton? Why do we make him into an alcoholic?

Do will fill his body with bitterness, resentment, hate, and other poisons?

We are the body of Christ. God lives in us. We are a holy temple of the Lord.

That’s cool. I’m saved from hell. Let’s get a few drinks and go for it. Oh yeah, we are going to party now!

But it’s not just us anymore. We are the body of Christ.

But that’s a metaphor, right? The whole temple thing is a metaphor, right?

Literal or figurative, we do not think it, do it, or embrace it. That’s not who we are now.

We were bought at a price. That price was the blood of Jesus.

By gratefulness alone, we should not do anything that would disgrace our Lord by surrendering his holy body to our carnal nature and the evil behind it.  

Paul is terse. Do you think you will inherit the Kingdom of Heaven? Do you believe there is a place prepared for you in God’s Kingdom for the sexually immoral?

Most of the big-ticket items for Paul in this part of the letter were sexual perversion, rampant fornication, and disregard for the body that now belongs to Christ Jesus.

So was he saying that these people were losing their salvation?

I don’t think so. I think he was challenging these believers as to whether they truly declared Jesus is Lord.  Did they really believe or did they just follow the crowd because that’s where the crowd was going?

God will judge us all. Until that day of judgment comes, the word of God will judge the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

But if you have not received the Holy Spirit and do not seek God, did you really believe or were you trying to hedge your bet in case your 401K crashed?

We are told not to judge—to condemn—but to have eyes to see. We talked before about not having to hunt down wickedness. You will know it when you see it, at least if you have surrendered fully to the Spirit of God within you.

But if you were just hedging your bet and didn’t actually believe, what then?

If you suspected this God and Jesus stuff was real but never received the gift of life that comes in the profession, Jesus is Lord! what then?

But we are vulnerable as humans. You remember last week's discussion of the flesh. We still sin.

If the Spirit of God is living in you, and if you professed and believed, he is, you will know when your sin. You might do it anyway, but the Spirit of God that lives within you will let you know that it is time to get back on the path that I call God’s Way.

If we do not declare Jesus is Lord and then wrestle with sin, the wrestling match is lost from the beginning. I know all the breakthrough leadership techniques for impossible situations.

Force of personality might get you through the impossible once, twice, or a dozen times, but it is not sustainable.  We need Christ and his Spirit who lives within us.

You remember I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me, right? I can’t resist the most basic of temptations for long without Christ in me. It’s too much.

But God did not leave us in a hopeless condition. He lives in us, and when we embrace that, we are tempted much less by the debased things of this world. They have no more appeal.

Let us get to that place where Christ lives in us. The Spirit of God shows us the way. We learn and live God’s way as he shows us the path and teaches us his way.

Our body is his body, and it is a temple. Let’s realize what God has trusted us with.

Amen.

Just Be Wronged!

  

Read 1 Corinthians 6

 

I like Paul’s turn of the phrase, speaking the truth in love. It’s got a ring to it.

It’s not waxing and waning and waxing worse in the King James vernacular, but it sounds like good modern-day Bible talk.

Speaking the truth in love.

Many of you who read their Bibles know that these words are from Paul’s letter to the churches in Galatia. They speak of Christian maturity.  We should be able to communicate better with each other than those who do not know God.

Why is this coming up again? 

We just finished a chapter about a believer who didn’t believe but was in the midst of the congregation defying God and even mocking him.  That dog don’t hunt!  But it was hunting in Corinth, and Paul was down to the last option.

Turn him over to Satan so that his sinful nature, which actively wars against God, might be destroyed and his soul saved on the Day of the Lord.

Somebody along the way should have spoken to this guy in a spirit of love and tried to bring him to the Lord in words and deeds. The congregation ignored the problem or even embraced their freedom by practicing terrible things.

That dog don’t hunt! Apparently, there had been no previous effort to talk with this man and see what was going on with him that caused him to desire his old self more than the new creation he was intended to be.

Remember, this was Greece at the beginning of the Church Age. The Greeks were well known for their language, which covered the known world and their thinking.  Those great orators began a long-standing tradition of logic, thinking, perception, and decision-making only a few hundred years earlier.

The Greeks liked to cuss and discuss. Their nature as Greeks was to talk it out. But nobody talked to this guy who was getting booted out of the fellowship.

We should never get there. We need to talk things out.

Paul gives us general counsel for conflicts between or among believers. He said the last resort is to take another believer to a secular court. He said to get it worked out.

Just who is he to say this?

Jesus said it first. His directions might also include disputes with those who don’t follow Jesus, but Paul was focused on the church that belonged to, served, and worshiped Jesus.

Work it out.

I still think fondly of my time as a counselor in prison. After a few months, I smiled every time an inmate client approached the door to my office, paused, and walked away.

Later on, some would tell me that when they turned away it was because they knew before we talked about whatever the burning issue was, I would ask them:

·       How does this get your closer to getting out of here?

·       How does this help you stay out of facilities like this one?

·       What is the most profitable course of action available to you?

Understand that inmates live in very limited geography and have few possessions, and if for some reason they lost their recreation time or had their Ramen confiscated. That could be big time trauma for these supposedly hardened criminals.

It didn’t take much for an inmate to have a crisis. Surely, these wrongs came at the hands of the prison administration, an evil streak in a correctional officer, or perhaps the moon phase.

When you are locked up because you got caught and convicted for doing something wrong, your human nature rears its head looking for any and everything done to you that might have wronged you in some way.

You put out your own personal BOLO: Be on the lookout for anything that wrongs me. I hope you never get to understand that firsthand.

But after a few months, many would walk to my door, pause, and walk away knowing the coming questions. Why do I tell you this?

It took a lot of conversation to get to this point.

It took a lot of talking and listening to get to this point!

To reach this point, it took a conceptual and practical understanding of efficacy, which most of the senior staff didn’t grasp.

It took some work to get to this point.

In my mind, it was worth it. Having inmates ask themselves if what they think they want can get them any closer to their goals.

That took much conversation. It took work. It’s not stacking heavy bales of hay work or carrying a hundred-pound pack and twenty pounds of mortar rounds up the hill work, but it still requires focus, engagement of some sort of effort, and comes with the hope of producing something profitable.

Work!

But sometimes, the offense seemed so egregious that my standing questions didn’t help. What to do? What can you do?

Just be wronged.

Just accept the transgression against you without a hearing, without a chance to present your case, and without what would surely be the most just outcome, at least as you see it.

That was tough for an inmate to swallow. Your justice might be no justice at all, at least in the moment, but you are not taking the wrong exit on the interstate of getting to and keeping freedom.

As I said, that was tough for an inmate to swallow.

That’s tough for us to swallow!

But that is precisely Paul’s counsel. If you can’t work it out with another believer, you are better off just being wronged. You are better off not seeking redress if it must come from outside of the church.

If you have to go to a state or federal court to get justice with another believer, you are better off just to be wronged.

But should it come to this? No.

Believers should be the best communicators on the planet. We should speak in a spirit of love and listen in the same way.

The world doesn’t want you to be good at communication. Satan rejoices when we don’t communicate. We don’t grow much at all without communication. But what have we been taught in our life experiences?

There is the Seagull Model where you swoop in, say what you have to say, and that’s the end. ‘Nuff said.

Why call it the Seagull Model? You swoop in, poop on as many people as you can, and fly away. This is actually a leadership model (not a good one) that had application here.

That’s a wimpy, cowardly approach to communication. We must speak the truth in a spirit of love and receive what other believers are telling us in a spirit of love.

Of course, there is gossip. You never talk to the person or people directly, but you talk about them profusely.

 Remember, we are talking about believers.

Then there is the dialogue of the deaf. These are Stephen Covey's words, but they are on target. Both people, or perhaps many people, are talking at the same time. Nobody is listening.

There are surely others, but these cover upwards of eighty percent of the failed attempts to communicate that we see repeatedly.

But for the believer, none should have standing in their lives.

What is Paul saying?  Work it out.

But, but, but….

Work it out.

You’re mean.

Work it out.

WE CAN’T!

OK, then just be wronged.

Just be wronged!

Communication is a matter of will. I can’t force you to understand me, but I can force myself to keep listening to you until I do. That doesn’t mean tht we will agree, but we will understand each other.

I can do that. Paul’s counsel applies to all believers. We should never have to drag another believer to court.

But it happens. Our selfish human nature does not want to be wrong. We get that, right?  Christians in large numbers take others who are Christians to court all the time.

But our counsel is to work it out.  Work it out!

Let’s say, I take you to court and get what I want, but in the process, we become stumbling blocks for other believers and for non-believers looking for a reason to believe.

Consider the segue statement as Paul is about to change topics.

In our liberation from sin and death, we can do whatever we desire, but not everything is profitable.

Not everything is profitable!

As far as heaven and hell go, the pressure is off for the believer. We know that God has claimed us—yes, with all of our shortcomings—and won’t let us go. He loves us with an everlasting love.

We, as Christians, should be able to communicate with each other better than anyone else on the planet. The pressure is off. We are not headed to a lake of fire. Jesus has a room ready for us.

But when we hit gridlock or are ready to give up on communicating and take this guy or gal to court, don’t. Just be wronged.

This is more profitable in the Kingdom of God than being proven right in a carnal court. Being wronged is not the best possible outcome, but it is more profitable than believers taking each other to court.

But understand this. The best outcomes reside in good communication, with listening to understand being our best tool

Understand that this takes work.

Understand that it takes more work than you think it does.

Understand actual profitability resides in our will as believers to seek accord in Christ.

Understand that being wronged is better than dragging each other’s business into the street or court.

Why spend so much time on this?

Because this is tougher now. We live in the Facebook, TikTok, Twitter, or X world. Things that families would never share before are posted online for a few billion people to see.

Disputes seek an audience online. Parties to the dispute are looking for likes and shares, not real solutions.

This seeking to understand business is a foreign language to our world.

We, as believers, have something of a communication hierarchy that we can derive from the full biblical witness. Here goes:

1.    Work it out.

2.    Try again to work it out.

3.    Ask other believers to help work it out.

4.    Work it out.

5.    Don’t drag each other to court. Work it out.

6.    When you can’t work it out, just be wronged.

The freedom that we enjoy in Christ Jesus is incredible. We don’t fear eternal punishment. We are free to make all sorts of choices as we live out our salvation, but not all options are profitable.

Sometimes, you take it on the chin and press on towards the goal. We don’t typically put that in the church brochure, but if we want to grow in God’s grace, we might not get every transgression against us resolved on our schedule.

But trust God over your own understanding. If divine justice is required, I will trust the only qualified Judge to administer it.

We still use our sound minds, but we should not surrender them to the world because we want justice for us now. Sometimes, be wronged. Move on. Bring glory to God.

As I said, we don’t put that one in the brochure, but we must understand it in our hearts.

Amen.

 

 

In the Middle?

  In the Middle Midst

Rick Warren’s Statement about the crucifixion has a bunch of Christians fired up in controversial responses.

What did he say?

If you’re looking for the real Jesus, not a caricature disfigured by partisan motivations, you’ll find him in the middle, not on either side.

I think he was right on target and off by a hundred miles, but this is what most of the so-called engaged Christians are talking about.

Who?  It’s sort of the equivalent of the Facebook warriors that emerge with each news story. You know, the Chinese balloon experts, the firearms experts, the gender and transgender experts, and whatever the topic of the day is experts.

I think the context here was probably political (right and left) or sexual orientation (straight or gay). What I think Warren was saying was that Jesus wasn’t choosing sides.

He referenced Jesus on the cross between two thieves.  That’s how the hubbub started.

The Saddleback pastor hit the mark but scored an 8 out of 10 in the bullseye. I suggest using the word "midst" instead of "middle."

Jesus is in our midst. He is among saints and sinners. There is no need to decide to whom he stands closer or closest. He is all around us.

We believe in God and that Jesus was God in the flesh. He walked this earth and still calls the crown of his creation to follow him.

How can you come for the sick if you won’t make some house calls? Jesus was in the midst of sinners because that was his mission.

He talked with sinners. He ate with sinners. He rebuked the self-righteous in the presence of sinners.

OBTW—all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Jesus came to heal the sick—the ultimate healing.

I also get the opposition to his statement because of the word “middle.”  Placing Jesus closer to one person or one group or cause, even if it’s the middle, just seems a bit off.

What do we do?  We are Cumberland Presbyterians, known for our grace. Known for calling whosoever to repent and believe. We are the frontier church that said the covered wagons are outrunning the word of God.

We are also a denomination considered to have a median theology. As that sounds, we are in the middle, and with good reason.

We teach, train, and make disciples from the center.  What’s that?  The undisputable stuff.

We believe in the Trinity:  Father, Son, and Spirit. It’s the second item in our Confession of Faith, but we had the good sense not to codify what each part of the Trinity does. God has three biblical manifestations: Father, Son, and Spirit. That’s the deal.

How each works is left to our biblical studies and the exhortations of someone standing behind or near a pulpit. We should have a heart to explore these.

We believe in God’s love for humankind, that he is always working—even though he modeled for us a Sabbath, and that mercy and grace are his trademarks.

We believe that God is love.

Now, we may vary somewhat in our baptisms. Immersion, pouring, and sprinkling are all just fine. We are not going to strain any gnats here.

We know that the Spirit of God is doing the work. The real victory in the water baptism is the believer's obedience to God.

We have a fair understanding of disputable matters. What are those?

These are the things on the periphery, not central to salvation, but we should explore them with abandon.

This brings us to James Hendrix. I loved James, and I love you guys, too, but James and I were kindred spirits. We liked to explore the edges without fear of our beliefs being challenged.

I don’t advise this if you are early in your faith. Eat a lot of spiritual meat for a while before taking on these morsels.

Don’t ignore them. Just don’t make them central.  There is good stuff along the perimeter; we can dig into it without fear because we are grounded in what is central and essential.

Let's press on with what we know so well and explore with great expectations those we do not, bringing glory to God all the way.

Amen.

 

 

Give Him the Boot!

 Read 1 Corinthians 5

I love this quote. Courage is knowing this is probably going to hurt but doing it anyway. Stupidity is the same. That’s why life is hard.

It is by Jeremy Goldberg, or at least, it is attributed to him. I don’t follow this guy, but this quote popped up in some search I was doing, so I checked him out. He seems to be a good person with good intentions: My mission is to make kindness cool, empathy popular, and compassion commonplace.

Why is the preacher delving into this secular stuff?  I thought you told us to trust God!

God did not give us a spirit of fear, but of power, love and a sound mind. We are to use our sound minds.

One of the things our Bibles tell us is to no longer conform to the patterns of this world but to be transformed by renewing our minds. I like to examine thinking and logic. I look for logical fallacies when I encounter a new thought or approach.

If it holds up through that, then I see how it aligns with scripture. If it doesn’t, I’m through with it for the most part. Sometimes, I feel the need to confront if it looks like it’s leading Christians to wickedness.

With my retirement from this pastorate on the near horizon, I have thought about what might be next for me in ordained ministry. Perhaps it will be a season for confronting this wickedness. If I believe it will produce a good return, then look out.

Back to my quote. Courage is knowing this is probably going to hurt but doing it anyway. Stupidity is the same. That’s why life is hard.

What in life is hard?  Paying bills? That’s not a lot of fun, but it's not that difficult. Budgeting so we can pay our bills is more complex, and many succumb to stress or anxiety.

What in life is hard? Reading my Bible?  Reading is not that difficult. Surrendering to God, trusting him over our own understanding, and putting his words into practice is sometimes difficult.

What in life is hard? For some my age, remembering why I walked into this room can be challenging. I remember the law of cosine from high school. I never needed it once but I remember it. And for those who don’t know this law, it has nothing to do with getting mom or dad to sign a car loan with you.

But why am I in this room?

Let’s get down to the rat killing. This is difficult in local church bodies. Telling someone who is practicing wickedness without remorse the need to confess his or her sin and fix this.

That’s tough, especially when we anchor ourselves to the verses about not judging. But sometimes, something has to be said or done, not in condemnation but in love.

Somebody needs to say, “That dog don’t hunt,” and do it in love.

Locally, we have dealt with this once in this century when close family members displayed romantic practices in the worship service. This was the early service, so most were unaware. We love children coming into the church building; we just don’t want to conceive them there.

The session met and dealt with it and the family kept coming.

But somebody had to talk with them.

It was a challenging matter to address, but we did it and kept the believers in the body. Often, people converse with their feet and stop coming.

What exactly did Paul tell the church in Corinth to do?  Kick a guy out. Why?

He was sleeping with his father’s wife. Most think that this was his stepmother or possibly there was plural marriage, and this was a wife who was not mother to the man in question.

It could have been a trophy wife. In the spirit of full disclosure, I will tell you that I am a trophy husband. It’s a participation trophy, but a trophy nonetheless.

I will have to figure out how to take that one with me when it’s my time. You all don’t like my singing voice, but I’m doing the song.

…and my trophies at last I lay down.

Corinth was in Greece, but this was not an episode of Oedipus the King by Sophocles.

We are most likely talking about a stepmother. Paul noted that even the pagans don’t put up with that!

So, Paul told them to boot this guy out of the fellowship of believers. If he wants to be a pagan so much, give him what he wants and have nothing to do with him.

That doesn’t only mean that he can’t come to the worship service and Bible study. Don’t go to lunch with him. Don’t connect on social media. Don’t go over to his house.

How mean!

No!  Let’s go with how merciful. Why did Paul say to do this? Do this so that his soul might be saved on the Day of the Lord.

What?

Give him the boot so his flesh may be destroyed, and he will be saved.

What?

We need to understand the Greek word for flesh. It is sarx.  Here are the typical translations. This is from Strongs (4561).

- The physical body or human nature (e.g., John 1:14, "The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us").

- Human nature in its frailty and susceptibility to sin (e.g., Romans 7:18, "I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my flesh").

- The sinful nature or the aspect of humanity that is opposed to the Spirit (e.g., Galatians 5:17, "For the flesh craves what is contrary to the Spirit").

I want to give you all three if you want to dig down more, but I think in this case Paul is talking about what is opposed to the Spirit of God.

Why does it matter?

I think you will find that we all fall short. We give into our human nature.

But we do not all take up arms against the Lord. We don’t all oppose him.  Understand, I am talking Christians here.

Paul noted that he wasn’t going down the rabbit trails of what the pagans do. That’s between them and God.

Paul was writing to those who have declared JESUS IS LORD!

Paul was talking to those commissioned to make disciples, baptize, and teach.

Paul was talking to the body of Christ.

Paul was talking to those who should have spoken the truth in love to this man instead of boasting about it. Yes, it seems that the congregation was having a little lockerroom banter about this, bragging, if you will.

The ability to speak the truth in a spirit of love is one mark of growth and maturity in believers.

How does any of this apply to our lives?

·       We got through our chapter for the week. Let’s go with that.

·       Consider our sinful nature that rebels against God and wickedness, which actively fights against the Spirit of God. Now dig down.

·       When it is the sinful nature at work in our brothers and sisters, pray for them, encourage them, walk with them, challenge them, support them, have fellowship with them, and love them as your own.

·       When it is wickedness, stand firm in opposition. Be strong. Hold your ground.

The good news is that most of the time, we work on our own failings, pray for and encourage others as they do the same, and fellowship with others who are also failing—there are many of us.

But we don't give an inch when it is time to hold our ground. When we are up against wickedness, we might be mistaken for mean people, but we won’t budge

So, what do we do here?

Let’s scour the ranks of the congregation for wickedness and run it out of town. Let’s leave no stone unturned. Let’s be like Saul heading to Damascus.

Or not. Wickedness usually rears its head all by itself. We don’t need to launch a purge. We don’t need to be on a mission to kick people out of this congregation.

We all fall short. We are not all in league with the devil.  When wickedness comes, we hold our ground.

So, as far as wickedness goes, we don’t need to do anything most of the time? Are you letting us off that easily? Really?

Yes, we can kick people out of the body, but we have plenty to do working on ourselves most of the time. Do you remember commit, learn, and grow? We are working on ourselves, knowing that we will reach our destination because God said he would finish this work.

Does anyone remember make disciples, baptize, and teach? That’s what we do.

It is 2025, so I get a new quota for my military analogies.  Here it is.

We, the body of Christ, are the active duty forces. We are always on alert. We are growing nearer to God and making disciples while still working on ourselves.

We are also the reserve forces. We respond when called. We battle evil and wickedness when they try to penetrate our lines.

How do we discern the two? I’m going to use a phrase from a fairly well-known case decided by the Supreme Court of the United States regarding hard-core pornography. Potter White wrote in a concurring opinion, “I know it when I see it.”

 

As far as wickedness goes, if we stay tuned in, connected to, and engaged with the Spirit of God, we will know evil and wickedness when we see it.

Most of the time, we work on ourselves. Those within the family of faith should know fellowship and deny it entirely to those set against the Spirit of God—those who have declared war against God by their words and deeds.

Anything else aids and comforts the enemy. The common term for that is treason.

This whole chapter speaks of God’s mercy, even the expulsion and cold shoulder approach to the one allied with the enemy.

For those in the body, commit, learn, and grow in God’s grace as we make disciples, baptize, and teach.

Life can be tough, but it doesn’t have to consume us. We are on call to defend this body. We are always working on ourselves and sharing the good news with others.

Some of you might still want to do a purge. I get that, and I am willing to go along with it, well, with one condition. What condition?

For every person you want to kick out, bring in 12 more who are just as bad or worse. What? They will take over.

In a secular organization, you would be correct. But we have not had a chance to share the gospel with these new folks we call wicked.

We have not talked with them about the love of God that we know so well.

We have not read the Bible with them and dug deep for understanding that can be implemented.

If they hold fast to the flesh—to the point they are at war with God’s spirit—kick them out as well.

But let’s do what we are commissioned to do before giving them the boot.

Let me put it this way. If we are hunting down evil and wickedness so we can kick it out, how are we keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus?

We will stand and hold our ground when it’s time to fight evil in our midst, but that is not number one on our list of priorities.

·       Love God. Love one another.

·       Commit, learn, grow.

·       Make disciples, baptize, teach.

We are always ready to fight evil, but God gave us higher priorities for most of the time.

For today, eyes fixed on Jesus and growing in our discipleship will be enough.

Amen.

I don't even judge myself!

 Read 1 Corinthians 4

Paul said that he didn’t even judge himself.  That’s a statement right there!

I don’t even judge myself.

That’s Paul. Surely that’s not for us. Is it?

Realize that Paul explained that people are not qualified to judge others. Our human nature kicks in, and we condemn more than we discern.

You might be thinking, I get judged yearly on my performance evaluation. I hope not. I hope that it measures value. Judgment or discernment is involved in the evaluation process. We judge or assess the amount, number, or value of something.

We are not venturing any further into performance evaluations. Let’s focus on judging, specifically Paul's comment about not judging himself.

Among the tougher jobs that I had as a Marine officer was as a Summary Court. Yes, one individual can be assigned as the whole court.

In the court, I was the prosecutor, defendant’s counsel, clerk, and judge. I did get a Marine to serve as bailiff to get other witnesses, evidence, or coffee. It sounds easy enough—you do the whole thing.

You think it would be easy. You only have to sort things out for yourself. You are missing out if that’s what you believe. You don’t know the joy of objecting to your own questions. It does get you ready for marriage, though. So much for the rabbit trail.

The hardest part was getting the defendants to say something good about themselves. These young Marines knew they screwed up and were ready to pay the price. But as their legal counsel, you wanted to put their best side forward, even if you had to pull it out of them.

I say all of this to make a simple point. We are not prepared to judge another person. Our courts do the best they can, but what about the believer and his or her relationship with God? What about us?

Shouldn’t we judge ourselves? Wouldn’t it be nice to have a practice test? Don’t you want to know where you stand with the Lord?

Yes, you are forgiven, but what have you done with your life since you were forgiven and saved?  Jesus paid it all. All to him I owe. I get that. It’s all him.

Wouldn’t it be nice to see where we stand before we stand before the Lord?

We can. We have a judge available to us all the time. It’s like an app. The word of God judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

Paul didn’t need the approval of the Corinthians or Ephesians or even the Hebrew people.  God alone would judge him and if he wanted to know where he stood, he could consult God’s word, which Paul knew so well.

So today, I say:

·       Don’t be subject to what others think of you. That’s outside of your purview.

·       Don’t decide based on how others might react. Just do the right thing.

·       Do what your Master tells you to do. Its right there in black and white. Some of it might be in red.

·       Don’t judge yourself. Be receptive to what God’s word says about you, but don’t get wrapped up in others' judgment of you.

·       Don’t beat yourself up. None of you surprised God when you fell short. I might be the only one who surprised him with how far outside the lines I was coloring.

Do those and you will have a humble confidence. You will also have someone who is always upset with you.

Elsewhere, Paul noted that one should get along with everyone as much as possible. If one does not get along with someone, one should make sure it is not the Lord that one offends.

Let the word of God be your judge. Focus on practicing the Lord’s words, learning from him, and pouring yourself into your discipleship.

Amen.

We are not there yet, but will be...

 Read 1 Corinthians 4

Imagine walking into a worship service where the music is loud, voices of praise to God are louder, and hands are raised. Amens and hallelujahs abound.

People at this worship service are motivated to worship God. They are motivated.                   

We Cumberlands are just fine raising our hands or sitting on them.

We are balanced. By that, I mean that people are equally bored with the sermon and the hymn selections.

Sometimes, I wish we were as visibly excited about worshiping God as we are about our sports teams. Can’t we get motivated?

I like motivation. I like enthusiasm. I love getting pumped up about something.

But it is our commitment that gets us to the goal, our commitment to press on, and our commitment that gets us through the lows.

It is commitment that stays the course.

In the adult Sunday school class, we often ask when we were closest to God. The most common answer is in our lows, our trials, or our suffering.  That’s not my answer.

I feel closest to God when I am bringing glory to his name. When is that?

When I commit to take his yoke.

When I commit to learn from him.

When I commit to put his words into practice.

When I commit to this relationship: JESUS IS LORD.

Motivation is wonderful. Everyone should get a good Motofix now and then. One of the cool things about preaching is that you get to make up your own words. It’s in the dictionary.  Ok, it’s my dictionary on the computer, and it gives me the option to add to the dictionary.

Commitment gets you to the endzone.  I like my metaphors freshly out of season.

Commitment gets you to the finish line.

Commitment is essential to growth.

Let’s get to the letter. Paul was a writer. He wrote about half of the New Testament over just under 20 years.

I think that Paul got paid by the word. They were good words. His stuff is still on best-seller lists.

He was an apostle, a pharisee, a Hebrew, and a Roman citizen, but make no mistake: Paul had significant mastery of at least one language. He used it to communicate with believers far away.

Paul was excited to have planted this church. He saw many gifts in these people, but he also saw problems and difficulties of many sorts. There were lingering pagan practices, little communion among believers, and fellowship fell short.

There were things to work on, but Paul was in Ephesus.

Camps were being formed as to who followed whom.  These folks needed a visit or at least a good letter.  The letter would have to suffice for now.

You think Paul could have just uploaded a TED talk. I would have liked to have heard this TED talk. It might have contained a little hyperbole.

You Corinthians have finished the race in record time. You have received your Victor’s Crown and are reigning.

Wow! How I wish I had your insight and knowledge of God. If we, who are apostles, could only catch the idiom of what you are doing, we would have it made.

As it is, we still struggle. We often live at the poverty level. Sometimes we are well received, but we still get beaten and run out of town from time to time.

This is the race God has set us upon. Why?

So many may come to know the love of God through Christ Jesus. So some could be saved.

Paul challenged this body of believers to answer a simple question: Are you really there yet? Has everything been fulfilled already?

Are we on some sort of self-actualization high?

Are you really there, yet?

This is Paul’s style of saying the more you know, the more you need to know—the more you realize, we have miles to go.  There is a whole bunch beyond your immediate knowledge that applies when Jesus is your Lord.

The secular concept here is called the Dunning-Krueger Effect. It was first defined in this information age ad got a name at the turn of the last century, but I suspect a rose by any other name has always been with us.

How do you display confidence when you don’t know diddly? You act like you do know it all. You believe you have arrived at your destination and nothing is left to learn. Only after some epiphany can growth genuinely occur.

And that revelation often comes with a considerable humility price tag. Do you know what it’s like to know everything—or at least think that you do—only to discover you have miles and miles to go to comprehend mercy and grace?

When Paul noted that he and some who traveled with him were treated like the dregs of the earth, I don’t think he was complaining.

Remember back to Acts 9, God told Ananias that he would show Paul how much he would suffer for the name of the Lord. Paul knew the calling he had accepted.

Paul was not complaining. As we read more in this letter, we will see him explain that we all have our part in the body of Christ. We each have gifts, some the same, others not.

Paul flips what could have continued as division. You don’t have to choose between Paul and Apollos. The Lord gave both roles, tasks, gifts, and authority.

You need only follow Jesus. God alone will judge whether you used your gifts and talents well or capriciously. God alone will judge.

Paul noted that only God would judge him, not Romans, Greeks, or believers in Corinth.   

We should all do what God has called us and gifted us to do, but we must all realize that we are not there yet. We deceive ourselves when we think we are.

We may have arrived in some areas, or we are getting close.

Our beliefs may be solid, but on rare occasions, we may wrestle with doubt. Life can be tough, and times can be tougher than we thought we could handle. With God, we get through them, but we might struggle.

Perhaps we forgive easily, but is there a person or two that don’t make the forgiveness cut? In your mind, was their trespass unforgivable? Was it so much that you would mock God by disobeying him? He gave very stern warnings at the end of the Lord’s prayer.

Perhaps you are a prayer warrior. You pray without ceasing, but do your prayers spend nearly enough time on thanksgiving? Are we truly living a thankful life every day or just on occasion?

Do you listen? Can you wait patiently upon the Lord? Can we truly trust God?

Perhaps none of us are there yet.

Paul noted that he would instead work on this now via correspondence, hoping not to have to show up ready to chew out these new believers who were only slightly removed from paganism. He wanted it to be a joyful reunion when he returned to Corinth.

We will discuss this whole new creation business further, but for now, remember that you are still a work in progress. We don’t boast in ourselves that we have done so much.

We seek to humbly walk with our Lord, knowing with certainty that he will complete the work he began in us. We are not there yet but, on our way, and assured of our destination.

We will have ups and downs, highs and lows, but we must continually grow.

So, what does that look like?

·       Be encouraged but not satisfied.

·       Be confident but not complacent or boastful

·       Be self-correcting without feeling that it’s all on us.

·       Endure your trials and even suffering, knowing that God will use your circumstances for some sort of good.

Here’s one:  Walk humbly with your God who loves you more than you understand. Let’s keep going.

·       Be humble in your salvation.

·       Receive correction.

·       Do what God has called and equipped you to do.

·       Take his yoke.

·       Learn from him.

·       Put his words into practice

Those should sound familiar. Of course, there are other things to help us bring glory to God, but for now, let’s take our lesson from Paul’s letter and work on these things.

We do not do it because Paul will visit us if we don’t.

It is not because Paul will send us a letter. He already has. He sent this one to Corinth first.

We do it because we will all stand before God, and we want to hear "well done, good and faithful servant."

That’s not a conditional statement. We will all stand before God!

Let’s do our best to live humbly now, seek growth, and enjoy what God has in store for his faithful servants.

Let’s do our best to let the word of God judge the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

We know we are not there yet.  Today, I ask—it’s a big ask—to commit everything to the Lord.

Commit, learn, and grow, for we are not there yet, but we surely belong to him.

Commit.

Amen