Until Next Time, Corinth

Transcript

Good morning, Saints. You all look beautiful this morning because I see Jesus in you, and he is beautiful. It’s really, really been encouraging to sing with you guys this morning. It’s, yeah, it’s blessed my soul. So incredibly, incredibly encouraged. Grateful to be here, grateful to get to worship with my brothers and sisters. Well, friends, we find ourselves back in Paul’s first letter to the Corinthian church, 1 Corinthians, and we find ourselves in chapter 16. So if you have your Bibles, I’d like to invite you to open them to chapter 16 of 1 Corinthians, and we’re going to read through the whole chapter as we draw our series to a close. And it’s a lengthier reading, so I’ll allow all of you to stay seated, and I’ll show grace as the Lord has shown so much of to me. It’s just my little way of giving back.

This is the word of God. It reads,

Now concerning the collection for the saints, as I directed the churches of Galatia, so you also are to do. On the first day of every week, each of you is to put something aside and store it up, as he may prosper, so that there will be no collecting when I come. And when I arrive, I will send those whom you accredit by letter to carry your gift to Jerusalem. If it seems advisable that I should go also, they will accompany me. I will visit you after passing through Macedonia, for I intend to pass through Macedonia, and perhaps I will stay with you, or even spend the winter, so that you may help me on my journey wherever I go. For I do not want to see you now just in passing. I hope to spend some time with you, if the Lord permits.

— 1 Corinthians 16

(ESV)

But I will stay in Ephesus until Pentecost, for a wide door for effective work has opened to me, and there are many adversaries. When Timothy comes, see that you put him at ease among you, for he is doing the work of the Lord as I am. So let no one despise him. Help him on his way in peace, that he may return to me, for I am expecting him with the brothers. Now concerning our brother Apollos, I strongly urged him to visit you with the other brothers, but it was not at all his will to come now. He will come when he has opportunity. Be watchful, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong. Let all that you do be done in love. Now I urge you, brothers, you know that the household of Stephanus were the first converts in Achaia, and that they have devoted themselves to the service of the saints.

— 1 Corinthians 16

(ESV)

Be subject to such as these, and to every fellow worker and laborer. I rejoice at the coming of Stephanus and Fortunatus and Achaicus, because they have made up for your absence, for they refreshed my spirit as well as yours. Give recognition to such people. The churches of Asia send you greetings. Aquila and Prisca, together with the church in their house, send you hearty greetings in the Lord. All the brothers send you greetings. Greet one another with a holy kiss. I, Paul, write this greeting with my own hand. If anyone has no love for the Lord, let him be accursed. Our Lord, come. The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you. May love be with you all. And my love be with you all in Christ Jesus, amen.

— 1 Corinthians 16

(ESV)

This is the word of the Lord. Well friends, we’ve reached the end of our study of 1 Corinthians.

Until Next Time, Corinth

We’ve spent the last couple of months going through our series titled Christian Living in the Current of Culture, and now we’ve reached the end of our series. And I’ve titled this sermon, Until Next Time, Corinth. There’s a two-part meaning to this title. The first is, I really hope this isn’t the last time that any of us read 1 Corinthians. And I hope that this will be a continued study for each of us as we continue to delve into the truths and the beauty and the power of the word of God. And as we continue to study the Bible, as we continue on in our Christian walk, this is one of those books that we should be coming back to regularly to reflect upon our walk, our approach to others, our ministries, our being led by the Spirit, and so on and so on. The other is, because we see this right here in the title, Paul wants to see these people

again. And we’ll circle back around to that and we’ll touch on that briefly. But we’ve had a chance to dig into this beautiful yet challenging letter that Paul wrote to the Christians living in an intensely pagan and an intensely anti-Christian society. And in this letter, what he’s done in writing these folks and in encouraging them is he’s calling them to unity in Christ. He’s rebuking their hands-off approach to an immoral relationship going on in the church. He’s speaking to them about legal matters. He’s speaking to them about marriage and singleness, their witness in the culture. He writes them about male and female roles and leadership. He writes to them about the Lord’s Supper, about spiritual gifts, about the resurrection as we just spent time studying. And all that to say, over the course of the study, we’ve had a chance to cover a lot of

ground. And now we find ourselves in this final chapter, which is full of concluding remarks and parting thoughts. And I think a lot of us, when we come to passages like this one, where we read these kind of concluding remarks, we kind of just gloss over and we’re like, well, where’s the meat? You know, where’s the hearty stuff? I would argue that this is a very, very meaty, hearty portion of 1 Corinthians. And it’s not by coincidence that the Holy Spirit saw fit to pass this portion of Scripture onto us. As Paul offers his final thoughts to the church, he seems to be focusing on this one very important theme over the course of the chapter, and that is this theme of work, specifically doing the work of ministry. Look back at our chapter. Take a look at verse 9, for a wide door for effective work has opened to me.

And then again at verse 10, when Timothy comes, see that you put him at ease among you for he is doing the work of the Lord. And jump ahead to verse 15, now I urge you, brothers, you know that the household of Stephanas were the first converts and that they’ve devoted themselves to the service of the saints or the work of the saints. And jump ahead to verse 16, be subject to such as these and to every fellow worker and laborer. This continued topic just kind of comes up over and over throughout the chapter as he’s giving these final thoughts to these saints. And then he gives several examples of faithfulness in work, of faithful ministry, of a faithful Christian walk, and he names these people all throughout the chapter. And all that he says to these people as he ends this very instructional letter to them

draws back to living this life that’s wholly given over to the work of ministry, to what God is doing, not only in this church, but beyond the walls of this church as well. A life that in every way is changed by the gospel, a life that in every way is led by the Spirit, and a life that is redirected to live for God and for the building up of his church. Now even with the problems that we see in 1 Corinthians and in the Corinthian church, all of the need for correction that Paul offers and the continued work that needs to be done there, what Paul does here is fantastic, it’s beautiful. He speaks affectionately to these people. Now he could really go for it with these people. He could really just continue a whole chapter of just rebukes and just be like, I’m out.

And just end it on that. And then he’s like, let the Lord judge you, I leave you for him. But that’s not how he ends the letter. He shows them love. He takes these people that are struggling, like in a very real sense, and he calls them to participate in his gospel ministry. He cares for them by continuing to think through, well, who’s going to visit these people after they receive this letter? Who’s going to spend time with them? Who’s going to invest into them? Who’s going to love these people? He thinks of them, he encourages them, and then he tells them that he loves them. Paul continues to show Jesus to the Corinthian believers, and friends, this should be an important lesson for all of us, navigating relationships with people with whom we disagree, and people who we might find offensive at times. And I can tell you, I’m pretty sure that Paul was offended by things he saw in Corinth,

deeply offended, and yet he loves these people. In the previous chapter, Paul focuses on the resurrection in great detail. He focuses on the sting of death being gone, and that we have lasting hope now. And if you haven’t listened to the four sermons that our pastors, Thomas and Greg, walked us through, chapter 15, I’d invite you to go back and listen to those. Those were a wonderful reminder of the hope of the gospel, namely, in that we will die, but we won’t die. Spoiler alert. And now here, Paul goes from eternity, these big, grandiose concepts of the eternal, defeating death, to very, very practical things. From the defeat of death to day-to-day matters, from the doctrinal to the intensely practical. So let’s dig into our chapter and look at it in four parts, and what we’re going to look at is we’re going to look at the topic of giving, the topic of ministry, we’re going

Giving as Unto the Lord

to look at an exhortation that Paul offers, and then we’re going to look at the Christian life in action. Let’s take a look at the topic of giving first, and I’ve titled this point Giving as Unto the Lord. And this is kind of to draw our attention to this concept that we see in Colossians 3, of Paul writing to that church and saying, all that you do, do as unto the Lord. The chapter begins with this phrase, now concerning, which as we’ve seen before, as we’ve been studying 1 Corinthians, this is him addressing something that they’ve either asked about or circling back to a previous ongoing conversation with these Christians. So what’s going on with this conversation about giving? Well, there are several reasons for the collection of funds to be collected and sent over to these believers living in Jerusalem, and there’s a great need there.

And so he’s kind of circling back to this thing that they likely have been thinking about or have heard about or, you know, that has been brought to their attention. One of the reasons why this is a really, really important thing for them to be thinking about is that following Jesus was an incredibly costly thing at this time. And you just think about the spiritual landscape of Jerusalem, think Judaism, but also Roman rule. So on all sides, these Christians were facing intense opposition. And so doing so, following Jesus, not only removes certain opportunities to make money, think, you know, Christians having to now do business honestly, no more cutting corners, and that inhibits, you know, how much money you can make and how successful you can be in business. And it also presents challenges with accruing wealth or doing business, think the limitations

of persecution. Oh, you’re a Christian? No, I don’t want to do business. I don’t want to buy what you’re selling. And so Christians were really, like, pushed out of the marketplace. A lot of these businesses were struggling to stay afloat. And so this was a really challenging thing for these Christians. And as if that weren’t hard enough, as it is, what was actually happening in Jerusalem at the time of the writing of this letter is that there was a famine happening in Jerusalem and there was an economic crisis happening in Jerusalem. So even if you could make money, even if there was none of this persecution, none of the antagonism that these Christians were facing, just politically and economically and socially, it was a really, really difficult time for these saints. And so Christians were called to provide and care for their neighbors, especially those

who, you know, were just coming to faith. And so these Christians in Jerusalem are, you know, in the midst of this challenging situation are still thinking about their brothers and sisters that are coming into the church. And so this notice of what’s happening in Jerusalem is going out to these other churches and other regions of praying for Jerusalem and thinking about Jerusalem and providing for Jerusalem. All that to say, tough times abounded for the saints in Jerusalem. And so here Paul is saying, hey, we can’t ignore that. We can’t just kind of gloss over and just be like, hey, everything’s like kind of cool in Corinth and we’re all doing OK. And, you know, my bills are being paid and our church is cared for and we have enough food on the table. He’s like, no, no, no, that’s not how that’s not how this works anymore.

If you’re a Christian, if you’re a follower of Jesus and another Christian in region X is struggling, you can’t be indifferent to that. And so he’s writing to the Corinthians, he’s writing to other regions in Galatia, and he’s saying we have to care for these people. We have to provide for them. Now before I comment more on giving note, what Paul says specifically on when and how on the first day of every week. Why is that? Why is that important? Why this day? And I just want to touch on this really briefly. Jesus resurrection was on the first day of the week. The way that people knew that he was resurrected was his appearance to the disciples on the first day of the week. In Revelation 1, John refers to the first day of the week as the Lord’s day. And all throughout church history, going back to really the second century A.D., we see

that Christians would gather on the first day of the week, regularly meeting for worship. And so there’s a reason that we meet on Sundays. We’re part of a long line of saints. And so beloved, learn to see yourselves as part of the church, capital C, all throughout history. We can talk more about Sunday versus Saturday worship, Sabbath, all of these. That’s a lengthier discussion, and there’s a lot to be said there. But I think that it’s important for us to not, not to like distance ourselves or separate ourselves from the church throughout history and how things have been done. And this is where reading church history is fascinating, because if you read a lot of the early accounts, you see that our worship services, although modernized in many ways with a lot of, you know, modern accoutrement, we still are doing things more or less exactly

like they were done in the early church. People would gather. They would sing songs. They would pray. Somebody would read the word. Somebody would explain the word. People would give. People would encourage one another. They’d have fellowship, and then they’d break bread. So there’s a historic precedent, and there’s a biblical precedent for how we worship. Gathering on Sundays, these Corinthians were to give to the needs of the saints. Now notice, what Paul is not doing is he’s not telling them to give a set amount. He’s not saying, hey, give 10%, give 15%. He’s telling them to give a proportion of what God has given them as a part of their regular worship. Our giving should be voluntary. There’s no command in the New Testament for tithing. It’s an Old Testament command. We have guidelines on giving, but there’s nothing on tithing and a certain percentage

that we’re given in the New Testament. Our giving should be regular on the first day. It should be proportional as he may prosper, as Paul writes. And so a good principle for how we give is, does it maybe hurt a little bit? Is it costing me something to give? Is it, do I feel it when I support ministries and support brothers and sisters and give to the church? Is this something that is just kind of frivolous and thoughtless for me and I just kind of like put aside my three or four or 5% or whatever, you know, I’ve kind of allotted to the giving of the work of ministry? Or is it something that I actually feel and something that maybe hurts a bit? The New Testament doesn’t tell us to tithe. This is something that was specific to Israel. And if we’re going to say that, no, no, no, we still have to tithe, well, you know, I

got news for you. Israel tithed a lot more than 10%. If you count up everything that Israel was called to tithe and give, it was more like in the range of 25 to 30%, right Jan? Yes. Our resident Old Testament and Hebrew scholar. So it was closer to a quarter or a third of everything that you not just make that month, but everything that you own. This concept is not given in the New Testament, but rather what we’re taught in the New Testament is to give gladly and to give generously to the ministry of the gospel and to help fellow brothers and sisters. Again, this isn’t set amount, but we are told to give gladly. And 2 Corinthians 9 tells us that the Lord loves a cheerful giver. And then we see in Mark 12, Jesus points to the poor widow who gives her last might and

says that she has given more than all of the people who came before her who were giving a lot more money than a might. Why? Because it was generosity and worship. And she wanted to give what she had to the Lord. She wanted to worship with her money and it costs her everything. I’m not saying you need to go clear out your bank account and donate it to, you know, the work of ministry. But I am saying that when we give, we need to be intentional about that. We need to worship with how we give. We need to think about why and how we’re called to do so. Friends, God doesn’t need our money, but we have an opportunity to bless and to care for others with what he provides for us. We have an opportunity to worship him with how we use our resources.

Again, we can say a lot about this, but the heart of this is how you give and how you utilize the resources that God provides for you, how you use the money from the paycheck from the job that God has given you. Do you do so because you want to honor him with what he’s given you or do you do so out of some sense of duty, thinking that, well, I have to give this amount? If so, friends, this should be worship and this should be out of a desire to bless and to love and to care for the people around us. Notice also that when speaking about money and when speaking about giving, Paul is distancing himself from the money. He’s not the one in charge of it. He’s not the one who’s carrying the money. He’s not saying, well, just send it to me and I’ll take care of it and I’ll bring it.

No, he’s saying, no, no, you guys choose somebody and if need be, I’ll join, but I don’t really need to be there. So he’s distancing himself from that. He’s creating accountability. He’s removing this question or this doubt of, is Paul just like this money-hungry spiritual leader that’s using this whole church thing and Christianity thing for his own gain? He wants there to be no cause for stumbling in his ministry, no questions about his ministry and about his integrity. There’s a lot of wisdom about being cautious with money to not allow for sin to creep in, especially as it pertains to those in positions of leadership and positions of power. But for all of us, really, we need to live our lives in such a way where there’s not a question about whether we love money more than seeing it as a resource and seeing it

as something that the Lord provides to care for us and provide for us. And then in verse three, Paul says that he will send those whom the congregation approves. Does that sound familiar? Whom the congregation approves? Congregationalism, right? Hey, that’s good. See, he entrusts these very Christians, yes, these very Christians, these immature Corinthians, these struggling Corinthians with the making of a decision and the giving of responsibility to take care of money to provide for people in need. And Paul’s not doing that because he’s foolish or because he’s frivolous or he doesn’t care. Paul is doing that because he believes in the Holy Spirit working in people who may not necessarily look like it or are in root or are in process and who are developing and growing and yet he’s still not saying, well, okay, maybe when they mature, then we’ll kind of entrust them with the responsibility.

No, he’s saying these are God’s people and the Spirit is in them. And so let’s entrust these people to make that decision and to lead this process of providing for the saints in Jerusalem. It’s a beautiful thing because God is not trusting the Corinthians necessarily, but he’s trusting the Holy Spirit in the Corinthians. Now don’t miss the fact that the money collected was used to care for and provide for the needs of other Christians. Care and love for those in need is a beautiful picture of hearts changed by the gospel of Jesus, especially considering the fact that he’s calling Gentiles to care for the needs of Jewish believers. Those Jewish believers who didn’t very much like the Gentiles, there was still some strife and some issues and there was some division going on and these Jewish believers, a lot of them often were struggling to actually see the Gentiles as being brought into the

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Ministry Done God’s Way

fold of God and he’s saying those are the people that we’re going to care for. Those are the people that we’re going to provide for. The people that don’t like us very much struggle to see us as equals. Give generously for those people. Love those people. Pray for those people. Nevertheless, even with those challenges, we see that we should be generous in desires to meet the needs of the people around us, which brings us to our second point in verses five through 12, ministry done God’s way. Ministry done God’s way in contrast to ministry done in the way of people. Take a look at verses five through 12. I’m not going to reread these, but follow along as we walk through both Paul’s missionary journey and his travel plans and his ministry and also the people that he includes in his ministry. In these verses, what Paul is doing is he’s explaining his plans to the Corinthians and

he’s explaining that the Corinthians’ desires are not necessarily what might come to pass. He’s saying, I have these plans, you have these desires, but that’s not necessarily how all of this goes. We can plan for something and we can work towards something, but this is not always how it ends up working out. As Paul journeys through these different regions, as he preaches the gospel, as he helps to plant these churches, as he helps to raise up leaders, he’s continuing to think of and plan on seeing these believers again. He’s thinking about them and he wants to be with them and he says he even wants to be with them for an extended period of time. He’s trying to find a way to come back to them. His desires are good. We can all agree that coming back and equipping and investing into a church that’s struggling,

a church that’s young, a church that really needs some pastoral care, that’s a really, really good desire. But Paul well understands that may not necessarily be what the Lord has in store. And then with that, he’s prepared to stay or go or whatever the Lord decides for him, wherever the Lord leads. He knows that he’ll only be able to go where the Lord opens up a path for him. His own plans may only come to pass if the Lord permits us. We see in verse 7. And isn’t this often the case in our lives? We plan and we work at things and then, you know, we see that the Lord seems to be closing that door. We see that the Lord may be taking something away. And as we do that and as we process that, sometimes that can sting and that can hurt

and that can be confusing. Be like, Lord, this was a good thing that I was working toward. Why would you take that away? And many of you know that my wife and I, we were planning on going overseas to do missions in Belarus and we were planning on it for like nine years. We were going back and forth. We were praying about it. We were talking about it. And that summer that we ended up at Trinity, we were getting ready to move. We’d sold our house. We were living in an apartment and the Lord, you know, allowed for the war in Ukraine to start and that was really close to the border. And then a bunch of things happened, which led us to visit Trinity one Sunday. And then a bunch of things happened with work. And God just kind of put all of these roadblocks along the way and it was incredibly confusing.

But now I look back and I say, wow, what an amazing thing the Lord did in our lives. What a beautiful gift he gave us in giving all of you to us. And I see that it was really not what we had planned. We weren’t even thinking about it, not even a little bit. But the Lord in his kindness redirected our path, even though the plans were good to go overseas and to do missions work. But nevertheless, the Lord redirected our path. And I think that if you’ve been a Christian for any length of time, this has been your story as well. You work at things, you plan for things, and the Lord has something else in store. And sometimes you get to see what a blessing that thing is. Sometimes you don’t. Sometimes you just look forward to heaven where these things will be made a little bit

more clear. But nevertheless, the Lord does what he knows is best. While waiting for that opportunity to go to Corinth, Paul says he ends up walking through the door that God has opened for him to do ministry in his time in Ephesus. And we see that in verses 8 and 9. But although Paul can’t come now, he still wants the Corinthian church to be blessed. And so he sends Timothy, he sends his disciple, his co-laborer in gospel ministry. And I just want us to notice one key thing from these verses. At times we want something for our church. We’re working at something. We expect something like this is going to be the best thing for Trinity. And think of your thing. And at times we work at that thing and we plan on our ministry or our church going in a certain way. And it may be a good or a necessary thing, but the Lord’s plan or maybe his timing is

different. And so things go another way. We have to battle discouragement. So the thing that I want us to ask ourselves as we contemplate church life and how we invest into what we’re all doing here is do we submit when that happens and continue to see God’s way is better? Or do we fight and grumble in our hearts and say, well, this isn’t what I wanted for my church, and this isn’t what I wanted for what we’re doing here, and this isn’t what I think is fruitful, and this isn’t the best thing. Are we able to actually put our preferences and our points of view, even if they’re correct and good and right, are we able to put them aside and see that the Lord has brought elders to this church and he’s brought a lot of other saints that are filled with the Spirit

and the Lord has placed us, you know, geographically somewhere where sometimes things just go a little bit different than planned, and are we able to praise him all the while? Paul seems to be pointing to the fact that God’s way is always better than ours. You see, he’s not complaining about the fact that God is redirecting his path and God is redirecting his timing. And God may do things differently in Corinth than what he wanted, but he’s just pointing them to the fact that this is the way the Lord works sometimes. While waiting for someone recognizable and noteworthy, and remember, the Corinthians loved gifts of speech and presentation and rhetorical ability, what this church receives instead was a young, inexperienced minister named Timothy. So Paul is like, come on, guys, be nice to Timothy. He’s doing the Lord’s work. He’s doing something good. He’s doing something beautiful.

He’s my brother. I love him. I care for him. Provide for him. Care for him. Show him hospitality. Show him grace. Paul wants to go to Corinth. He’s making that plain. The Corinthians seemingly want Apollos to come minister to them because Apollos is gifted. He’s bright. He’s a great speaker. He’s a great communicator. So much so that there’s a segment of the church that’s like, we’re of Apollos. And a young Timothy is who’s sent to them instead. What they wanted was someone impressive, but that’s not how the Lord usually works. Exhibit A. I think that we see that the Lord regularly uses people that are needy and weak and lacking in something, not just because the Lord wants to punish those people or you, but because he loves to do something big with people that are very small so that there would be no confusing about who’s doing it.

The Lord is kind to us in that way, to keep us from boasting, to keep us from relying on ourselves, to keep us praying and needy and dependent and loving him and not just certain gifts or certain ministries or whatever else. Beloved, we get at church not exactly what we want, but God uses it nonetheless. And even if on a given Sunday a certain preacher is not your favorite, like today, or the songs that we sing aren’t the exact ones that you wanted to sing and you wanted to sing something else or whatever, are you grateful to God for his church? When you’re driving to church, are you praying for the saints? Are you praying for your pastors? Are you praying for this poor aging preacher? I was going to say young, but that’s..no. Do you seek to hear what he’s telling you, regardless of the communication being maybe

in a different way than you wanted? Do you seize the opportunities that he presents to you, or do you wait for the ministry opportunity that you think you need, with the kind of people that you think you should be ministering to? In the length of time that you think is enough, using just enough of the resources to do what you think you ought to be doing, or are you actually open to the Lord taking from you and giving to someone else? Not always our money, not always, you know, our whatever. Sometimes it’s our time, sometimes it’s our emotional life, sometimes it’s whatever. Are you prepared to give what the Lord asks for the good of the people that he sends your way? You’ll hear things and you’ll experience things that may not necessarily be your preference at church, but I want to encourage you to be thankful to God for his church done his

A Life of Love

way using his chosen people. This isn’t our ministry, saints. Trinity Church is not our church. This is Jesus’ church. That brings us to verses 13 and 14, where we see an exhortation to live a different kind of life, a life of love. Let’s read these two verses. These are beautiful.

Be watchful. Stand firm in the faith. Act like men. Be strong. Let all that you do be done in love.

— 1 Corinthians 16

(ESV)

I’ll just say right up front, that phrase, act like men, is not actually gender specific. He’s saying be mature, essentially. He’s saying act in accordance with your identity. Be who you are called by God to be. So this is for all Christians. Ladies, you don’t get to escape this one. He’s saying be mature Christians, brothers and sisters. In these two verses, Paul exhorts the Corinthian believers to a different kind of life. Something that looks very different from how the people around them live.

Something that looks very different from the broader culture. And in that sense, when we think about how we operate in Portland and Vancouver and beyond, what we’re being called to is very counter-cultural to what’s going on outside of these walls. He gives them these five exhortations, or these five commands. And they really read like commands in a row. And the words used in these exhortations, as he kind of walks through them one by one, they’re just these short kind of strong statements. They almost sound like military commands, don’t they? They’re like marching orders for battle. Until you get to verse 14, that is. And correct me if I’m wrong, military friends. I don’t know. Were you told in the military to do all that you do in love? Everything sounds like marching orders until you get there. And then it just slows down pretty rapidly.

Just consider once again what we’ve been studying in 1 Corinthians. What this church has been going through and dealing with. There’s sin in the congregation. There’s issues with the Lord’s Supper. They can’t seem to figure out a correct relationship to eating meat offered to idols and how close you can get to idol worship. There’s problems with a biblical view of the work of the Holy Spirit and spiritual gifts. There’s a secular cultural influence seeping into the church. They need to be taught about the exclusivity of the gospel of Jesus Christ. They need to be shown what biblical marriage looks like. They need to be told that without the resurrection of Jesus Christ, we’re all doomed. Basic stuff. That’s a lot to process. That’s a lot to grow in. That’s a lot to deal with. And humanly speaking, friends, it’s impossible to be balanced in all of these things.

Get it right in the middle of the road every single time. Just perfectly balanced. Understanding things. Putting them into practice. My family’s great. My theology’s great. My money’s being spent right. My influence outside of the church is great. Everything is just perfect. It’s impossible to balance all of these things perfectly. It’s impossible to overcome all of the sin involved in all of the areas of our lives. To be obedient in everything that Paul is calling the Corinthians to and really what God is calling all of us to. But the love to which Paul is calling the Christian, this isn’t something that we will into existence. It’s the love that we display and show to others. Why? Because he first loved us. This is why in this list of military commands we’re told to do everything in love. Because he loved you enough to give himself for you.

To make you his own. To make you his people. To give you a family. To give you a purpose. And to give you an eternal destiny. Because he first loved us. It’s because he loved us and because he saved us and because he’s sanctifying us that we can stand firm. That we can be strong. That we can mature. That we can invest. That we can be strong in the face of trials and challenges and adversity. We now have an identity. We now have a purpose for our life. We have his example of how we are to live and how we are to navigate. We have the examples of the saints that God sends around us. Who but Christ perfectly embodies strength and courage and conviction. Who but Christ perfectly loves. Who is motivated in all that he does by perfect love. It’s Jesus. It’s not inwardly that we look to obey these commands.

It’s not inwardly that we look to think about how do I be stronger? How do I be more mature? But it’s to Christ that we look, beloved. And so if we start with that section, if we consider love, then it would read something like this. Trinity Church, be on guard. Be strong. Be mature. And stand firm. See, without love, you just hear that as a list of commands and you’re like, got it. Okay, I’m going to try to be stronger and try to be better. It’s just another list of things to work on. And in a way that’s okay because we all have things we need to be working on. But if we understand that the only way that we mature in our faith and have the fortitude to stand firm when things get tough is by clinging desperately to the cross of Christ and relying wholly on him for strength, it’s only then that we actually have a healthy

way of obeying these exhortations. So once again, saints, Christians, be watchful. Be on guard. Fight sin. Strive for holiness. Stand firm in the faith. Trinity, don’t waver from the scriptures and the one true gospel that saves. Act like mature men and women. Be strong even when it feels like you have no more strength to give. And saints, let all that you do be done in love. And this brings us to our last point. The more excellent way in action. And here we go back, if you remember, to what Paul calls the more excellent way as he leads into chapter 13, the love chapter. He says that this is the more excellent way and we’ll look here at verses 15 through 20. Here we get practical with seeing the Christian life, which is the way of love, the life of love, practiced in an imitable way.

The More Excellent Way

As Paul mentions Stephanus and Fortunatus and Achaicus and Aquila and Priscilla, here called Prisca, he says that these people are exemplary and that they’ve devoted themselves to the service of the saints. And this is a great, beautiful thing to give yourself to. May we strive to give ourselves to others, brothers and sisters. May we strive to be those that, because we love them, we want to give ourselves for their good. We want to encourage them. We want to bless them. Saints, do we look for these opportunities as we walk through life with others? Do we jump in as people are going through difficult stages of life and walk through those stages with them? Do we pay attention to the physical and the financial needs of those around us? Do we labor in prayer for the good and for the growth of others? Friend, is your comfort something that you’re willing and ready to sacrifice if it means

being a greater blessing to the people around you? Beyond looking to these people as examples, we ought to submit to these people, Paul says, to heed their counsel, to follow their lead. He says this in verse 16. And so if God sends people our way that are mature, that are exemplary, that we ought to be imitating, Paul is saying, follow these people. And if they’re in positions of leadership, if these are godly leaders that are exemplary, follow them, submit to their leadership, love these people, because these are the people that God has intentionally sent into your life. Rejoice in the work that the Lord is doing through others. Look to godly examples. Beyond just seeing and celebrating how others live for Christ and for the good of others, we should strive to actually live more radically than we ourselves might be accustomed to, to live up to our profession of faith in a Messiah who purchased for himself a people

with his own blood and made those people new creations. And so saints, open up your home. Give yourself for the good of others. Spend time. Pray with people. Ask people how you can be in prayer for them. Reach out. Just surprise somebody with a phone call. Just be like, hey, you know, you’re busy, I’m busy, let’s just pray over the phone together. What’s going on in your life? Engage one another. Walk with each other. And greet each other. It’s an interesting way to greet each other, though. Greet one another with a holy kiss. The kiss is very culturally specific. Let’s just start there. So growing up in conservative Slavic Baptist churches in the former Soviet Union and even in the United States, people practiced this. And I mean, it was like wet, like lip-on-lip kisses, and it was a terrifying thing as a child to just kind of navigate, you know, and just bobbing and weaving through the congregation

of just, you know, don’t greet me, I’m not saved yet. And I think that this is something that, you know, for us is like very foreign. And so in our cultural context, it’s not going to be a holy kiss, per se. Maybe, I don’t know, are there French people around here? Maybe this is something more along the lines of hug one another. Put your arm around a brother or sister. Pray with them. Be warm. Be kind. Be affectionate. Make eye contact when you talk to people. Remember people’s names. And then maybe if we, you know, plant a church in Paris, then we’ll revisit this. The greeting of Christians is universal. Being a people who greet one another and who love one another and who want to be around each other is not culturally specific. That’s just Christian. Show affection and love and warmth to others.

Be hospitable. And notice what Paul has done in this chapter is he’s pointed these believers to the bigger picture of Christianity. He’s not just kind of narrowing in on like, here’s Corinth, here’s what’s happening in Corinth, here’s something that’s hyper-specific to your culture and your church and your neighborhood. But he’s pointing them broader. He’s calling the Corinthians to give to saints in another country and to give sacrificially. He’s calling for them to think like well beyond what’s going on in Corinth in a very different cultural context, in a very different religious landscape. He’s calling for them to consider teachers and preachers that God sends their way even if it’s not necessarily their preference. They have this idea culturally of like what a public speaker should be, what a pastor is like. And he’s like, no, no, no. Scratch that. This is who I’m going to send, and this is who God is sending your way, and this is what

this looks like. He’s calling for them to live in a counter-cultural way, doing all that you do in love, clinging to the hope of the gospel. And he’s calling for them to consider greetings from churches in other areas. Remember this church. Remember this church. Think of these saints. Are you catching the flow here? The Christian life is simultaneously very narrow and very specific. As you’re shepherding your child in your home and praying with them and speaking the gospel into their life and praying for your children to be saved and learning to be a better husband or a better wife, learning to be a better neighbor, it gets very, very specific to what we’re going through and the life that we’re living. But it’s also very broad, and the Christian life is global, and it goes well beyond my little life. With God doing things all over our city that we may not expect and we may not think of,

with God doing things all over our state that we may never consider as a viable ministry model, with God doing things all over the country and the world that we can’t even begin to imagine, and do we think about the global church often and how the gospel moves in these other places and the people that he uses to accomplish his purposes that may look or sound or speak very differently than what we’re accustomed to? Friends, are we mindful and prayerful of the nations, or are our minds stuck here, just in my life and what I’m doing? We’re called to invest into this church. We’re called to invest into one another. We’re called to build one another up spiritually, but to what end? So that we could go out built up and encouraged and edified and strengthened and edified by the word and preach the gospel to our friends and our neighbors and our co-workers and see

sinners come to faith in Jesus Christ, and then for those people to grow and to go out and to preach and to reach Portland and Vancouver and beyond and out to the nations. We find encouragement in the fact that this mission and this vision is not unique to us. If it was just us, that could be pretty discouraging, that can be pretty intimidating. But what Paul is doing is he’s broadening the vision of the Corinthians to think bigger than just Corinth, and I would encourage us to do the same. It doesn’t start and it doesn’t end with us, brothers and sisters. We have fellow saints down the street and we praise God for them. We have brothers and sisters in Chicago and Milan and Kiev and Nairobi doing the same exact thing that we’re doing here, and that’s a beautiful thing because it’s not just us.

Love in action gives all of who we are for God’s purposes as he does it all over the world. As I draw this sermon to a close and as our series comes to a close, I wanted us to actually look at Paul’s final thoughts and conclude our study with those final thoughts. So let’s once again look at verses 21 through 24. I, Paul, write this greeting with my own hand. If anyone has no love for the Lord, let him be accursed. Our Lord, come. The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you. My love be with you all in Christ Jesus, amen. What we see here, saints, is the grace and love of God towards sinners. In reading verse 22, it really doesn’t feel that way, does it? Paul is kind of just getting right to the point. If anyone has no love for the Lord, let him be accursed.

There’s no middle ground. There’s no ifs, ands, or buts. If you don’t love the Lord, the Holy Spirit, through the writing of the apostle Paul, says you are accursed. Friends, God deserves all that we are, and He will accept nothing less. It seems harsh to say it like that. I understand that. I understand it sounds confusing to some of you. But sinners need to hear the reality of their rebellion against their Creator. Friends, God loves you, and He gave Himself for you. But apart from Him, apart from the sacrificial death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, you will perish in your sin. That is the worst curse of all. Eternal death, eternal damnation, eternal separation from God. This kind of submission and full-on love for Jesus is not something that we summon. This is not something that we learned. It’s received as a free gift of grace, as we see in verse 23.

God’s grace given to sinners in Christ, and given in abundance. Do we then, as Christians, in receiving this grace, and in receiving this love, show it to others? Are we known by our love, and known for our grace toward others? In our interactions, yes, but also in the way that we care for their souls, and intentionally try to reach people with the good news of Jesus Christ. Paul’s final comments in verse 24 are a good lesson for all of us. When saying the hard things, which Paul has done a lot of throughout this letter, never ever do so without loving the person to whom you speak. He let the truth of the gospel speak loudly, and for his love to always be seen in how he cares for these people. He loved them. He really loved these people, and he let them know. And so, dear saints of Trinity Church of Portland, the grace of the Lord Jesus be with you.

And my love be with you all in Christ Jesus. Amen. Father, we’re so incredibly grateful to you for your word. We’re so grateful for your faithfulness to us, for your love, for your continued care of our church. Most of all, Father, we’re so thankful that you loved us enough to not let us perish in our sins, but you sent your Son to die in our place. Lord, I pray that this study of 1 Corinthians would reinvigorate us to being a gospel-centered, gospel-focused people who are intentional about sharing this good news that we get to hear every Sunday, and that we’ve experienced in our own lives. Let us not be stingy with the good news of the gospel and the love of Jesus Christ towards sinners. Let us be a people who are not influenced primarily by the culture, but are influenced by your Spirit, by the people around us, by the word, by the example of our Lord Jesus

Christ. Help us to love Him above all else. Help us to live for Him in an intentional, meaningful way. And help us to honor you in the way that we as a church function in an antagonistic culture, much like Corinth, to your glory and for the good of Portland. We pray in Jesus’ name, amen.