The People Part 2 (2)

Good Morning, glad to be with you this morning!

Pray

How many people here are gardeners?

Ok, to have an effective garden what things do you need? Good soil, water, maybe miracle grow, sun light. These things all help growth, but what actually causes the plant to grow? Scientifically speaking, the process of growth has to do with hormones that cause cells to divide and therefore causes the plant to increase. This has been designed that way by God. Now, this is how plants grow. Ultimately we know, it is God that cares for everything, and sees to it that everything runs in its proper order. Even that growth of plants is a gift of God.

Second question: How does the church grow, and who is responsible for it? Is it really good people, or a great pastor? Nope, they are just tools. Is it really great curriculum or a sweet building? Again, just tools. In fact, it is God who builds a church, and the church - both this local one and the universal church - are God’s masterpiece.

I wanted us to focus on this momentarily because of where the message is going today. This is week five of our six week series in 1 Corinthians 1-4. Everything that we have encountered Paul saying up to this point itself in this passage. Divisions around leadership, wisdom of this world vs. wisdom of God, God’s power at work in people’s lives, Paul’s work as an evangelist, we find it all here. We are focusing once again on the ‘people” aspect of church, because this is Paul’s application section (one of many) for the Corinthians. And it is definitely applicable for the 21st century as well.

1 Corinthians 3 ESV

But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready, for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way? For when one says, “I follow Paul,” and another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not being merely human? What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building. According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it. For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw— each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire. Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple. Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is folly with God. For it is written, “He catches the wise in their craftiness,” and again, “The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are futile.” So let no one boast in men. For all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.

Paul is speaking to a people who are struggling with one insidious problem: Pride. Their arrogance and self-made wisdom has lead them into a trap of living as people walking in worldly wisdom, and not in Christ. How does this carry over for us, right now in our church? It’s that:

Founded upon Jesus, our church is God's masterpiece.

This body of believers is God’s work. He does the work of bringing us together, through the transformative power of the Holy Spirit that we talked about a few weeks ago. This leads us to three principles that surround this truth that God is building the church upon Christ, and even that He is working through His people to do it. The first principle is that

God Gives Growth 1-9

As we dive into our passage we immediately find something unexpected. Paul tells the Corinthians that, despite them being people who have the Spirit of God, they cannot be addressed as those kind of people. Why? Because they are not acting like it.

It had been five years since Paul had first come and planted the church in Corinth. Paul spent 18 months with them, and during that time the Corinthians should have grown in their faith. Right? They should be growing in the depth of their relationship with Christ. They should be growing in maturity as Spiritual people. But that didn’t happen, and now five years later it’s still not happening.

Paul illustrates this with the whole milk vs. solid food metaphor. This is a cultural idiom of the day, and in that culture, it stood for the difference between simple and complex teaching. But it doesn’t seem like that’s what Paul was getting at. The Corinthians should have allowed the Holy Spirit to continue His transformative work in their hearts, but instead they are happier to live lives that are still one foot in the world. They’ll take the “synthetic” wisdom of this world - found as we have explored in power, influence, and I will add selfishness, over the true life-changing wisdom of God. They should have been growing, maturing in Christ, but they aren’t. Clearly we see the fruit of this synthetic wisdom is evident, because they continue to quarrel and argue about stuff that doesn’t matter! Clearly, they are still operating as people of the world, despite their salvation and years walking with Christ.

The Corinthians were “characterized by the flesh;” they are acting worldly, not in God’s Spirit. How is this played out in their lives? Jealousy and quarrelling, which incidentally Paul lists in Galatians 5 as directly against life in the Spirit. We already saw this in chapter 1, but again Paul addresses how the Corinthians are pridefully placing their favourite teachers on pedestals to boost their own self esteem. They failed to see what Paul and Apollos and any of the other teachers were truly there for: to serve Christ and the church. I love how William Baker puts it:

1 Corinthians & 2 Corinthians Commentary

They fixed their gaze way too low, at mere humans, and not high at the one who deserves their devotion. This had needlessly created divisions among them.

So Paul demonstrates who is really important in the church, and who we are really serving: God. Read 5-9 with me again:

1 Corinthians 3:5–9 ESV

What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building.

This is the heart of this first principle: You may plant the seeds about Jesus, and I may water it by continuing to witness or disciple someone, but it is God that actually does the growing. Paul says “hey, I’m just a servant, not the leader!” God is the leader and the catalyst for growth. In fact, Paul shows that the work of the individual workers is not the significant part, but rather God is the guy on display! Paul and Apollos and all the other leaders of the church are colleagues together, though each is accountable for their own work. They work for God, but they are not the ones on display.

How does this transfer to today? This is a really practical message Paul gives us, but the challenge is to apply it.

My prayer is that God would bring many more people to Jesus, and continue to grow this church family. But everything that we do as a church body is not about our gains, but God’s. It’s about people having a real-life, personal relationship with Jesus. That takes time, and we don’t always see the result. But what I may plant in someone’s heart, someone else may water. Ultimately, God makes the seed of the gospel flourish into faith, and it is His growing work that ultimately moves the kingdom forward. So for us as a body, we need to be careful to have our hearts in the right place. Looking to God for growth, and not making the mistakes the Corinthians did. We need to steer clear of pride and arrogance. This leads to division, and this is something our church desperately does not need. Instead, we need to be united in focusing on God’s mission, and how He wants us to participate in moving His kingdom forward.

God’s Building, founded on Jesus 10-17

Jesus is the foundation of the church. In verse 9 Paul switches from a farming metaphor to a building metaphor, and carries on in verse 10 to say

1 Corinthians 3:10 ESV

According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it.

Then Paul says:

1 Corinthians 3:11 ESV

For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.

Paul says he laid a foundation, and gives a warning that those who build should be careful about how they build on this foundation. This is the thesis for the next few verses. Is it possible though that Paul is a little arrogant; is he saying that no one can build on the foundation he’s laid, that it’s Paul’s way or the highway? Let’s start with this idea of foundation:

When we think of the word “foundation” we often think of a house. Haha, maybe you just think of all the big cracks that keep letting in water. Usually that foundation is made out cement. In ancient times, a foundation would have maybe a base of bedrock, or large stones closely fit together. This would have been how the temple was built. But on top of that, foundation in the Bible also refers to the initial preaching of the Gospel. This is the foundation Paul laid - the gospel message.

Ok, keep these two things in mind, the temple, and the foundation of the gospel message. This is the “foundation” Paul laid: Jesus Christ! So Paul is not arrogant at all, but truthful. No one can build another solid foundation, because if Christ is not the foundation, there is no other truth upon which to base our lives! Paul may have laid these stones, but he himself is not the foundation. That, is Jesus Christ. This leads us to understanding of the building metaphor, because Paul continues:

1 Corinthians 3:12–13 ESV

Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw— each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done.

In this passage, Paul does not see every person in the church as “builders,” but more the teachers and leaders. This leads us to ask the question: For those who teach and lead, what is the quality of your work like? The quality of our work will be exposed on the day of judgement. Paul says that it will be tested with fire, and although the worker will not be consumed, if the quality of their work is mere straw or wood, instead of gold, or silver, it will be burned up. Fire is something the Corinthians would have understood well… when Corinth was sacked about 100 years before, it was burned with fire. Talk about a strength test for craftsmen’s work! They understand what it means to have stuff tested in the fire. Paul shows how we are accountable to God for how we work on his building. Is it on the foundation of Jesus Christ? Are you being careful to use right teaching, and disciple others well? These are questions we as leaders need to ask ourselves.

Paul uses the temple metaphor next, and in this he notes that those who destroy God’s temple will be destroyed. Paul viewed the Corinthian believers together - their church body - as the temple of the Most High God. If you desecrate this temple, the promise of punishment and destruction is sure. So what kind of building, what kind of temple is this church body? Unified, built with quality work, and shining bright? Or weak, poor quality, and being desecrated by pride and personal agendas different from God’s mission? As a pastor, my prayer and my focus is on building up this body on quality teaching, unified for God’s glory. But I’m not the only teacher in this room, and certainly not the only Christian. Together we are God’s masterpiece, founded upon Jesus Christ. But even as Paul noted earlier, we need to be people of the spirit, not people of this world. Because when we allow pride and arrogance to divide us, we are desecrating God temple. This is the second principle, that we are, and should act like, God’s masterpiece, unified together for His glory. This draws us to the third and final principle we will look at this morning:

We are Jesus’, and Serve Jesus 18-23

As we step into this final principle, we see we are encouraged to remember who we work for and what this means. We encounter again what Paul has previously said: God’s “unwisdom” trumps human wisdom.

Paul quotes two OT scriptures to illustrate how God’s wisdom confounds the wisdom of this world. First, Paul quotes Job 5:13

Job 5:13 ESV

He catches the wise in their own craftiness, and the schemes of the wily are brought to a quick end.

Then again, Paul uses Psalm 94:11

Psalm 94:11 ESV

the Lord—knows the thoughts of man, that they are but a breath.

Why does Paul lead back here again, to this exposition on wisdom? Because the Corinthians were still operating in worldly wisdom, boasting in their own leaders and thereby building up their own pride and arrogance.

So we get down to verse 21 and Paul says:

1 Corinthians 3:21 (ESV)

So let no one boast in men.

Here’s the Corinthian’s problem: They are arrogant. They are so busy promoting their favourite teacher who baptized them, they have completely forgotten who they - and their teacher leader - serve! God. This divisiveness in Corinth is destroying the temple of God’s people. It is hurting the body badly, and Paul essentially tells them to quit it right now. It’s like he says “Enough! Don’t you see? It was never about me, or Apollos, or any other teacher you guys had! It’s about Jesus! You are so focused on your own pride, and us as the object of that pride that you don’t realize we are just servants of the church. And the church is Christ’s bride, Christ’s own body! And Christ is God’s! God is trying to build you in Christ’s image, but you are so busy nit -picking at each other and lifting up these teachers as the ones you follow that you have missed the point. Follow Christ, serve the church, and stop dividing the body of Christ.

Paul calls the Corinthians his “brothers” earlier in the chapter. He considers them family in Christ. But they are walking in the way of the world. Worldly wisdom is prideful, and seeks to build yourself up. God’s wisdom is the antithesis of that. We follow a Saviour who laid down His life for us. Remember from a few weeks ago we saw that boasting is a form of worship. Who are you boasting in? Boasting should only be in God. Yet the Corinthians were encamping themselves around the teachers that had baptized them. They were building up their own self-esteem by arrogantly declaring allegiance to this teacher or that. But what Paul says at the very end of the chapter is that everything is already theirs! Paul, Apollos, death, life, the world… Paul lists a total of eight things, and demonstrates that their striving to make this teacher or that “their” teacher is pointless, because Paul and Apollos and these other things already belong to the church. What this means essentially is that Christian’s already possess everything. They have their teachers, because their teachers and leader serve that church. They have the earth. Not in the legal sense, but in the sense that we share a deep connection with the one who made it. So we can enjoy its beauties and blessings. Even life, and death, becomes our possession in that we can find joy in all circumstances, and because our hope is spending eternity with our Saviour face to face. But they can only operate in this when they are unite in Christ.

What we need to grasp here is Paul’s use of the plural. All the times he says “you” he is talking to the corporate body of the Corinthians. Only together, united under Christ can they operate in the freedom of this promise in Christ. The kicker is, when they divy up into factions, they actually sever their tie with the Lord of all things - christ - thereby eliminating their rulership over this world and its forces. No wonder they were acting as worldly people. They were not unified in Christ. Their teachers are servants of the church. Yet for their own glory they are trying to claim individual allegiance to one teacher over another. How ludicrous is that? Everything they need they already have in Christ, and He is the One they declare allegiance to.

This is the bottom line: as a church here and across the globe we belong to Christ. We are His church. It’s not your church, or my church. It’s Christ’s church. That means we serve Christ. I as a pastor serve this local body of believers. We as a church serve Christ. Christ serves God by accomplishing in this world the plan God has pre-ordained from the beginning of time. This is how we work. I am not the great and mighty teacher, with my followers all huddled around me. That’s cult-like. Instead, together, we serve Christ. I, as I build on the foundation here along with all of us who have a teaching and preaching role. Every one of us as believers living out God’s grace in our lives day to day, and telling others about Jesus. This is our third, and final, principle: We are Christ’s, and we serve Him.

Conclusion

These are the three principles surrounding this main idea that

Founded upon Jesus, our church is God's masterpiece.

It’s that you might plant, and I water, but God grows a church

Coupled with that, this church and the church as a whole is God’s design and God’s building, which is founded on Jesus Christ.

Finally, we serve Jesus, and we are Christ’s. And that comes with promise and possession over the world and it’s forces. But in order to operate within that we need to be united together in Jesus Christ.

Arrogance and pride are often the root of many problems in church. Unfortunately, our human nature naturally makes us want to to build ourselves up. Yet this is the antithesis to a healthy Spirit-filled life. When we choose as the people of God to walk in our own pride, putting our want to be built up over the needs of the church, we essentially say that we are better than everyone else. Christ laid down His life for us, and calls us to humbly serve Him as part of the church. Unfortunately, when we choose to walk in our own pride the second thing it does is turn away those who the church might be trying to reach. Think about how many times a church has split, or someone has walked away because they were hurt by a leader that thought it was all about them, or because people were fighting so much that it turned others away from the church. This happens. In effect, pride is the fuel for the exact opposite of our mission as church. Jesus tells us in Matthew 28:18-20

Matthew 28:18–20 ESV

And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

The Corinthians got so stuck in their arrogance that they were lifting up the leaders who baptized them, instead of remembering whose Name they were baptized into: The name of the Father, the name of the Son, and the name of the Holy Spirit. Their pride got in the way. I pray that this will not be said of our church. Our church is God’s masterpiece, that He is building and creating. We are founded and rooted in Jesus Christ, our cornerstone. No where in this is there room for our own agendas, fighting, or pride.

If you do not know Jesus this morning, my prayer is that the Holy Spirit is speaking to your heart this morning and drawing you to God. Sometimes we don’t want to commit our lives to Christ because it means giving up control. Our pride won’t allow us to do that. I encourage to allow God to take the reigns, and to not let your pride bar you from allowing the Holy Spirit to breath life into your heart.

If you know Jesus here today, my challenge for you this week is to as God to show you how you can find one way to build up another member of the congregation up, and encourage them in their walk with Jesus. When we put others first it allows space for the Spirit of God to build humility. This week, as you walk in relationship and devotion to our Lord, remember whose you are and who we are working for: Jesus Christ.

Pray