Co-Laborers for the Kingdom
The Church of Corinth; Struggling to be in the world but not of the world • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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On June 5,2022 I began this series in 1 Corinthians. These last two years, I watched the Lord use this letter to shape and instruct our church. I fashioned us for things we were not expecting to come to our steps. The Spirit used it to encourage, strengthen and discipline us in Christ.
This study has shown all of us that the Word of God is sufficient to meet our spiritual needs by the power of God’s spirit. As the bride of Christ, His word anchors us to Christ who he came and purchased with his blood.
We will finish up today look at verses 10-24. In these verses Paul mentions a few of his co-laborers in the gospel ministry to the Corinthians and then he closes with some. exhortations for the church. We will look at both: Examples of Co-laborers and Exhortations for Co-laborers for the Kingdom.
1. Examples of Co-Laborers
1. Examples of Co-Laborers
A. Timothy
A. Timothy
Timothy is mentioned twice in this letter by Paul. We know that Timothy was a young pastoral trainee that Paul looked to as his own spiritual child in the faith. Timothy and Paul connected when Paul came to Derbe sharing the gospel.
Timothy eventually accompanies Paul on his missionary journeys and eventually Paul sends Timothy to help strengthen and lead the churches. Timothy
In 1 Cor 4, Paul states that he sent Timothy to Corinth ahead of him to provide leadership in the areas of concern in that church. Timothy would eventually lead the church at Ephesus, but before then, he aided the church in Corinth for a time.
10 Now if Timothy comes, see that he is with you without cause to be afraid, for he is doing the Lord’s work, as I also am. 11 So let no one despise him. But send him on his way in peace, so that he may come to me; for I expect him with the brethren.
Paul states that Timothy is a co-laborer in the Lord’s work and warns that Timothy should not meet any opposition when he arrives to Corinth. What opposition we ask?
Paul uses the two terms in the greek,
phobos(fear)
exotheneo (disdain, contempt, ridicule, rejection)
The suspected fear that Timothy might have had before arriving in Corinth was to reject his authority and leadership. Elsewhere in regards to Timothy’s leadership in Ephesus, Paul states,
12 Let no one look down on your youthfulness, but rather in speech, conduct, love, faith and purity, show yourself an example of those who believe.
I can relate to the real emotion Timothy might have faced in regards to ministering to those much older than himself. As a minister of the gospel, you have to understand that God’s word is timeless and sufficient for all the needs of your people. You are teaching those truths and not your experience, therefore age doesn’t matter. Instead of discriminating against a minister based on age, we should rather avoid those who lack spiritual maturity.
If God wants to use you in someone’s life, don’t let your age deter you from being an encouragement to them or a correction for them. God used young David to do what a fearful army of strong men were afraid to do. This bring glory to Christ.
Next there is….
B. Apollos
B. Apollos
Secondly, Paul mentions Apollos coming to Corinth as well but only when he has opportunity. We looked at Apollos at the beginning of our study as saw one of the issue in Corinth being divisions in the church. There were factions that were being created, not be leadership, but by divided loyalty. FANBOYS is the contemporary term. The Corinthians were creating conflict in the church in the name of these leaders out of arrogance and pride. Paul condemns such division and instead turned his attention to both men as merely servants of Christ. Paul writes,
5 What then is Apollos? And what is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, even as the Lord gave opportunity to each one. 6 I planted, Apollos watered, but God was causing the growth. 7 So then neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but God who causes the growth.
In the end, Paul wanted their efforts not be be idolized but instead for the church to understand that both men served Christ and sought for only Christ to be preeminent. There is no great danger for division in a church to arise over allegiances to one pastor over another. It is a quick trip to the downfall of a church’s faithful ministry in the Lord. Unity among the body was a heavy theme in the beginning of our study of this letter.
The next co-laborer is…
C. The Household of Stephanas
C. The Household of Stephanas
Paul does not mention one person in this next point, but instead a household belonging to Stephanus
15 Now I urge you, brethren (you know the household of Stephanas, that they were the first fruits of Achaia, and that they have devoted themselves for ministry to the saints), 16 that you also be in subjection to such men and to everyone who helps in the work and labors. 17 I rejoice over the coming of Stephanas and Fortunatus and Achaicus, because they have supplied what was lacking on your part.
Paul mentions this household twice in this letter. In 1 Cor 1:16, Paul mentions baptizing them as an important moment in his ministry to Corinth. In chapter 16, we understand that it was because the gospel first bore fruit with this man and his household as the first believers in Achaia. Achaia was the Roman province with Corinth as its capital. We would assume that Paul would have a special connection to those whom first believed in his ministry to that region. These were his first spiritual children of Corinth and they were special to his heart.
I cannot imagine what the graphic might look like if we drew the spiritual genealogy of those who were saved as spiritual children of Paul. It would be massive piece of art, with branches twisting and expanding across the page. All would be as a result of a faithful preacher who committed to being a servant of Jesus Christ until his last dying breath.
D. Aquila/Priscilla
D. Aquila/Priscilla
One example of Paul’s fruits of ministry is Aquila and Priscilla mentioned as our fourth example of co-laborers. This couple is mentioned in Acts 18 as being dispelled from Rome by Emperor Claudius because the Jews there were being disruptive regarding Jesus. This couple settled in Corinth, where they connected with Paul in their trade of making tents. They showed hospitality to Paul and it is believed that they became followers of Jesus.
They continued to help Paul in his missionary journeys and it was when Paul was in Ephesus, that Aquila and Prisca/Priscilla settled and started the church of Ephesus in their home.
19 The churches of Asia greet you. Aquila and Prisca greet you heartily in the Lord, with the church that is in their house.
Now its important to see the connection in these verses. For it is believed Paul helped Aquila and Priscilla come to faith in Christ in Corinth in Acts 18. They seemed to flourish under the time he spent in Corinth starting the church and strengthening the believers in it.
By the end of Acts 18, Apollos enters the scene in Corinth and he is a believer who is also teaching in Christ. He do not where he was instructed in the Lord but he traveled around and taught the Scriptures like Paul. But upon hearing him teach in Corinth, Aquila and Priscilla pulled him aside and helped him correct some things that he was teaching incorrectly.
So you have Paul——Aquila and Priscilla——Apollos —-Corinthians. This is just an example of the downline impact that the church can have when we are committed to spiritual investing in the lives of people God puts in our path. It reminds me of a story I read recently.
There was a man named Thomas Scott in London who was a Anglican preacher who was an theological critic of John Newton in 1775. Scott made it his mission to refute and disagree with Scott in all the public arenas in order to try and dsicredit Newton. But Scott failed in doing so and in the process of dialoging with Newton, Scott actually understood the gospel and was saved. He writes about having to call on Newton
“under discouraging circumstances . . . and his discourse so comforted and edified me, that my heart, being by his means relieved from its burden, became susceptible of affection for him. From that time I was inwardly pleased to have him for my friend . . . I had, however, even at that time, no thoughts of learning doctrinal truth from him, and was ashamed to be detected in his company.”
Harvey, Dave. Am I Called?: The Summons to Pastoral Ministry (p. 31). Crossway. Kindle Edition.
No longer Newton’s opponent, Scott actually became a faithful preacher of the gospel and flourished in gospel ministry in London. Newton was so impressed with how the Lord was using Scott in ministry, that he sent a young and aspiring gentlemen to sit under Scott preaching so that he might sort how his spiritual confusion. That man was William Wilberforce who later went on to preach against the slave trade. (Newton-Scott-Wilberforce)
The reality of the church is that the Lord uses each of us as he pleases to bring about spiritual good in those who come after us. We are not sure how he will use us to bear spiritual fruit in others. Some in Christian history seems to bear spiritual harvests as far as the eye can see while others only a small plot. Both examples are kingdom faithfulness for as Jesus stated in the parable of the sower:
23 “And the one on whom seed was sown on the good soil, this is the man who hears the word and understands it; who indeed bears fruit and brings forth, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty.”
2. Exhortations to
2. Exhortations to
The second point in this concluding chapter is a summary of commands from Paul for the church in Corinth. Each of these commands looks backward to what he commanded the church. I will deal with these 5 commands briefly.
A. Honor
A. Honor
15 Now I urge you, brethren (you know the household of Stephanas, that they were the first fruits of Achaia, and that they have devoted themselves for ministry to the saints), 16 that you also be in subjection to such men and to everyone who helps in the work and labors.
Paul mentions Stephanas we an honorable leader in the church in Corinth and should be treated as such. This was the same message regarding Timothy as he arrived there. Looking backward, it was the same message regarding Paul’s ministry at the beginning of this chapter. Paul was criticized as many ministers are in the history of the church. Sometimes that criticism is warranted, other times its not. Paul encourages them in v 15-16 to “be in subjection to such men and to everyone who helps in the work and labors.
Paul has a similar message to the Thessalonian church,
12 But we request of you, brethren, that you appreciate those who diligently labor among you, and have charge over you in the Lord and give you instruction, 13 and that you esteem them very highly in love because of their work. Live in peace with one another.
B. Alertness
B. Alertness
The second charge is spiritual alertness. This is a necessary reminder after the constant sin that Paul was addressing in this letter. The Corinthians were in a sense the opposite of alert. They were spiritually lethargic when it came to dangers among them and it was crippling God’s blessing of them. Our alertness is always centered around the dangers of sin and Satan that becomes an obstacle to our work for the kingdom and our lives of holiness.
8 Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.
Jesus told his disciples at the garden of Gethsemane to “keep watch with me” but they failed to stay awake. He rebuked them saying,
41 “Keep watching and praying that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
Jesus is helping the church the battle of the flesh to be enticed to a spiritual paralysis that makes us ineffective for the Lord and burdened by sin.
C. Faithfulness
C. Faithfulness
With that alertness comes faithfulness to Christ and his word.
13 Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong.
We need to be reminded that the Corinthians were being tempted to listen and believe in false and erroneous doctrine about the resurrection of believers. This disease in their church led Paul to call them to believe true things about the resurrection so that they might have hope in Christ’s victory over sin and death.
His challenge to stand firm in the faith is to be “steadfast and immovable” as he stated in the previous chapter. As I said previously, that means the church must have a doctrinal steadfastness to God’s revelation about himself. Do you be easily tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine that blows by.
Look at what Paul says in 2 Cor 4:2
2 but we have renounced the things hidden because of shame, not walking in craftiness or adulterating the word of God, but by the manifestation of truth commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.
With a faithfulness in word, it leads us to a faithfulness in deed. Our works abound to carry out the mission of Christ in this dark world.
58 Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your toil is not in vain in the Lord.
Church, let our understanding of good doctrine about Christ lead us to be continuous working diligently to serve him! This leads us to the next command…
D. Courage
D. Courage
“be strong….act like men”
I lump these two commands together because Paul is talking about strength and courage with the illustration of what Calvin calls “manly fortitude.” Physical Strength in history of humanity has been attributed to men over women. Scientific research has shown the physiology of a man’s body has a greater capacity to physical strength compared to a woman
An article by AE Miller at the National Library of Medicine website states,
“Data suggest that the greater strength of the men was due primarily to larger fibers. The greater gender difference in upper body strength can probably be attributed to the fact that women tend to have a lower proportion of their lean tissue distributed in the upper body”
When Paul states to act like men, he is calling the church, not to be physically strong, but to be strong like men in the face of trials and sufferings in the church. He is calling all the church to be courageous. But our courage and fortitude in spiritual matters does not come from our natural DNA. Paul is not asking women to be strong like men if their biology does not all them to do so.
Instead our strength comes from the Lord and so our courage follows.
10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might.
This well known passage on spiritual warfare reminds us that the Lord is the source of our courage and strength as the church.
E. Love
E. Love
14 Let all that you do be done in love.
Love seasons the genuine believers life in all that he does. When we are not showing love, we should repent for it reflects the devil and not Christ. For love has been shown most beautifully in Jesus Christ work of redemption for sinners and so the Spirit manifest love in all those who are truly saved.
John MacArthur writes,
Love complements and balances everything else. It is the beautiful, softening principle. It keeps our firmness from becoming hardness and our strength from becoming domineering. It keeps our maturity gentle and considerate. It keeps our right doctrine from becoming obstinate dogmatism and our right living from becoming smug self-righteousness.
With that love that we express to each other in the church, Paul also commands the church to ...”greet one another with a holy kiss.”
This form of greeting was common in the early church and it was simply a kind gesture that displayed brotherly love. That kiss was on the cheek or forehead and it was by no means a erotic thing. It was simply the side hug of that culture and sadly, sexual perversion makes us laugh at such a command today.
But it was a way to show love and affection for the family of God. It is also a cultural practice across the world in many cultures. I remember going to Spain and being kissed on the cheek and my wife kissed on the cheek.
Regardless, there should be an appropriate display of affection in the church because love but it should be appropriate to the culture. Because kissing is not something done in America, then a holy kiss becomes more awkward than good. Instead, men shake hands, women hug women, kids fist bump as a means of saying hello and I care deeply about you.
Paul’s final greeting is given in love. As he closes out his message to the church, he identifies himself as writing the closing of the letter. Paul would often use a scribe to dictate his words to the church but here, he is concluding the letter with his own hand. This is his authentication of authority.
But notice how he communicates love for the Lord and for these people. he identifies those who do not love the Lord should be considered accursed in the church. It is a stern warning that love reigns supreme in the church. That love is rooted in the truth of God, not in feelings or emotion, not in pragmatism or cultural norms. Love comes from God and it is the foundation of the church. Therefore, whoever does not have that love…does not belong in the church. They are accursed in the eyes of God and God’s true church.
Paul concludes as he does with all his letters that the Lord’s grace and love be with them all. Love and grace from the Lord Jesus are distinct and yet inseparable gifts that we receive in Him. God’s love is given to God’s elect in the saving work of Jesus who died, was buried and who rose again. This grace is gift of God to give his love to those who were once his enemies but now sons and daughter of God.
Have you experienced the love and grace of Christ? Do you know for certain if you died today, you would accepted into the presence of Christ, not on your merit, but by God’s immeasurable love?