Pride Divides

INTRODUCTION

Good morning and welcome again to First Christian Church! We are so glad you are with us this morning as we worship our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. We are continuing through the book of 1 Corinthians, and today we will be in chapter 4 and starting in verse 6.

Have you ever thought you were good at something, only to be humbled? Maybe you were the best at a board game at your house, but then you played with friends and met your match?

Being humbled can be a painful experience at times. Before it, you had all the confidence in the world. After, you can feel defeated. You see this play out in sports: a team that thinks they are untouchable meeting a team that just wants it more.

Humility is a character trait that defines some of the best people we know. We would rarely be drawn to follow someone who is arrogant and prideful. The Bible warns us against pride. And today in 1 Corinthians 4, we are going to see what Paul tells the church at Corinth, and us, about being puffed up with pride.

Would you join me in prayer this morning?

PRAY

As we approach our text for this morning we are reminded that Paul is talking to the corinthians about the divides that have sprung up in their church. Chapter 4 begins with Paul saying this:

This is how one should regard us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. 2 Moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found faithful.

1 Corinthians 4:1–2.

Paul is explaining that he and Apollos should be seen as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. There is no need to elevate them to a status higher than that, and there is no reason to view one teacher greater than the other.

To be called a servant meant that they were subordinate and subject to God. That is the master they serve. A true pastor, teacher, or leader understands that they are actually a servant to God. In fact, the greek word we translate to servant translates to an “under rower.” The lowest of the low for a servant on a ship. But Paul is not just describing himself as this, he says that all who are serving God should view themselves this way. We are servants to God, working toward the same task, none more important than the other, but all driving in the same direction.

Paul also uses the word “steward” to describe the work being done here. A steward is a house manager. They keep all things in order and tidy. They make sure that things are being done the way they need to be, and in a way that pleases the head of the household. The pastor is to proclaim the whole word of God to his church. He needs to be bringing the whole counsel of scripture to his congregants, preaching the word, the mysteries of the word, to the body. A faithful pastor does not sugar coat or avoid text that will be problematic, in his opinion, but brings the whole counsel of scripture, proclaiming the truth to the body.

If the Bible is not being presented truthfully, if it is being twisted to turn an opinion into law, then it is not being handled correctly. He must be found faithful to the word of God. He must know the word, be a student of it, to rightfully proclaim its truth. And as the church you have a responsibility to judge what is said from the pulpit by the scripture you hopefully hold in your hands. But know, I do not seek the approval of man, but of God. I seek to be found faithful to His word.

So, Paul is explaining that the pastor is a servant and steward. Not a celebrity to be idolized, but a servant of God pointing his sheep to the true shepherd. This is his effort to diffuse the idolization of church leaders, and to point them to what characteristics should be present in the life of a pastor that leads them.

When we jump down to verses 6 and 7 we read:

I have applied all these things to myself and Apollos for your benefit, brothers, that you may learn by us not to go beyond what is written, that none of you may be puffed up in favor of one against another. 7 For who sees anything different in you? What do you have that you did not receive? If then you received it, why do you boast as if you did not receive it?

1 Corinthians 4:6–7.

Paul lets the church know that he has applied what he was speaking about to himself and Apollos for the benefit of the church. The standard for pastors is still applied to them, because this standard is a benefit for the church. His hope is that they learn from them. And he wants them to see that they should not go beyond what is written or they will become puffed up.

What does he mean by what was written? We can see that this would first likely apply to the things he writes in the beginning of chapter 4. Those qualities of a pastor that he explained to them. Those things should be the standard, and a pastor should be careful not to go beyond those things in his thinking of himself. To go beyond being a servant and steward will lead to the puffing up of that leader.

It also speaks to how and what we want to teach as the church. The phrasing tells us that any extra-biblical instruction has the danger of puffing us up. There is a built in danger of pride growing in us when we start to take things that are not gospel and treat them as if they were.

Pride Divides

What is the real danger that Paul is attempting to get at by warning the church of the danger of pride? Well Paul understands, and wants the church to understand, that pride divides. If the divisions that were sprouting up in the church were based around the teachers of the church, we could trace that back to pride. There was a sense of pride in who they followed compared to the teacher someone else did. This is why Paul is making it clear that both he, Apollos, Peter, or any other teacher are servants and stewards not idols.

What is pride though? We hear it used in both a negative and positive light. I can say I have pride in Tommy when I see him hit a baseball or be kind to a stranger. But at the same time I might say that pride comes before the fall. Well, in this instance Paul is not describing a pride that comes from something positive. He is not saying, ‘don’t see your children acting like Jesus and squash that.’ He is not telling us that we shouldn’t feel some joy when a family member surrenders their life to Jesus.

What Paul is warning us about is a pride that comes from what dictionaries would call an “undue confidence and attention to ones own skills, accomplishments, state, possessions, or position.” This type of pride, a reliance upon our own self and thinking that we are more important than we are because of our skills or accomplishments, is the kind of pride that puffs us up. And it is this kind of pride that will divide a church, or any group, quicker than we can ever imagine.

This pride is also the type of pride that will push people away from the church. When we allow ‘religion’ to puff us up, it divides not only our church family, but it makes the church look and feel unapproachable to the world. The public reputation of the church by many is that we are on a moral high horse looking down on all that are below us, and that is because some have allowed pride to puff them up and act in that way.

Why is this the case? Because pride will not only impact our attitude, but it will impact our actions. It causes us to move our confidence from God to our own self. Proverbs 13:10 says:

By insolence (pride, arrogance) comes nothing but strife, but with those who take advice is wisdom.

One bible teacher described pride in believers this way:

There is nothing less tolerable in the servants of Christ than ambition and vanity.

John Calvin (French Reformer)

As we move our confidence, our hope, off of God and on ourself, we will bring nothing but strife. Pride brings with it not the fruit of the Spirit, but quarreling, fighting, and strife. It causes man to build his hope on himself, not on the God who saved him, not on the source of all truth and wisdom.

We also see that as pride builds up in us, we stop seeking after God. Look at Psalm 10:4 with me:

In the pride of his face the wicked does not seek him; all his thoughts are, “There is no God.”

Psalm 10:4.

This means that even in the church, if we allow pride to build up and begin to take root in our lives, we shift our focus from God to ourselves. Eventually, this will lead to us not even seeking the God we see in the bible, but the God that we have built up in our image. And that is no God at all.

What does this look like in our world today, though? We don’t have people dividing in our churches between Paul and Peter. That is true. But in a world overrun with information and the ability to access that information, it can look like the misuse of scripture.

When we water down the gospel, we are misusing the word of God. When we twist scripture to fit what we want it to say, we are creating a breeding ground for pride. I think the biggest thing we must guard our own hearts from is taking not gospel issues, but what I would call 3rd tier arguments, elevating them to first tier, and claiming that to do it opposite of how I am makes you wrong. This is the biggest threat to us, allowing pride to puff us up in the church today.

What do I mean by this? Theological triage is a term used to describe how we handle and divide topics in the bible. Just like triage is used at a hospital. If I were to walk into the hospital this afternoon and complain of chest pains, they would immediately provide care, because this could be a problem that needs to be acted on now. If I walk in and have a paper cut on my finger that is annoying me, they will push me back on the list to be seen.

For us biblically, the first importance that we looked at last week is the Gospel. The Gospel, the good news of Jesus, is the only hope that we can build our lives on. It is the only path of salvation. Jesus came to this earth, died for your sins, and rose again on the third day. There is good news in Jesus, that we can have new life with Him, that God loved us so much that He sent His son as the ultimate sacrifice for our sin. God even loved us while we were still sinners. That is of first importance. If you hear any other gospel being proclaimed, that is not the Gospel of the Bible. It is not the gospel of Jesus Christ. There are no works we do to earn salvation, there are no things we must do outside of faith in Jesus. We repent and believe in Jesus.

For second-tier issues, we look at things like baptism. We believe that the Bible instructs baptism to be done after salvation. Some branches of Christianity will baptize a baby. I believe that the Gospel is still present in some of these churches, but there is a difference in the interpretation of baptism. In instances like this, we can be friendly, but we more than likely will not come together in worship. We will go to different churches.

Third-tier would be matters of opinion. These are areas of scripture where there is not a clear black and white answer, and it is not a matter of salvation. We might find things like Bible translation, opinions on tattoos, and the type of worship music. These are things that would fall under opinion; we could still come to church together, but we have different opinions on these theologically grey areas.

We risk allowing pride into our lives when we take a third-tier issue and elevate it to a first-tier issue. When we start to take our opinions and make them of the first importance, we start to puff ourselves up. We can also hear it in our speech. We will start to hear things like, “a real Christian does this…” or “if you knew Jesus, you would do this…” and most of those statements would not be followed with things you find in scripture, but things that people just like. It is an opinion or preference, and preference is not of first importance.

Our opinion or preference cannot supersede or overpower what the gospel teaches. It does not go over and above the Gospel or the word of God. Paul is warning the church that when you start to divide amongst which teacher you like more, you are really going beyond what is written. You are elevating things to places of importance that they should not occupy.

When we see this in church, it rarely draws people into the gospel. It is not allowing the spirit to work and preaching the good news of Jesus to the world, it is seeking to draw boundaries and borders and if we are not careful we start to say things like “we have figured out what it really means or really says.” The word of God is the foundation for what we are to know of God. We trust the word to guide and instruct:

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

2 Timothy 3:16–17.

The whole counsel of the word of God is needed and useful for us. We cannot twist scripture to make it say what we want. We do not get to add to or subtract from scripture to make it more palatable or easy to swallow. We judge what is taught by the word of God. We judge it against what the bible says. We do not get to make the bible say what we want it to say.

Humility Unites

If we do not want to be puffed up with pride, what do we want? We should seek to be humble in all that we do. Humility is us being grounded in a clear self-assessment of our own limitations and relationship to God. It is what Paul is trying to tell the church in verse 7. Why do you boast as if you didn’t receive what God has given you as a gift? Why do you act like you have earned it or created it for yourself?

What example of humility do we have to follow? Philippians 2:5-8 gives us the example of humility that we are to follow:

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

Philippians 2:5–8.

Jesus shows us what humility is. It is the son of God, emptying himself and taking the form of a servant. The example of Christ as the servant is the basis of the example that Paul gives us at the beginning of chapter 4. Jesus humbles himself and is obedient to the will of God, even to the point of dying on the cross for us. We have new life through the obedience and humility of Jesus.

When we are humble, we are not seeking to place our selves before anyone else. We are looking to serve others, to place others before ourselves, and carry out the great commission of telling the world about Jesus. This humility causes us to be united with each other, not divided.

The beauty of the Gospel is that when we follow Jesus, we get the righteousness of Christ placed on us. It is not something we work for, there is no job or action you can do that will earn you salvation. It is not in our own effort that we get eternal life, but through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Our glory is in the grace of God and the cross of Christ, not in our own self-righteousness.

Today, if we know Jesus as our savior, we can find comfort knowing that there is no other work we have to do to be saved. If you do not know Christ as your savior, don’t wait. Make today the day that you repent and turn to Christ.