1 Corinthians 9:19-27
Notes
Transcript
Sermon Tone Analysis
A
D
F
J
S
Emotion
A
C
T
Language
O
C
E
A
E
Social
Start at the end - the three crowns
Start at the end - the three crowns
This morning we’re going to go backwards. That is, we’re going to start at the very end of this passage, the prize, and then work backwards from there. Because everything that Paul writes is leading up to that, and if we don’t really know where we’re going and what it’s all for, we’re going to find the journey unnecessarily hard.
In the second half, Paul is using a metaphor from athletics. He describes a runner, running not just for the sake of it, but to win. In the Greco-Roman world, of which Corinth was a part, athletics and racing was, quite literally, a national sport.
Philippides was the first marathon runner in the world. He ran from Marathon in Greece to Athens, announced victory, and fell down dead. The furthest I’ve run is a half marathon, and that first time I did that I lay on the ground thinking I was dying, so I resonate with Philippides! And if anyone tries to convince you to run a marathon and you want an excuse not to - there it is.
Corinth had its own famous event, the Isthmian games. My favourite thing about the Isthmian games is the prize. In our era, we give out medals. Here’s one I won for simply participating, very slowly, in a race.
Show medal
In the ancient world, the prize was a crown, made of plants. Sometimes Laurel. In the Isthmian games, it was often pine, but there was a brief and wonderful era when the crown was made of celery.
Show and tell celery crown
So in a race, the prize is a crown of leaves. And glory and honour etc, but those things fade too. Most of you hadn’t even heard of Philippides before today, and even those who had, had probably forgotten his name.
The Bible tells us of another kind of crown. It’s the crown that Jesus wore in His moment of triumph.
Show and tell crown of thorns
1 Then Pilate took Jesus and had him flogged. 2 The soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns and put it on his head. They clothed him in a purple robe 3 and went up to him again and again, saying, “Hail, king of the Jews!” And they slapped him in the face.
Jesus wore a crown of thorns as He was crucified. The soldiers intended it as a mockery - they were making a pastiche of honour, to someone they were shaming.
If you’ve ever felt shame, the image of Jesus, dying on the cross, bearing on his body the marks of the flogging, and wearing on his head the crown of thorns - let that sad, terrible picture be an encouragement. You see, we don’t ever wear the crown of thorns, the crown of shame.
I’m an expert in shame, at least in feeling it, and so my ears prick up every time the Bible promises that those who trust in the Lord will never be put to shame. That promise is in there multiple times, and in his letter to the church in Rome Paul echoes it:
11 As Scripture says, “Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame.”
So this is the crown that Jesus wore.
Is this the prize that we’re aiming for? NO
Jesus didn’t stay dead. That image of the saviour on the cross is a precious one, but it’s not the only one. Jesus rose to resurrection life, and the Biblical picture is of another kind of crown that waits for those who trust in Him.
12 Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because, having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him.
The crown of life. Now I did not have the skills or vision to make a crown of life, so you’re going to have to make do with this crown that is made of a grapevine.
Show and tell crown of life
The crown of life will last forever.
25 Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever.
It won’t go floppy, like the crown of celery. It’s also described elsewhere as a crown of glory, a crown of righteousness, a crown of joy. It’s life, forever, with God in the new heaven and on the new earth. It’s no more tears, no more sickness, no more death. It’s resurrection life, begun in Jesus, and going on forever in those who wear that crown of life.
So now as we work our way through this passage, I want you to keep these three crowns in view. Eyes on the prize.
What’s Freedom?
What’s Freedom?
19 Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible.
What comes to mind when you hear the word Freedom?
Braveheart - (I’ve never seen it)
Guns under the bed
A lawless society - sounds like ultimate freedom to some, and utter terror to others
Freedom to be who you are
So what does freedom mean to you?
In a lot of Paul’s writings, the freedom that he is talking about is freedom from the Law. Not the law as in the police, but the law that marked out the boundaries of the Jewish people, of whom Paul was one. We’ve talked about that a fair bit in recent weeks, and if you missed it, it might be good to go back and listen to Luke’s talk on it from June.
Paul uses a strong metaphor here, and it’s one that some of us will feel uncomfortable with.
It’s estimated that between 20 and 30% of people in the Roman world lived as slaves. A slave is someone who is completely under the authority (and also, at least in theory, dependent on), another person.
Slavery still shapes our world today. People live with the legacy of the enslavement of their ancestors. Here in Limehouse, we’re so close to the docks where goods were brought in that had been harvested by enslaved people, or even exchanged for those people.
Just this week, Sir Mo Farah shared his story of being trafficked to the UK for domestic servitude. Slavery is not ancient history. Slavery was, and is, an ugly reality In most times and in many places.
Paul isn’t writing casually here. We know from his other letters that he was friends both with enslaved people, and with at least one person who enslaved others. He had seen slavery from the inside. We know that the earliest churches were really attractive to enslaved people - they worked hard to carve out a space where the social hierarchies of the outside world were suspended, and ultimately the message of the gospel resonates with people who found themselves enslaved.
So why does Paul use such a shocking, ugly image to describe how he views his life on mission for Christ? Maybe there was nothing else that would so strongly convey what he was teaching.
19 Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible.
I think Paul has a role-model in mind as he writes this. Here’s what Paul wrote in a letter to another church:
5 In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:
6 Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
7 rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
8 And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
The translation there in verse 7 is servant, but the Greek word used is the same one that Paul uses in 1 Corinthians.
Jesus, who was and is God in very nature, made Himself a servant, a slave - one who is dependent and unfree, and humbled himself even unto death on a cross.
The gospel was a radical challenge to the prevailing worldview because, instead of trampling on the weak, they worshipped a saviour who had embraced weakness. This was a worldview where honour was everything, and while someone could die an honourable death for others, not a death like Jesus’s death. Publicly flogged, stripped, taunted by Roman soldiers, wearing a crown of thorns.
Still today, the very fact that Christians claim that Jesus died such a shameful death is a stumbling block to some - how could God be humiliated? Is that not blasphemy?
But in being shamed, Jesus made common cause with those who the world rejected.
So Paul uses this freedom-slavery language to highlight the stark contrast here as he tried to imitate Christ. He is free from the religious law, yet:
20 To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. 21 To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law.
And then, having started, he goes on.
22 To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some.
What does he mean by ‘becoming all things to all people’? That phrase can be a bit of an insult - we might use it to describe someone who says what people want to hear. No-one could accuse Paul of being like that. Simon read this passage last week but it bears repeating in this context. Here’s Paul outlining some of the consequences of how he has spoken and acted:
2 Corinthians 11:23–25 (NIV)
23 I have worked much harder, been in prison more frequently, been flogged more severely, and been exposed to death again and again. 24 Five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. 25 Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was pelted with stones...
That’s not the CV of someone who goes around changing his demeanour to please people.
Paul is not a pleaser of all, but a servant of all. At times that means confronting people, and at other times it means laying down his freedom so as not to put up barriers. We’re talking in the context of food sacrificed to idols, a really big issue for some people. This Paul, who did not believe that circumcision was necessary for a follower of Christ, and who argued aggressively against those Galatians who said it was, this same Paul encouraged Timothy to be circumcised in his specific context so that he could minister to Jews without being slandered.
As you reflect later this week on this passage, I want you to think about how you might live this out. How can we serve the gospel by serving others?
What’s it worth laying down freedom for?
What’s it worth laying down freedom for?
Why would Paul do that? To imitate Jesus. But why? Paul had caught a vision of something so worthwhile that he was willing to lay down everything else for it. He had found not a system, but a relationship with a person.
I think that some of these passages can be hard to hear if we’re hearing them through headphones of shame and condemnation. We hear ‘You should work harder, do more, give up everything’, and it all sounds too much.
I want to ask if you know Jesus? And before some of you say yes, I want to confess that there are many times when I would have to answer that question with a ‘no’, and I’m one of those paid ministers that Paul was writing about in the section just before this one.
The Bible consistently uses the metaphors of close human relationships - those of parents and spouses and friends, to show us the kind of relationship to God that we are talking about. We have to be careful not to make a metaphor a prescription. But there are aspects of human relationships that are mirrored in our relationship with God, and like our human relationships, it can be cultivated, or neglected.
Our love can go cold. Sometimes we come to faith in Jesus out of a really dark place, and we love the new identity and life that following Jesus gives us. That initial rush of love can fade down.
The good news is that the Bible shows us a God who is faithful, even if we’re not faithful. So this isn’t me saying ‘be careful not to neglect God or he will leave you’. But I do want to invite you to think about your love for Jesus. Did it start as a fire and is it now an ember? If so, no wonder the idea of laying down everything for the sake of the gospel is kind of exhausting. If nothing else, I hope that today I can just encourage you to come close again to God - know that He is faithful even when we are not, and whether you’ve been lukewarm for a day or a year or a decade, He’s ready to fire you up. He wore the crown of thorns for you, so you don’t have to. There is no shame left for you to bear yourself.
Paul says:
23 I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.
What are the blessings of the gospel? Peace with God, fellowship with Him, being reconciled to one another, the fruit of the Spirit in our lives, the promise of resurrection. The crown of life.
What’s discipline?
What’s discipline?
Let’s talk a bit about the second section, where Paul talks about runners. He’s comparing the Christian life to a race, in which we train, run hard, and win. What kind of training is he talking about? Again we find that really troubling metaphor:
26 Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. 27 No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize.
This time, Paul is talking about taking control over his own body. Some of us get a bit antsy about this. If you have a history of eating disorders or body dysmorphia you probably have a bit too much experience of controlling your body. I think it’s really important to keep the goal in mind here. This isn’t about self-discipline to be acceptable to ourselves, or admired by others.
And it’s definitely not about punishing ourselves - Jesus has taken on all the punishment for sin. But it’s about making sure that the life we live in the body matches up with the life we live in the Spirit, and in this world, that is going to require discipline.
Can we discipline our way to a sinless life? No. I’ve never seen anyone do it, I don’t believe the Bible teaches it, it’s the opposite of the gospel to say that if we just try harder we can beat this sin thing on our own. The message of the cross is that we aren’t enough, and we will never be enough, but that we are loved, and Christ is enough.
So why then do we need self-discipline? What is this training in Godliness? Thankfully, we don’t do it on our own. We train as a team, sharing what works and encouraging each other. We fast, we give, we serve those who are in need, we pray out loud and in silence, we meditate on God, we wake up early or stay up late to read His scripture which,
2 Timothy 3:16 (NIV)
16 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,
We do some of these things together, and some we do alone but in all of it we can encourage one another.
Paul flags up that in a worldly race there is only one winner. Only one runner gets the crown of celery. In the race we’re in, we’re not alone.
Show image of Brownlee Brothers
Brownlee Brothers
You may remember this moment, in a triathlon in Mexico. Jonny Brownlee collapses. He can’t go on. Alistair gave up his chance to win the race, and hauled Jonny to his feet and helped him over the line.
I don’t know what your birth siblings are like, if you even have them. I like to think my brothers would help me out like this, though they’re pretty competitive so honestly I think it would depend on their own chances a little bit. But this is how it can be in the church family. We train together, and we help each other over that finish line. Even when we’re alone, we’re not alone. Our Christian family pray for us, and Christ Himself intercedes for us.
So we train, not in vain but for the prize.
What’s the prize?
What’s the prize?
What crown do you want to wear?
Crown of celery?
Worldly success.
The perfect job that fulfils every aspect of your personality? A perfect body?
A reputation for being really nice, or really strong, or really brave, or really successful?
None of those things will last, and none of them will fulfil you. My most outwardly successful times in life have been the times of most internal turmoil.
Don’t waste your life running in a race you can’t even win for a crown of celery!
Crown of thorns?
You do not have to wear this one. If you put your trust in Him, you will never be put to shame. If shame is a part of your story, the enemy of your soul will whisper about it to you. You can tell Him right back:
11 As Scripture says, “Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame.”
Let the crown of thorns stay where it belongs, on the head of the saviour, the one who loved you and gave himself for you, the One who, being in very nature God, made Himself nothing, taking the nature of a servant, to wear the crown of thorns so that you could wear the crown of life.
Crown of life?
This is the crown that waits at the end of this race. Whether we cross the finish line triumphantly with something in the tank, or stagger across leaning heavily on our brother, there are enough crowns for everyone who completes.
Song - Mercy
Segue into worship.