Sermon Tone Analysis

Intro:

-God’s speaks to humanity in his reveled word and he speaks in ways that the human mind can understand his words with clarity.

Therefore throughout the scripture, The HS is using word pictures and analogies from our earthly realm to teach us.

He does this to communicate heavenly truth to earthly minds.

For Example:

Farming/gardening

Athletics

Creation

Construction:

Last week : 1 Cor 3:9

Construction has been an area of interest with me for many years.

My Great Grandfather owned an electrical business (see pic), which he trained and turned over to my grandfather, Cito, who trained my dad, who trained me.

That gave me a love for fixing things and therefore construction is a natural path for me.

You can say its in my DNA.

Passages like this really speak clearly to me and Paul, understanding the culture of Corinth, is speaking to them as well.

You don’t have to be a construction foreman to understand the basics of how buildings (foundation, walls, roof) are constructed and how they are constructed well.

Imagine the Corinthians, with all the elaborate buildings in this grand city like the Acropolis and the temples to the Greek gods like Apollo and Aphrodite.

Even a working knowledge of such amazing structures, the Corinthians like the current believer ,can easily discern Paul’s word pictures.

Paul speaks to communicate in these verses to the Corinthians how to build the church properly.

He is warning them as he warns us that there is a right and wrong way to construct God’s church.

let’s look and see how

Components of Constructing God’s Church (v.10-11)

The Church

Remember that Paul is speaking to believers and therefore when he says, “you are God’s building” he means you are the church for the church is NOT a building but a people.

Even though Paul is talking about beleivers in Jesus Christ who make up the church, he uses the analogy of a physcial building construction to illustrate how the church should be properly built by the power of the Holy Spirit, through its members.

“The church is the people of God who have been saved through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ and have been incorporated into his body through baptism with the Holy Spirit.

It consists of two interrelated elements: the universal church is the fellowship of all Christians that extends from the day of Pentecost until the second coming, incorporating both the deceased believers who are presently in heaven and the living believers from all over the world.

This universal church becomes manifested in local churches

the church is composed of a particular people: “sojourners and strangers” (see 1 Pet.

2:11).

In contrast with some common notions today, it is not a building...a denominational tag...a national or state church ... avatars worshiping together in the virtual world ... or the Catholic Church, with its claim that “the one Church of Christ . . .

subsists in the Catholic Church.

Rather, the church is people; specifically, the church is the new covenant people of God.”

Allison, Gregg R.. Sojourners and Strangers: The Doctrine of the Church .

Crossway.

Kindle Edition.

What Paul then is teaching in these verses is that there is a proper and improper way for the people of God, or his church, to grow.

This passage then speaks to all of us and answers the question, what should we do as God’s people to grow spiritually?

The Foundation

Sometimes simplicity is all that is needed.

Earlier, Paul not wanting the Corinthians to think that preaching was some mystic or complex oratory, he simply defined his preaching as

“We preach Christ crucified.”

Later in 1 Corinthians, he will spell out the gospel as: 1 Cor .15:3-4

1 Corinthians 15:3–4 (ESV)

3 ...Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures,

Now he defines for us in the simplest terms what the church is built upon.

We understand this idea in construction terms as the chief importance of any building project is its foundation.

If the foundation is fragile, the house will fall.

If the foundation is not level, the house will not be level.

Paul states simply in v 10-11

Paul acknowledges that the foundation of the church is Christ and Christ alone.

This was the foundation that was laid when he arrived in Corinth and he laid that foundation with faithful preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the making of disciples of Jesus Christ for a year and a half.

Others have laid crumbling foundations in the start of their churches, churches built on pizazz, churches built on politics, churches built on programs.

I talked with a pastor this week who shared with me the fast growing church in his town who has rented hot air balloons before to fly the pastor into an event.

We were reminded how some churches ministries are constantly trying to catch the attention of their patrons with some other means than simply Jesus Christ.

He is enough and His word is enough for the people of God to worship and celebrate.

Throughout the history of the church, since its inception at Pentecost, there has been nothing that has solidified the structure of the church in this world other than Jesus Christ and his word.

The promise of the Scripture is that “the gates of hell will not prevail against (the Church)” because it is the church with a foundation laid which is Jesus Christ which will stand and remain and produce Spirit empowered results.

The Workers

In v 10, Paul starts in a humble way with himself, in his analogy stating he is the “wise master builder.

” He is wise in comparison to the confused culture that taught that integrating cultural influences was necessary to build a successful ministry.

Instead, he demonstrated true wisdom in resting his head at night knowing the church was built upon the solid foundation of Christ.

Secondly, he calls himself a wise “master builder” which in the GK is ARCHITEKON which sounds like our english word Architect.

This implies that while the building the church most simply rests on building it on Christ alone, it is also complex and requires careful attention to detail.

Like a master builder, plans need to made, strategies need to be laid out, and actions steps in correct order need to be followed.

Healthy churches are not grown willy nilly.

All steps in a growing a healthy church then must be filtered through what the Word of God teaches about the church, which serves as the blueprint for how we are to live and function as God’s people.

Secondly, Paul talks about others who build upon his work, in this case, it would be what Apollos accomplished after him.

Again, Apollos’ work wasn’t in opposition or competition to Paul’s, for both heralded the cause and glory of Christ in the church.

Therefore, Paul states that those who came after him, build a structure upon the foundation.

These are the WORKERS, or LABORERS who follow the design and plan of the build and bring it to fruition.

A couple of truths to consider:

the workers don’t re-write the design of the building, its been done for them by someone greater

the workers accomplish the task of building the structure upon what was already been laid, carefully paying great attention to how they build upon the foundation of Christ.

1 Corinthians 3:10 “ Let each one take care how he builds upon it.”

the workers accept their role of faithfully building, not as consumers, not sitting idly by doing nothing, and not wasting precious time that has been given to them to complete the task.

You and I then are God’s fellow workmen.

We are the laborers at the construction site of God, building the church, God’s people.

We understand our role and we accept the responsibility as a community.

This is not just a message for pastors, but all of us because individually, we are responsible for our own growth and corporately, the growth of our local assembly.

We grow in Christ as one people!

We take care how we build the church when we first take care how we are growing spiritually as individuals in Christ.

Are we resting in Christ’s finished work of redemption?

Are he longing for the salvation that is to come?

Are we confident in his sovereign rule over all time and history?

Are we trusting in the power of the resurrection to gain us victory over sin?

Are we hopeful for His return?

The Materials

Paul then continues this metaphor looking at the materials that are being used in the build.

In my line of work, we use high quality materials in comparison to poor quality.

Everybody wants a cheaper price and they sacrifice quality for price.

They will choose cheap veneer cabinets only to replace them sooner than quality ones made with solid and true materials.

Paul states that we take care how we build the church when we consider the quality of materials that are used.

He names :

Gold, Silver, Precious Stones

These materials would have been used in the ornate buildings like the temples of his day.

In the Jewish temple at Jerusalem, in the temples of the Greek gods.

They quality of the materials served as an expression of worship for the temples to whom they were dedicated.

YHWH gave great detail to Moses about the materials and craftsmanship that was needed to what he was instructed to build for worship.

If you look back in Exodus, the first item to be constructed was not a building or structure, he started from the inside and worked his way outward.

What was the first thing Moses was instructed to build?