Let's turn to the word of God.
We'll turn now to Paul's first letter to
the Corinthians.
Again, let's look at the first verse to
see first couple of verses to see what
the subject of this letter is.
There's a little phrase here which I'd like
you to look at, which I think describes
the subject and theme of this letter.
Verse two, to the church of God, which
is at Corinth, the subject of this letter
is the functioning of the local church, the
church in a city or a town or
a village.
And what we see in this letter is
that the city of Corinth, the spirit in
that city had got into the church.
See these two expressions here, the church of
God and the city of Corinth, and the
spirit in that city had got inside the
church instead of the church influencing the city.
And that happens in many, many churches where
the spirit in the world around influences the
church instead of the church influencing society.
And the believers in the church get influenced
by the spirit of the world instead of
them influencing their relatives and people around them.
So that's what Paul is writing about in
this letter.
But he has a lot of things to
criticize in the Corinthians because there was so
many terrible things going wrong in that church.
But in spite of all that, he begins
with a note of thanksgiving.
And that's a very good example for us
that even in believers in whom you may
see a hundred and one wrong things, there
may be one or two things you can
find which you can appreciate.
And I always say, don't criticize a brother
whom you have never appreciated.
Did you hear that?
Don't ever criticize a brother whom you have
never appreciated.
Many people try to help others by criticism
and they cannot help them because in the
time before that brother did something wrong, when
he was doing some good things, they never
appreciated it.
I've used this example of a blackboard.
If I have a blackboard here and I
have a piece of chalk, I can write
on that blackboard and you can see what
I'm writing.
But if I don't have a blackboard and
I have only a piece of chalk and
I write correct things, I'm writing on air,
you can't see anything.
The blackboard is appreciation.
When you have appreciated a person, then you
take the white chalk of criticism and you
write it, he can see clearly what you're
writing.
But if you have never in your life
appreciated him, there is no blackboard and then
you criticize, all your criticism may be correct,
but you're writing on thin air, he can't
see a thing and he's not helped.
Most believers are writing on thin air.
And that's why they accomplish nothing.
Shall I show you a more excellent way?
Love that person.
And when you see something good, appreciate it.
Show him that you love him.
And then even one word of criticism that
you write on the board, he can see
it clearly.
It'll go home to his heart and he'll
do something about it.
So Paul begins like that.
I thank God, verse four, for you always.
I thank God because there are so many
good things in you.
First of all, for the grace of God,
which you received, that you fellows are born
again.
And in everything, verse five, you've been enriched
in him.
Praise the Lord for that.
And you fellows can share God's word so
wonderfully, your speech, your knowledge.
I appreciate your Bible knowledge, the way you
speak about God and the testimony concerning Christ
was confirmed in you all.
I thank God for that.
I thank God, verse seven, that you are
also zealous about spiritual gifts and not like
so many other believers who don't care for
spiritual gifts.
You people in Corinth are eager to have
spiritual gifts and you have all the gifts
because you sought for them.
You're not lacking, verse seven, in any gift.
And you're eagerly awaiting the coming of Jesus
Christ who will confirm you blameless.
God is faithful, verse nine, through whom you
were called into fellowship with his son.
You can't believe that this is a church
which has got so many wrong things, as
you read in the remaining chapters.
We can really learn a lesson from the
Apostle Paul in many of the letters he
writes.
He begins with, do you know, fellows, I'm
praying for you.
And the first thing I do when I
think of all of you is I really
thank God that you chaps have come to
Christ out of heathenism.
You've accepted the Lord.
But I know you're not perfect, but there's
so many good things in you I appreciate.
I want to teach all of you young
people a lesson.
Learn to appreciate.
Have you heard that story of the teacher
who kept a white sheet on the wall
with a small dot, black dot in a
corner and told all the students to write
down, write down carefully what you see.
And everybody wrote, I can see a black
dot in the corner.
And then the teacher collected all the papers
and said, none of you wrote, I can
see a white paper.
All you wrote was, I can see a
black dot.
He said, that's our nature.
So much of white, less than one percent
of black.
And that's the only thing you see.
And that's the only thing you write.
That's our human nature.
We're like that.
We're like that when we look at one
another, there's so many good things in those
brothers and those believers, you don't see that.
We don't see it.
We need to train our eyes to see
as God sees.
OK, we move on.
One of the things he finds fault with
them, he says, all of you are quarreling.
Once he's put up the blackboard, now we
can write on it.
He says, one of each of you is
saying, I'm a Paul, I'm a Paulist, I'm
a Cephas, I'm a Christ.
See, they were divided into what we would
call denominations sitting in the same churches.
My favorite preacher is Paul and my favorite
preacher is a Paulist.
My favorite preacher is Peter.
And then there was the people who felt
they were holier than everybody else.
He says, we belong only to Christ.
Now, do you think the people who said
I am of Christ were actually more spiritual
than others?
No, I think they were probably the biggest
troublemakers.
The people who said, who looked down on
others, saying you belong to Peter, you belong
to Paul, you belong to a Paulist.
You know who we belong to?
We belong to Jesus.
So that means we are holier than the
whole lot of you.
So they also belong to Jesus.
You need to appreciate that.
Even though that fellow may have a denominational
name, he may be born again.
Value him as a brother in Christ.
Don't think that you belong because you belong
to a denominational assembly which does not have
a denominational name.
Therefore, you alone belong to Christ.
Some of the people who belong to non
-denominational assemblies can be the most arrogant, conceited,
spiritually proud people you ever meet.
And some of those people who are born
again in those denominational churches may be very
humble people.
But they have a denominational label.
So Paul says, has Christ been divided?
Were you baptized in the name of Paul?
Again, he's on this theme of accept everyone
who is born again.
Don't bring divisions on the basis of preachers.
And Paul himself avoided baptizing people, verse 16,
because he didn't want anybody to say that
I got baptized by Paul.
I didn't get baptized by some ordinary believer.
In verse 18, he speaks about the subject,
which I would say goes right through Corinthians.
The word of the cross.
The solution for a carnal church like Corinth.
What is the solution for a carnal church
with all its problems?
The word of the cross.
That's the solution.
The word of the cross is foolishness to
those who perish.
But to us who are being saved, it
is the power of God.
What is the word of the cross?
Christ crucified in the last chapter of second
Corinthians.
Also, he speaks about it.
This is the answer in both letters that
Paul writes to the Corinthians.
He speaks about the word of the cross,
the gospel of the cross of weakness, of
rejection by the world, of misunderstanding, of not
retaliating, of humbling ourselves, of not having anything
to glory in from a human standpoint.
That's what he goes on to speak about.
Verse 26.
Consider this, my brothers.
There are not many wise people among you,
not many noble, not many mighty.
And here is the word of the cross.
Verse 27.
God has chosen foolish people to shame the
wise.
When Jesus chose his first apostles, he chose
unlearned fishermen to put to shame the great
Bible scholars of his day.
Gamaliel was a professor.
Annas, Caiaphas were all bishops.
And what was Peter?
Peter was a fisherman.
And God picked him up.
What was James?
What was John?
Fisherman.
You know what fishermen are like?
Go down to the coast of Kerala and
you'll see what fishermen are like, if you
want to know what type of people Jesus
picked up.
Unlearned, uncultured, Jesus picked them up.
But hardworking, sincere, with an open heart, Jesus
picked them up to shame all these clever
people in the religious society of his time.
He's doing the same thing today.
He doesn't say that he doesn't choose any
wise person.
He says not many.
Most of the people God picks up are
foolish, weak.
Verse 27.
Verse 28.
The base things of the world.
The things, verse 28, that are considered as
nothing.
And brother, sister, if you feel that you
fall into this category, that you're one of
the nobodies, that's why God picked you up.
God has great delight in using nobodies.
And if you look at the history of
India and the men who have, the men
of God through the centuries, who have influenced
India for Christ and proclaimed his word, you'll
find they were not great scholars.
They were simple people.
Very simple people, not highly educated, and who
were sincere, just like in the first century.
God picked them up, anointed them with the
Holy Spirit, and gave them a ministry.
And that's something which we must remember.
Why?
Because if a man serves God with all
his scholarly ability and knowledge, he will think
that because I'm such an intelligent scholar, God
used me.
And he will be proud of it.
But God does things in such a way,
verse 29, that no one will be able
to boast in his presence.
The ultimate purpose is that no human being
will ever be able to boast.
You know, the new song when we stand
before the Lord is, Thou alone art worthy,
O Lamb of God.
Thou art worthy, O God.
Thou art worthy, O Lamb.
Nobody else.
Not Paul.
Paul is not worthy.
Peter is not worthy.
Mr. X and Miss Y.
None of them are worthy.
Lord Jesus, you alone are worthy.
No man will be able to boast in
God's presence in that day.
And because rich people and clever people and
intelligent people tend to think that God is
using them because of their cleverness and intelligence
and their wealth or something like that, that
my wealth is spreading the gospel, or because
I'm such an intelligent person, God picked me
up.
And used me.
I'll never forget more than 20 years ago,
or was it 25 years ago, I was
asked to speak at the graduation ceremony of
a Bible seminary.
And during the time I was there, I
spoke to a young student who came first
in the outgoing class.
He got the prize for for topping number
of subjects, came first in his class.
He wanted to talk to me.
And when I talked to him, he said,
he says, I'm thoroughly defeated by sin.
All those years of accumulating Bible knowledge did
not deliver him from dirty thoughts and the
lust of the eyes.
I say, I told him how sad that
is.
And he said, actually, after four years here,
I'm worse off than I was before in
my life.
I said, what is all this Bible knowledge
doing for you then?
You're going to be a pastor in a
few years.
And what are you going to tell people?
Are you going to tell them about Hebrew
words and Greek verbs and things like that?
Those fellows don't need to know about all
that.
They need to know how to overcome the
lust of the eyes and how to overcome
dirty thoughts.
You don't have that.
What are you going to teach them?
That's the tragedy in Christendom today.
Scholars who are teaching all types of things,
which are not helping those people over there.
It's like people, you know, the man's got
an injury here and they're putting the medicine
somewhere else.
He doesn't need a medicine there.
He needs it over here, brother.
He doesn't need all your Hebrew words and
Greek verbs and all that.
He needs to know how to overcome sin.
And if you don't learn that, what are
you going to help people?
I never forget that when I met this
young chap.
And I felt very sad for him because
he was a Hindu convert.
He had come to the Lord.
And I think he just ended up his
life, wasting his life.
OK, so I want to encourage you to
think more seriously about your life.
That's more important.
And don't boast about your family background or
cleverness.
Anything that makes you boast will hinder God
from fulfilling his purpose in your life.
And then Paul says, let me give you
my own example.
But, you know, Paul was from a very
wealthy family.
Tarsus, he was Saul of Tarsus.
Tarsus is a town where only rich Jewish
businessmen would go.
I'm sure that Saul's father was a very
wealthy businessman.
And Saul came from a very wealthy family.
His father had sent him as a young
man to the Bible seminary in Jerusalem, where
Gamaliel was the professor, the top seminary of
that time.
And his father could afford that.
In those days, it was a great honor
for a man to be a scholar at
a young age.
And Paul was a man with a brilliant
mind.
He was not only from a wealthy family.
He was a man for the brilliant mind.
I think if Paul had gone into any
profession, he would have succeeded.
If he had gone into politics, he'd have
been a success.
If he'd gone into business, he'd have been
a success.
If he'd been living today, he'd have been
a top computer programmer.
He would have been a success at anything.
But he gave it all to Jesus.
But he did not use his cleverness.
That's the point he's trying to say.
He says, when I came to you, chapter
2, verse 1, I did not come to
you with all the superiority of speech and
wisdom proclaiming to you the testimony of God.
He says, I did not come to show
you what a scholar I am and how
much of the Bible I know and all
this human cleverness.
He says in verse 4, my message and
my preaching were not in persuasive words of
human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Holy
Spirit and power.
He says, because if I had preached to
you with human cleverness, your faith would have
rested on my cleverness and not on the
power of God.
Those of you who preach the word, let
me encourage you and challenge you.
Make your preaching simple.
For many, many years that I have preached,
I've always asked myself this question.
Could the little children in my church understand
what I said?
Or is it only the highly intellectual people
who could understand?
What about multitudes of people who sit in
my church for whom English is a second
language?
They don't know all these high English words.
Did they understand what I said?
That's enough.
If the children and the people with fourth
standard pass can understand me, all the rest
will understand me.
But if only the certain clever people can
understand me, then 90% of the people
haven't understood me.
Then what have I got at the end
of my message?
Some honor as a great scholar or speaker.
I don't want that.
I want to bless people.
When I was a young preacher, the Lord
asked me a question.
Do you want to impress people or do
you want to help them?
I said, Lord, I want to help them.
Then the Lord said, stop trying to impress
them.
I said, OK.
That was the turning point in my life.
And I want to encourage all of you.
When you get up to speak, do you
want to impress people or do you want
to help them?
If you want to impress them, use your
scholarly abilities and knowledge.
If you want to help them, be simple.
Speak in such a simple way that even
the children and the less educated people there
can understand.
The gospel is very simple.
Jesus was a very simple man.
When Jesus spoke, children could understand.
When Jesus spoke, everybody could understand.
100% could understand him.
But today, when a lot of people preach
in Christian circles, very few can understand.
So Paul says, even though I have such
a brilliant mind, I'm a greater scholar than
all of you put together.
I could have used my mind to speak
in a very scholarly way better than all
of you.
But he says, I didn't do that.
I laid it at the feet of Christ.
All my ability and knowledge and all that.
And I decided to speak in a very
simple way with the power and anointing of
the Holy Spirit so that the Holy Spirit
could take my words home to your heart.
That's what I wanted.
Not that you would be impressed with my
cleverness, but that the Holy Spirit would bring
conviction in your heart and change your life.
That is God.
That's the word of the cross.
That's how the cross works in our life.
But he says, we have.
And the other thing is, he says that
you people were babes.
So I couldn't give you anything more than
milk.
Chapter three, verse one and two.
You know, you have to also recognize when
you're preaching to people, what is their spiritual
level?
For example, if you're speaking to mature Christians
who are godly men, you speak in one
way and you speak to people who are
just babes in Christ, you have to speak
in another way.
And Paul recognized that.
He said, these Corinthians are still babes.
They've been believers for many years, but they
haven't grown.
So I must speak to them at their
level.
He says, I could not give you meat,
solid food.
Verse two of chapter three, I give you
milk.
But with other people who are more mature,
chapter two, verse six, he says, we speak
wisdom among them.
We have, we can speak about deeper things
when we go to them.
We can speak about dividing soul and spirit
with them.
But with these people, we got to speak
about simple things like how to overcome dirty
thoughts and how to overcome anger and very
elementary things.
We've got to give them milk because that's
all they can tolerate.
Yet he says, when we do speak, even
when we speak to these mature people, we
don't try to speak in a worldly, clever
way.
Chapter two, verse six, not a wisdom of
this age, but we speak God's wisdom.
Verse seven.
So we must keep that in mind.
Now, these, this wisdom of God, it says
in verse nine, cannot be seen by the
human eye or heard by the human ear
or understood by the human heart.
But worse than it has to be revealed
by the Holy Spirit.
See, that's where it makes no difference whether
we are clever or not clever, whether we
are brilliant minds or not so clever minds.
It's revelation by the Holy Spirit.
And that's why through the years you find
that God has used some very, very simple
people and given them an outstanding ministry, brought
many, many people to the Lord through people
who are not scholars.
And even if you look around India today,
what do the great Bible scholars do?
They don't go into the villages and bring
people to Christ.
They go for these big conferences on evangelism
and present papers and become directors of big
organizations who are the people who are doing
the real work in India, the simple people
who go into the villages and bring people
to Christ who are filled with the Holy
Spirit and go out there and bring people
to Christ and establish them in the Lord.
That's the work.
That's the real work.
So I say, let the useless people go
to all these conferences and let them sit
on the committees and be the directors.
You get down and build a church, bring
people to the Lord.
That's what I want to do all my
life.
I don't want to waste my time sitting
on committees and presenting papers.
I want to bring people to the Lord
and establish them in a church.
That's our calling.
That's what Paul did.
And so we move on.
In chapter three, he speaks about evangelism and
building the church.
He says in verse four, see, some of
you say I'm of Paul and I'm of
Apollos.
He said, what's the difference?
We are both servants.
I planted chapter three, verse six.
That means I did evangelism.
I went there, dug the ground, planted a
seed.
That's evangelism.
Apollos came after me.
He didn't plant any seed.
He didn't dig any ground.
The seed which I had planted, he watered
it.
Now some people get upset if someone else
comes along and waters what he has planted.
He said, why don't you go and plant
something yourself?
Why you come into my field?
I said, is this your field or is
it the Lord's field?
I thought it was the Lord's field.
That's why I came to water it.
If it's your field, then keep it.
See, this is the tragedy of a lot
of evangelism today.
This is my convert and that's why there's
so much of duplication of work today.
Lot of people doing the same thing instead
of one doing what God has called him
to, another doing what God's called him to
do.
If Paul plants, isn't it good that Apollos
comes and doesn't plant, but he waters and
he nurtures that plant and lets it grow
up into a solid tree.
That's the cooperation they had in the first
century.
What we have today is not cooperation, but
competition, unfortunately.
So don't duplicate another person's work.
When you have evangelism and making people disciples
and building the church, the way I pictured
it in my mind is, supposing 100 people
are carrying a log of wood and 99
people are holding one end of it and
one person is holding the other end of
it.
If you're a sensible person, which end will
you go and help?
The end where there's only one person.
I see in many situations, 99 people doing
evangelism and one person making disciples and building
the church.
I say, I want to go and help
with that end.
Not because I'm against the people at the
other end.
They are also carrying the log, but there
are too many people there.
We got to carry the other end of
the log too.
The Mark 16 commission and the Matthew 28
commission.
So Paul and Apollos worked together.
They were not in competition because their converts
were for the Lord.
The church was for the Lord.
I planted, verse 6, Apollos watered, but God
was the one who caused the growth.
So he says, all the glory should go
to God.
And what am I and what is Apollos?
Both of us, verse 7, are nobodies.
We are nothing.
See, that's why they could work together.
That's the secret.
Paul said, I'm a nobody.
Apollos said, I'm a nobody.
And two nobodies can work together wonderfully.
But when one fellow thinks I'm a somebody
and the other fellow says, well, if you're
a somebody, I'm a bigger somebody than you.
Very difficult for them to work together.
It's impossible.
But if you're a nobody and somebody else
is a nobody, we can work together wonderfully.
You know, if you ever build a church
in any place, let me give you a
recommendation.
Build a church of nobodies.
Make everybody a nobody and you be a
nobody yourself.
And you'll have a wonderful church without competition.
Perfect cooperation.
If you can succeed in building a church
where every person, including yourself, is just a
zero.
That'll be a wonderful church.
So many zeros.
You say that they have no value, but
you put Jesus in front of it a
one.
And suddenly this has got so much value.
It's not just zeros.
It's one with so many zeros after that.
That's how it is.
Don't be a don't be a somebody.
The reason churches fail, the reason of fighting
among believers and leaders is because people want
to be somebody.
And so he said, he goes on to
talk about laying a foundation and building.
Both are necessary.
He first uses the picture of planting and
watering, and then he speaks about laying a
foundation, verse 10, and building on that in
verse 11 on 12 onwards.
The foundation is Christ leading people to salvation,
faith in Christ.
That's evangelism.
Then he says, you've got to build on
it.
Now, make sure how you build.
What type of church are you building?
Is it just a matter of size or
quality?
Always the big question you're going to face
in Christendom is quantity versus quality.
Remember this.
He says, you're either going to build verse
12 with gold, silver and precious stones or
wood, hay and straw.
Supposing you are given a hundred thousand rupees
to buy either wood, hay and straw or
gold, silver and precious stones.
What are you going to buy?
If you want to build a huge structure,
you will buy wood, hay and straw with
that money.
If you're concerned about building a structure that
will last forever, you'll buy gold, silver and
precious stones with that money.
So we have all got a limited amount
of time.
We don't have thousands and millions of years
to live.
We may live 60, 70, 80 years and
maybe 50 years of usefulness for the Lord
in that time.
What are you going to do in those
50 years?
Are you going to build something which is
big, without quality, which is going to be
burnt up in the final day?
Or would you rather build something small, which
is solid quality of disciples, which even when
it goes through the fire, it comes out?
That's the test here.
And that's the question.
He says some people build with wood, hay
and straw.
And with wood, hay and straw, you can
build a huge structure.
And some others build with gold, silver and
precious stones.
They don't build something so big, but it's
solid quality of believers, disciples.
It's a solid church.
One day, the Lord is going to put
everything in the fire.
And this man's huge structure will be burnt.
And there'll be nothing left of it.
But he himself was a born again person,
verse 15.
So he saved.
And the other man who spent all his
life despised by people, he was despised because
his work was not so big.
Oh, how many people in your church?
Only so many, is it?
I have so many in our church.
How many churches have you built?
Only so many, is it?
You know how many churches we've built?
OK, let's wait till the judgment seat and
see how many of these go through the
fire.
That's the test.
And when the fire comes and tests this
and this, you may find that the small
work of quality disciples, a few churches go
through the fire and come out pure.
And that huge structure with thousands of churches
burnt.
What are you going to spend your life
doing?
Think of eternity.
Think of what Jesus said.
Go and make disciples of all nations.
Are you producing something that will last forever
and ever and ever?
That's the question must always be in our
mind.
Is this the way God wants to build?
Is this got Christian principles in it?
Am I making disciples who love Jesus more
than anything else?
Or am I just gathering converts who just
say, Lord Jesus, I believe in you.
But they haven't become disciples.
So just think of the end of your
life.
It says in verse 14, all your work
is burnt up.
How sad you'll feel.
Everything that you lived for and did burnt
up.
You're saved.
You go to heaven.
But you live in heaven all eternity with
regret that you wasted your one earthly life.
I don't want to have that regret.
I want to build with gold, silver, precious
stones, quality work today.
Okay, let's go to chapter four.
It speaks here about the servants of Christ.
In verse two, it says the most important
thing required of stewards that one be found
faithful.
It says in the Living Bible, the most
important thing about a servant is that he
does just what his master tells him to.
It's a very important principle in Christian work
that you don't do so many things.
You do what your master has told you
to do.
You've got to wait upon God and say,
Lord, what is your ministry for me?
And I'm going to do that.
The most important thing about a servant, if
I have a servant in my house, I
don't want him to run around doing so
many things during the day.
I want him to do what I tell
him to do.
Otherwise, when I want him, he's busy doing
something else.
This is how a lot of full-time
Christian workers are.
When the Lord wants them to do something,
they've already made their program to do something
else.
They have no time to wait on God
to find out what is God's will for
them.
So learn to wait on the Lord.
The most important thing about a servant is
to hear what his master is saying and
to do that.
And in chapter four, it speaks about the
condition of true apostles, true servants of Christ
who walk the way of the cross will
never be honored.
The apostles are the greatest in God's church.
They are the elders of elders in churches.
They are the ones who plant churches, establish
elders, and are a guide to the elders
of churches.
How are they considered by the world?
In verse nine, God has exhibited us apostles
last of all.
In the world's eyes, the apostles are last.
They are not honored.
We have become a spectacle to the world.
Now, Paul is comparing himself as an apostle
and the other apostles with the Corinthian Christians
who were carnal.
He says, you people are filled, verse eight,
you become rich.
Verse 10, we are fools, but you are
considered very wise.
We are considered weak.
You are considered strong.
You are all distinguished in the world.
We have no honor in this world.
Do you know that a true servant of
God and apostle of Jesus Christ never has
any honor in this world?
He's not distinguished.
It's the carnal Christians who are distinguished in
the world.
If you seek to be distinguished in the
world, you will end up as a carnal
Christian.
He says in verse 11, we are hungry
and thirsty, poorly clothed.
A true apostle of Christ never becomes rich
through preaching the gospel.
Wherever you see a man who has become
rich through preaching the gospel, you can be
sure he is not an apostle of Christ.
A man who has bought houses and lands
for himself and his family through preaching the
gospel, he's not an apostle.
A man who can buy expensive cars through
the money he gets by preaching the gospel,
he's not an apostle.
No, he's just a carnal Corinthian Christian.
Paul could have made a lot of money.
He didn't.
A true servant of God does not make
money through preaching the gospel.
He receives gifts to survive, like Jesus and
the apostles did, but does not to become
a millionaire.
And you see exactly the opposite happening in
Christendom in India today.
That is why my respect for all these
so-called preachers who talk about speaking in
tongues and baptism in the Holy Spirit and
all, my respect for them is zero.
Zero.
I have more respect for some of these
Roman Catholic priests who go to North India
and live very simply far more than some
of these preachers who say they speak in
tongues and make money and become wealthy through
preaching the gospel and visiting the Gulf and
build houses and lands over here.
Look at the apostle Paul.
Which one are you going to follow?
Are you going to follow a true apostle?
Are you going to follow all these counterfeits?
To this present hour, verse 11, we are
hungry, thirsty, poorly clothed, roughly treated, homeless.
Apostles, roughly treated, homeless.
He says we toil, working with our own
hands.
He says we support ourselves.
We are reviled.
People tell all types of false stories about
us, but we bless them.
We are persecuted wherever we go, verse 12,
but we endure.
People tell false stories about us, verse 13,
we are slandered.
And when we are slandered, we try to
conciliate, to bring peace.
And we have become, as the scum of
the world, the dregs of all things.
You know, in big cities, you have a
sewage pipe.
The sewage pipe is where, when you flush
the toilet, all that stuff goes into the
sewage pipe.
Paul says we apostles are treated like that.
Who cares for what flows in the sewage
pipe?
Do you know that the greatest apostle that
lived said, this is how apostles are treated?
Whereas you Corinthian Christians, you are all scholarly,
distinguished, respected.
You got your titles and your honor, and
people in the world appreciate you, and you
feel happy that people in the world honor
you, and give you honor in their different
places.
He says, not us.
I'm sorry to say that Christendom has lost
that vision of what it means to be
a true servant of God.
And it is our job, if you feel
that challenge, to demonstrate in this country once
again, what it means to be a true
servant of God.
One who will not compromise, one who does
not seek for any of the honor of
men, one who doesn't want all the honorary
doctorates that the world gives, because he doesn't
want honor.
God's not impressed with all these honorary doctorates,
and neither is the devil.
The scum of all things.
Who wants to be like this?
People want to be apostles and sit on
thrones and get honor.
My brother, sister, listen to what I say.
Don't go that way.
Be a humble servant of God all the
days of your life.
Be an ordinary brother and an ordinary sister.
Humbly seeking to serve God.
Rejected by the world, perhaps.
Rejected by Christendom, perhaps.
It doesn't matter.
The dregs of all things.
You may say Paul had, psychologists will say,
Paul had this complex of being nobody, of
being martyred and all that.
Let the psychologists say what they like.
He was a true servant of God.
Don't be disturbed by what a lot of
Christians today are more influenced by psychologists than
by the word of God.
Don't worry about what they say.
Don't be disturbed by them.
Follow the example of this godly man.
And with all this rejection, was he jealous
of the Corinthians?
They are comfortable.
They are distinguished.
He says, no, I feel sorry for you
fellas.
I'm in a more blessed position.
And he says, I want to speak to
you as a father, not to shame you.
He says in verse 14, I'm not writing
these things to shame you, but to correct
you.
You can have 10,000 teachers, verse 15,
but not many fathers.
I'm your father.
You know, a true servant of God is
a father.
He doesn't shame people.
Teachers shame the students.
If a student does something, a teacher will
put him to shame.
A father will never put a child who
says something stupid to shame.
A true servant of God must be a
father.
And he says, you people can say so
many wonderful things, but when I come into
your midst, verse 19, I'm not going to
listen to all these clever words.
I want to see how much power there
is in your life.
I'm impressed, Paul says, by power, verse 19,
not by words, verse 20, because the kingdom
of God is not in words.
It's in power.
Power is the thing.
How much power do you have?
That's what I want to know, Paul says.
OK, we go to chapter five, where Paul
has to deal with immorality in the church
in Corinth.
And it's a very good chapter because sometimes
we have to deal with sin that is
not repented of, where people continue in sin.
Now, Jesus told us that when a person
sins in a church, the first four chapters,
by the way, are Paul is establishing a
certain foundation of a true servant of God
and about the word of the cross.
And then he deals from chapter five onwards
with the various problems there were in the
local church, how the spirit of the city
of Corinth had got inside the church.
And part of it was immorality.
There was a lot of immorality in the
heathen temples in Corinth.
And that spirit had got into the church.
There was a man who was living in
adultery with his stepmother, his father's second wife,
and not even repenting about it.
And the sad thing was the elders in
the church in Corinth was so spineless people
that they didn't do anything about it.
They didn't have any moral courage and conviction
to put that man out.
They wanted to be popular.
You know, sometimes you lose your reputation when
you put a man out of the church.
They say, oh, that elder is a hard
chap and they don't want that reputation of
being hard.
I've seen servants of God like that who
always love their reputation more than the purity
of the church.
They're always concerned about being popular.
They are more like politicians in the church.
They want to be popular.
They want to get everybody's vote.
And they're not concerned about purity in the
church.
And when you have a politician like that
as an elder or a pastor, you have
a church which is in chaos.
That's what happened in Corinth.
Why didn't the elders put that man out?
Isn't it?
Doesn't everybody know that if a man is
living in adultery with his stepmother, that's a
sin?
Why didn't somebody go and rebuke him and
correct him?
Because they sought honor.
And you may find perhaps he was a
rich man.
I have a feeling he must have been
a very rich man.
If he was a poor man, I'm sure
those elders would have jumped on his head
and rebuked him straight away.
But he must have been a very rich,
influential man.
And then they thought, oh, he gives a
large offering in the church, and we better
not disturb him.
These are the type of thoughts that can
pass through your mind when you lead a
church.
And so Paul said, I couldn't care less
whether the fellow is rich or poor.
The fellow is living in sin.
And even though I'm not there, he says,
I'm here far away from you, but I'm
with you in spirit.
And I have decided to deliver this man
to the devil for the destruction of his
flesh, so that his spirit may be saved
in the day of the Lord Jesus.
And he says in verse 13, put this
wicked man out of your church.
That is called excommunication.
Put him out of the church.
Sometimes we have to do that.
But Jesus said, first go and speak to
him alone.
Matthew 18.
Then go in verse 18 to 20.
Then the elders must go and speak to
him.
Two, three.
And if he doesn't listen to you, finish
with both those steps.
He still doesn't listen.
Continues in sin.
Then Jesus said, tell his sin to the
whole church.
And put him out and treat him like
a heathen.
So there is a place for discipline in
a church, just like there's a place for
discipline in a home.
A home where children are not disciplined will
be a chaotic home.
And a church where people are not disciplined
will be a chaotic church.
A home where children are not disciplined, the
children will take over the home.
And the father will have to sit in
a corner.
And a church where there's no discipline, the
elders will have to sit in a corner.
All the others will take over the church.
That's exactly what's happened in many places.
Because the elder seeks popularity rather than establishing
the church on divine principles of holiness.
And what does it mean to hand over
this person to Satan?
That means for the destruction of his flesh
means so that Satan will bring sickness into
his body.
All sickness is from the devil.
I don't have the slightest doubt about that
in my mind.
God doesn't give sickness to anyone.
God may permit sickness like he permitted it
in Paul's life, a thorn in the flesh,
but he never gives it.
God doesn't tempt anyone, but he permits Satan
to tempt.
God doesn't make anybody sick, but he sometimes
allows Satan to give sickness.
But with a purpose.
Sickness comes from the devil.
And he was praying that this man will
get so sick through the devil attacking his
body.
And he'll be put out of the church
and there'll be no believers caring for him.
And there in the darkness, spiritual darkness, even
though he's got so much money, he'll realize
what he has lost and he will repent.
So sometimes God uses the devil to bring
sickness to an unrepentant believer to turn him
back to repentance.
That's very, very common.
Sickness is used by God to lead people
to repentance.
So that's what Paul is praying that I
deliver him.
He was an apostle and he had the
authority to deliver a man to Satan and
permit Satan to bring sickness into his life
so that the man would repent.
So though the world treated him like the
sewage, as far as God was concerned, he
had authority and the devil was scared of
Paul, even though the world treated him like
sewage.
In chapter six, he deals with the question
of believers taking each other to court.
Why does a believer take another believer to
court?
Because he feels that God has not helped
me to solve this problem.
And he feels that the church elders may
not be able to help me.
So let's go to a heathen court.
And Paul says here, it's totally wrong.
And those who take each other to court
like this, you are dishonoring the Lord.
You should have taken that problem to the
church.
He's not saying believers can't have problems.
There will be problems among believers, but the
believer should take them to the elders of
the church and not to a heathen court.
And he says, if somebody cheats you as
a brother in Christ, okay.
Allow yourself to be cheated.
Verse seven, last part.
Why not rather be wronged?
Why not rather be cheated?
But on the other contrary, you yourself do
wrong.
You yourself go and take that fellow to
court.
That's wrong.
And then he says in verse nine, don't
you know that people who do such things
will not inherit God's kingdom?
Do you know that if you take other
people to court, other believers to court, I
mean, you can miss God's kingdom yourself.
That's a sin that can put you out
of God's kingdom.
Why?
Because you are bringing public disgrace to the
name of Jesus Christ by taking that other
believer to court.
And before non-Christians who are supposed, whom
you want to give the gospel to, to
bring them into God's kingdom, you are leading
them away from God's kingdom by saying that
Christians fight with each other.
When Christians are supposed to show, Jesus said,
all men will know you're my disciples when
you love one another.
But you're driving them away back into the
hands of the devil by showing that you
fight with one another.
Then God says in that case, if you
do that, you don't deserve to get into
God's kingdom yourself.
You better go and join all the other
heathen too.
Such people, verse 9, will not inherit the
kingdom of God.
In other words, a Christian must always be
concerned about the glory of God.
Later on, he says that in chapter 10,
verse 31.
Whatever you do, do all to the glory
of God.
Are you going to glorify God by taking
that brother to court?
No, then don't do it.
Whatever you do, do it to the glory
of God.
What are you accomplishing by taking that brother
to court?
Revenge.
You hate him.
You want the judge to punish him.
Leave it to God.
Vengeance belongs to God.
Please remember that.
Then he goes on to speak about our
body.
Verses 12 to 20 is a wonderful section
on the human body.
And there's some lovely passages here which you
would, it's good to think of.
Verse 12 says, all things are lawful, but
all things are not profitable.
I just want to say a few words
about this.
There are three levels at which people live.
First of all, unlawful or unrighteous.
That's where all unbelievers live.
Then you have a line there.
Above that is lawful or righteous matters.
That's where all believers should live.
Sometimes, unfortunately, believers go down to do unrighteous
things also, but they should not.
That's the second level.
And then you have the highest level, which
is not only lawful, but profitable.
See, out of 100 things, 70 things may
be unlawful.
So I don't do any of them.
30 things may be lawful.
I can do any of those 30 things.
But out of those 30 things, only 10
may be profitable.
So a wholehearted Christian does only those 10
things.
A half-hearted Christian does 30 things.
A worldly Christian or an unbeliever does all
100 perhaps.
So this is the difference.
You have a choice.
You can live.
If you're really a sincere Christian, you will
never descend to the lower unrighteous things.
You'll do what is lawful.
But if you want to be a wholehearted,
effective servant of God, even from the lawful
things, you have to select the things that
are profitable.
For example, if we have 24 hours a
day, I mean, if you're going to watch
movies and read dirty books, those are all
unlawful.
The 70% of things you can't do.
But there are 30% of things you
can do in the world which are lawful
and good.
And you decide to do those things.
But still among that, there are many ways
you could spend the day.
You could go sightseeing.
You could go for a picnic.
You could do many, many things which are
good.
And if every day you spend like that,
you're not going to be a useful servant
of God.
You could also spend that part of that
day anyway in fasting perhaps and praying.
You choose the things that are profitable.
In reading, there are many things we could
read.
We could spend hours reading the newspaper and
few minutes reading the Bible.
Or a few minutes reading the newspaper and
hours reading the Bible.
There's nothing wrong in reading the newspaper.
It's good to know what's happening in the
world.
But it's a question of proportion.
You may not be sinning by spending two
hours reading the newspaper.
But then you don't have enough time to
read the Bible.
Or there could be a lot of things
like that.
Money, for example.
Like time, money.
There are unlawful ways to spend money.
Doing wrong things with money, we should never
do that.
But among all the right ways to spend
money, there may be only a few ways
where money can be spent profitably.
A wholehearted Christian spends his time and his
money profitably.
Selection, selection, selection.
This is the secret of life.
Out of all the lawful things I can
do with my time, I select.
These are the things I'm going to do.
Out of all the lawful ways in which
I can spend my money, I select.
So these are the ways I'm going to
spend my money.
That is the man who's going to count
for God.
And then he goes on to speak about
the body.
In verse 13 to 20, he speaks about
food for the stomach and the stomach for
food, but God will destroy them both.
And he says in the last part of
12, I will not be mastered by anything.
If you want to be a servant of
God, you should not be mastered by the
love of food.
If you love food and you're mastered by
it, I can tell you in Jesus name,
you'll never be a useful servant of God.
You have to break free from that habit.
And that's where fasting helps us.
And then he speaks about the body.
And I want to tell you some wonderful
things about the body here in verses 15
to 20.
It says your bodies, first of all, are
members of Christ.
Your body is a member of Jesus Christ.
So don't join it to a harlot.
Don't let it be joined to immorality.
Your body must be, verse 13, the last
part, for the Lord.
And here's a wonderful promise.
I really love this promise.
I've claimed it myself for many years.
If my body is for the Lord, the
Lord is for my body.
Do you know that?
If you say, Lord, my body, head to
foot, my eyes, tongue, everything is for you.
Then the Lord is for my body.
Not only my spirit, he's for my body.
He will keep my body fit to serve
him as long as he wants me to
serve him.
The young people will faint.
But those who wait on the Lord and
give their bodies to him will rise like
eagles in the sky.
And our body is also, verse 19, the
temple of the Holy Spirit.
You have been bought with a price, verse
20.
Therefore, glorify God in your body.
Wonderful passage on the body, which I want
to encourage you to meditate on, because we
need a body to serve God.
And we need a healthy body to serve
God.
Many people talk about healing.
I want to talk about health.
Health is better than healing.
Prevention is better than cure.
It's better not to eat too much and
be a glutton and get sick and then
ask the Lord for healing.
It's better to not eat so much and
be disciplined and not get sick.
Isn't health better than healing?
Let the Lord not be your healer, but
let him be your health.
How many times have you heard people preaching
that the Lord should be your health?
We hear about the Lord being our healer.
Prevention is better than cure.
Give your body totally to the Lord and
say, Lord, you're my health.
You're the health of my body.
And as long as you want me to
serve you, I'm here available.
I want to glorify God, not only in
my spirit and soul.
I want to glorify God in my body
because I've been purchased.
Purchased by God to be his.
It belongs to him.
I have to vacate the house because he
has purchased it like we vacate a house
once we somebody assigned a sale deed and
purchased it.
We must vacate our body, all of us,
and say, Lord, you're the owner.
Please take it.
It's a sin to live in a house
which somebody else has purchased.
Hand your body over to the Lord.
Let's pray.
Heavenly Father, apply these truths to our daily
lives.
We pray that we can be effective servants
of God and build a church that will
glorify you.
We pray in Jesus name.
Amen.