Sermons for the Month
Four on First Corinthians (4)
DATE: March 5, 2000
SERVICE: Transfiguration
TEXT: I Corinthians 15:1-11“To all of you Saints here this morning, grace and peace to you from God our Father, from His Son, Jesus Christ and His Holy Spirit. AMEN So far in First Corinthians, we have discussed divisions within the church, sexual immorality within the membership, public lawsuits between church members, idolatry, that is, putting something other than God first in our lives, and attacks upon the authority of the founding pastor. Sounds like the perfect church any unchurched person would just love to be part of. NOT! After reading this you have to believe in the Holy Spirit. If the success of the Christian Church had depended on the abilities and commitment of the people, we wouldn't be here this morning. And now we come to worship. Believe me when I tell you while the issue is different, worship is still the lighting rod of the Christian church. With the advent of new worship styles, music and the diversity of people's expectations, it has become no easier to meet everyone's perceptions of what is proper worship even with our changes than in the first century. For Paul, the first problem had to do with veils. This is a strange problem to our ears. The situation was this: It was the Jewish custom for women to appear in public clad in a veil that covered her whole head and the upper part of her body. The Gentile custom at this point is less certain but it seemed that most women covered their heads as well. The Corinthian Christian women, however, had flaunted the custom and stopped wearing veils altogether scandalizing their Corinthian neighbors. Paul saw it as just one more piece of evidence they were still immature Christians. "While all things are permissible, not all things are acceptable." Paul advises the women to wear their veils to avoid further embarrassing the new church in town. But we must move on to a much more important issue: Holy Communion. Before you get too comfortable, a perceptive reading of Corinthians 11: 17-24 will reveal the Corinthian church has done it again. They have taken a simple, straightforward ceremony and messed it up. Just like they have seemed to do with the rest of Christianity. Can you imagine: getting drunk and eating like gluttons and calling it Holy Communion? How could they do that? Here apparently is how Holy Communion was celebrated in Corinth: Even though it was a church-wide event, the people divided up into groups, probably around their favorite leader, sitting in separate parts of the meeting place. Everyone then just started eating, without waiting for the whole church to gather. It seemed to be something like a big potluck dinner although no one shared anything. Then after concluding their meals they all went home. And that was Holy Communion. Paul tells them that the Lord's Supper is not a food orgy but a "remembrance" by which we "proclaim the Lord's death." And then he says, "23 For I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took a loaf of bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, "This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of Me." 25 In the same way he took the cup also, after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me." With these words, Paul stressed the heart of the gospel: Jesus died for humanity. And to eat and drink to such a gift in an unworthy manner demeans the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. In other words, shape up. Chapter 12 is an exciting chapter to study. In fact, we just talked about it in Confirmation a week ago. In it Paul gives us clear insight into how the Holy Spirit works in the lives of Christians. The phrase "to be filled with the Holy Spirit" takes on new meaning for us as Paul tells us about the nature of spiritual gifts. This is a section of scripture which we must read with great openness because it holds for us valuable insight into how we, as God's people, ought to function in the church and in the world. Paul likens the church to a human body with all of its part working together for the sake of the whole. 14 Indeed, he writes, the body does not consist of one member but of many. 15 If the foot would say, "Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body," that would not make it any less a part of the body. 16 And if the ear would say, "Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body," that would not make it any less a part of the body. 17 If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? 18 But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. All the parts are important and all have equal value. And he says, 4 Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; 5 and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; 6 and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. 7 To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. About these spiritual gifts Paul says, 1. There are a variety of gifts given. 2. They are inspired by God. 3. Each Christian has at least one spiritual gift. 4. The purpose of gifts is to promote the good of others (not just to provide one a personal spiritual thrill). 5. These are gifts, not our due, nor are they earned. In verses 8-10 Paul gives his first "list" of spiritual gifts. None of his six lists in chapters 12-14 are exhaustive. Nor are they intended to be. Rather they illustrate the various types of gifts the Spirit gives. Various authors have tried to compile a list from Paul's comments and they have come up with the following: 1. The gift of administration
2. The gift of Artistry
3. The gift of Discernment of God's Will
4. The gift of evangelism
5. The gift of Persuasion
6. The gift of Faith
7. The gift of Giving
8. The gift of Hospitality
9. The gift of Intercession
10. The gift of Knowledge
11. The gift of Leadership
12. The gift of Mercy
13. The gift of Music
14. The gift of shepherding groups of believers
15. The gift of Service
16. The gift of skilled craft
17. The gift of Teaching
18. The gift of Wisdom
19. The gift of Writing
Once again, Paul was trying to correct a problem. It seemed that some members of the Corinthian church thought of themselves as more gifted than the others and so more deserving of praise and position. Ego, apparently, was getting in the way of ministry. So Paul finds it necessary to slow them down. Their gifts are authentic, that he acknowledges. They are of God. They are necessary for the church. But they have to be used in the right way. Clearly the Corinthians were using them in the wrong way. So Paul provides here in chapter 12 an overview of spiritual gifts: what they are, how to use them and how they work. We, of course, listen in fascination to all this. Our problem is not (generally) an over-exuberant use of spiritual gifts. Our problem is the under-use of spiritual gifts. It is not that we do not manifest any spiritual gifts in our church. We do. We know, for example, that certain people have the gift of teaching. Others are always helping people out. Still others like nothing better than sorting out the best way to run this or that program. It is just that we are often not aware that these are spiritual gifts. Therefore we do not use these gifts to their full extent because we haven't realized that this is the thing the Lord wants us to do in his church. Nor do we get training in the use of our gifts and so expand our ministries. Probably that is one of the greatest deficiencies of the Christian church. On the one hand we don't provide training and on the other hand people don't seek it out. The result: mediocrity in ministry. And so Paul urges the Corinthian church: use your gifts to the fullest. We call that excellence. He encourages them to think of themselves as a body, each member as vital, having its part to do, without which the whole body suffers. As you know these last few months we have been slowly reorganizing around this very concept of spiritual gifts. Luther called it "the priesthood of all believers." As Council President Bill Beers put it, this transformation this year will be a "work in progress." Instead of the same few people doing all the jobs, we are reorganizing around many people doing specific jobs. People would enjoy what they are doing since by definition one enjoys using a gift. Our ministry would be, by definition, more effective since people would be skilled at their jobs and successful in the exercise of their gifts. We would make more of an impact on our community since it would both see and experience our ministry. We would not have to worry about finding people each year to do all the jobs. And we would have more direct experience of the Holy Spirit in our lives. This change is going to take time. It is going to take patience. It means giving up old habits and accepting accountability. On the other hand, we would be returning to our Biblical roots such as those outlined by Paul in First Corinthians and if we are a Bible based church as the world "evangelical" implies in our denominational label, then it makes sense we affirm that in how we organize. We skip now to Chapter 14 having last week reviewed chapter 13--better known as the Love Chapter. Paul tackles yet another worship problem in Corinth--speaking in tongues. Speaking in tongues followed by the gift of prophecy --also known as ecstatic speech--were THE spiritual gifts most prized by the Corinthians. What they caused however was chaos in the service. Indeed, Paul says, they are a turn-off to newcomers, to the unchurched, visiting for the first time. He advises, "If there is no one there to interpret what is being said--and that must have been a sobering request--then don't do it." This issue, I believe, is why Lutherans particularly have been so frightened about "spiritual gifts." We have literally thrown the "baby out with the bath water." Because Paul took to task the Corinthians about these two spiritual gifts, we have ignored all the other spiritual gifts listed in your sermon notes. But "spiritual gifts" is such an important part of the church. This is what people are looking for today--desperately. They are looking for authentic examples of community. They want to know if God is alive and real in that community. Visitors, my friends, will pick up on that within the first five minutes of visiting. The exercise of these intelligible gifts is often a clear sign to people that God is alive. Such gifts still bring conviction of heart even today as they did 2000 years ago. I commend to your reading Chapters 15 because it talks about the only theological issue in this letter--The Resurrection of Jesus and the implications that has for the Christian. It outlines an important belief of Christianity--the resurrection of the body and the reunion we will all someday enjoy with those who have died and been resurrected before us in the Lord. It needs to be noted up front that many people in contemporary America do not understand the idea of resurrection. In fact, when they think about life-after-death they do so in Greek terms, not in biblical terms. And this is the very problem the Corinthians had. They too misunderstood this idea of a bodily resurrection because it ran so contrary to the Greek idea of what happened after death. You may remember that the Greeks did not like the body. They felt it to be a prison house of the soul. At death, according to the Greeks, as they body fell away like a discarded husk, the soul was released to fly to heaven. Sound familiar? A lot of Americans would say, "Yes of course." But does it? Paul does not think so. After reminding the Corinthians of the significance of Jesus' resurrection i.e. marking him God's son, a teacher who can be trusted, a sacrifice for our sin, he gets to his real point. The after-life is not a matter of shedding a corrupting body at death and thus allowing an incorruptible soul to fly free. The problem is not with the body. On the contrary, bodies are good. God made bodies and all they involve. Rather, Paul says, it is a matter of shedding a natural body in favor of a spiritual body. His key concept is transformation. For Paul, the business of God is transformation, transforming people into his disciples and, for those who are his disciples, transforming their bodies to eternal life through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Paul sees the resurrection of the body--our body--as the final stage of that life-long process culminating in the transformation of this imperishable body into one that has continuity with our natural body, into a body that retains its own special characteristics, that will be imperishable, glorious, heavenly, immortal, bearing the likeness of Christ. That is our hope. This is our inheritance through Jesus Christ. Thank you for walking with me through this very important letter, the look it gives us of the early church and the implications it has for our church--Faith Lutheran Church, Fairlawn, Ohio. AMEN