Resurrection

Readings for today: 1 Corinthians 15-16

Boil the Christian faith down and what do you get? A man hanging on a cross, buried in a tomb, rising from the grave three days later. This is the heart of our faith. Without it, we preach in vain. We pray in vain. We live in vain. Without the death and resurrection of Christ, we are fools. We would be better off to eat and drink and party and make the most out of life because death wins. Literally everything rests on this fundamental truth...Christ has died. Christ has risen. Christ will come again.  

This is what sets Christianity apart from all other religions on the face of the earth. It’s what makes us unique. It’s what makes us different. It’s what makes Christianity true. We preach a crucified Lord and a Risen Savior. No other faith tradition makes anything close to the same truth claim. Sure, we might share the same moral code. Their gods might have some of the same attributes as our God. Their worship might look strikingly similar in terms of music and prayer. They might be good people with great families who live wholesome lives. They might make positive contributions to our society. But if they do not believe in the literal, historical, bodily death and resurrection of Jesus Christ; then their preaching is in vain. Their faith is in vain. They are still enslaved to their sins. Their dead are eternally lost. All because they are found to be misrepresenting God by denying the glory of His one and only Son. 

Paul is very clear. The physical death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is THE essential cog in our faith. It is the key to unlocking saving faith. It is the lens through which we now see all of life. It is the cipher that cracks the code of the Bible. Christ has been raised as the firstfruits of the resurrection. He is the foretaste. The forerunner. The first to be raised so that He can go before us and prepare the way. His physical body was laid into the ground perishable, dishonored, and weak. It was raised imperishable, glorious, and in power! He is the first to be changed. The first to be transformed. The first to be raised. By His resurrection, we know death has lost! Sin has been defeated! The works of the evil one destroyed! The death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is nothing short of the total and complete victory of God! 

And it is God’s victory that makes us immovable. Steadfast. Always abounding in His work. It is God’s victory that makes us watchful. Firm and strong in the faith. Persistent in love. It is his complete confidence in God’s victory that gives Paul courage to face everything he has to face. He considers all of it nothing compared to the surpassing worth of knowing Christ. What about you? Do you believe in the resurrection?

Readings for tomorrow: 2 Corinthians 1-4

A Humble Life

Readings for today: 1 Corinthians 12-14

One of the curses of our current age is self-righteousness. Whether we’re talking politics or social issues or cultural norms or personality traits, there is this drive within all of us to be right in our own eyes. And this need to be right or righteous is elevated to an almost sacred level which means anyone who may disagree with us is wrong. And not just wrong but unrighteous which means they’re evil. And if they’re evil, they cannot be tolerated and must be destroyed. We see this dynamic on display in the rhetoric from many of our current political leaders who claim those who differ from them are out to “destroy democracy” or are enemies of America. This dynamic seems jet fueled by social media which only serves to channel outrage and hatred and anger. This, unsurprisingly, leads to violence and conflict which is justified if it serves your particular agenda but gets labeled an insurrection if it doesn’t. One would think with all the information we have at our fingertips that we would humbly acknowledge the deep complexities of our world and other human beings. One would think because we all share the same fundamental nature that we would assume the best of one another rather than the worst. Sadly, this approach to life seems beyond us.

Of all people, Christians should understand the danger of self-righteousness. We should be the first to relinquish the need to be right in our own eyes. We understand, as the Apostle Paul puts it in 1 Corinthians 13:12-13 MSG, that “We don’t yet see things clearly. We’re squinting in a fog, peering through a mist.” This side of heaven, we don’t have a clear view of ourselves much less the world around us. We can only see the outward appearance of a person, we cannot see their hearts. And this should create a deep sense of humility within all of us. A willingness to let go of the need to justify ourselves. A deep longing for the day when “the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We’ll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing him directly just as he knows us!“ On that great day, every wrong will be righted…not by us but by God. Every injustice will be rectified…not by us but by God. Every tear will be wiped away…not by us but by God. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t work for these things in the here and now - of course we should - it simply means we should approach these issues with humility, recognizing the deep complexities of the human condition that lead us to our choices.

I love how Paul describes the way we work for justice and righteousness in our world. He says, “But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love.” Trust God. Always hope. And love as generously and lavishly and unconditionally as possible. What a great recipe for life! I know in my own life, things changed for the better in my marriage and with my kids when I decided to approach them with love rather than the law. When I let go of my need to be right and instead chose the way of love and encouragement and blessing. The arguments in my home went away. The conflict in my home died down. The tension and stress decreased significantly. It doesn’t mean we don’t speak the truth to each other. On the contrary, we have family meetings quite often where we have to talk about hard things. But we always do so with love first. We find ways to affirm and encourage first. We hug first. We seek to understand rather than be understood. We seek to meet the other person where they’re at rather than demand they meet us where we’re at. We recognize we don’t often know all that’s going on in that other person’s heart and we give them room to express what they are feeling. Ultimately, we show each other a lot of grace and trust the Lord to do the work only He can do in each of our hearts.

Readings for tomorrow: 1 Corinthians 15-16

Keeping our Bearings

Readings for today: 1 Corinthians 9-11

I love how the Message version describes Paul’s approach to ministry in our reading this morning. “Even though I am free of the demands and expectations of everyone, I have voluntarily become a servant to any and all in order to reach a wide range of people: religious, nonreligious, meticulous moralists, loose-living immoralists, the defeated, the demoralized—whoever. I didn’t take on their way of life. I kept my bearings in Christ—but I entered their world and tried to experience things from their point of view. I’ve become just about every sort of servant there is in my attempts to lead those I meet into a God-saved life. I did all this because of the Message. I didn’t just want to talk about it; I wanted to be in on it!” (1 Corinthians‬ ‭9‬:‭19‬-‭23‬ ‭MSG‬‬) Paul may be one of the most “free” persons to have ever lived. He refused to live by other’s expectations. He refused to bow to other’s demands. He refused to live one way when he was with the Jewish people and another when He was with the Gentiles. He refused to walk away from those who were struggling the most in life. He didn’t ever worry about his reputation. He simply kept his bearings in Christ.

“Bearing” is not necessarily a word we use often. It can mean many things but Paul is using it here to describe direction, orientation, heading, the trajectory of his life. He takes his bearing from Christ. Christ is the fixed point. Christ is his North Star. Everything he does is for the sake of knowing Christ and making Him known. There is no other calculus for Paul. There are no other factors in play. There are no other issues at stake. Christ is everything for Paul. And this allows him to maintain his “bearings” in the midst of a world of chaos, fear, and violence. Paul is very aware of how his life in Christ will set him apart. He’s very aware of how his life in Christ will make him different. And yet, because Christ is his firm foundation, he is free to enter the world of the least reached and least resourced around him and experience things from their point of view. He is free to engage and interact with them in an effort to win them to saving faith. It’s why he becomes a servant to all in order to save as many as he can.

What about us? Do we walk in the same freedom or do we worry too much about what others might say? Do we humbly seek to serve those around us, no matter their manner of life, in an effort to win them to Christ or do we hold back out of fear of the damage it might do to our reputation? Do we maintain our “bearings in Christ” as we navigate the challenges of this world or do we allow ourselves to be tossed about like a small ship on a raging ocean? Lean into Christ, friends. Make Him the fixed point of your life, your North Star, the firm foundation on which you stand.

Readings for tomorrow: 1 Corinthians 12-14

Let’s Talk about Sex

Readings for today: 1 Corinthians 5-8

Homer’s Iliad. The poetry of Sappho and Ovid. Pindar’s Odes. Plato’s Symposium. The Sacred Band of Thebes. Horace’s Odes. Without a doubt the Greek and Roman world was a highly eroticized one. Sexuality in all its forms was celebrated and embraced. Men were encouraged to build homoerotic relationships with young protégés. Homosexuality and lesbianism was known and commonly practiced. Temple prostitution was normalized as farmers slept with high priestesses to ensure the fertility of their crops for the coming year. Sexual promiscuity and adultery were not seen as taboo. Sexuality was a widespread theme permeating art, comedy, poetry, and philosophy. Sex was even used to bond men together in some of the great militaries of the period. 

By contrast, Jews and Christians practiced sexual restraint. They saw sex as a sacred act that bonded one man with one woman for a lifetime. Created to symbolize the “one flesh” God intended for man and woman to experience with each other, Jews and Christians maintained a healthy respect for its power. This is why they established strong taboos against any sexual activity outside the bonds of covenant marriage. They recognized that sex was not purely physical but bonded people emotionally and spiritually as well. To disregard the depth of the sexual experience or share it with more than one partner was to commit a sin against one’s own body which itself was a temple of the Holy Spirit. Sexual promiscuity was therefore intimately tied to ritual purity which is why transgressions took on a more serious tone. 

The Apostle Paul was steeped in the Judeo-Christian world of sexual restraint. The Corinthian Christians were coming out of the Greco-Roman culture of sexual promiscuity. You can easily see where these two worlds would clash. Paul confronts the Corinthian believers with some of his strongest language yet. Calling for the excommunication of a man who slept with his father’s wife. Commanding the Corinthians not to associate with the sexually immoral. Most certainly they should not avail themselves of the temple prostitutes and local fertility cults! At the same time, husbands should not deprive their wives of sex nor should wives do the same to their husbands. Celibacy is not God’s design for marriage. I see this as Paul at his pastoral best. Applying the gospel to the complex social and cultural realities that existed in his particular part of the world. 

What about us? Do these same principles hold true for us today? Absolutely. The Bible is univocal in both Old and New Testaments about the sanctity of the sexual relationship. It is to be shared between one man and one woman within the covenant of marriage over the course of a lifetime. Certainly one could point to deviations from this pattern throughout the Scriptures like the polygamy of the patriarchs. But those exceptions only serve to prove the rule. As Christians, we are called to sexual purity. We are called to sexual holiness. We are called to honor the sexual act as one of God’s great gifts and thereby exercise it under His divine authority. In our current day and age, we are witnessing one of the great moral shifts in history. Western culture is becoming increasing hyper-sexualized as it reverts back to ancient, pagan sexual norms. Sexual promiscuity has been on the rise since the so-called sexual revolution of the 1960’s. Serial divorce is rampant. Same-sex relationships are celebrated. The concept of “throuples” is quickly being embraced as definitions of marriage shift and change. The impact of all this rapid change is devastating. Sexually transmitted disease. Unplanned pregnancies. Broken relationships. The objectification of the human body. Pornography. Harassment. Abuse. Violence. Depression. Anxiety. Fear. These are a lot of the reasons the Greco-Roman world embraced the Judeo-Christian sexual ethic in the first place! They could clearly see the positive impact on families and communities who committed to practicing Biblical sexual restraint. Sadly, our world has no such examples as many Christians themselves do not seem committed to practicing sexual purity.

As our world rapidly plunges into sexual chaos, it is imperative for Christians to follow Paul’s words to the Thessalonians that we read earlier this week, “For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God...” (1 Thessalonians‬ ‭4:3-5‬) Lust is defined biblically as those emotions/passions that drive one to behavior outside the will of God. In the area of sexuality this means any sexual activity outside the covenant of marriage between one man and one woman.

All of us, no matter what our sexual orientation may be, suffer from the same disordered loves. Sexual desire, like all desires, were originally created good and pure by God but were corrupted by the Fall. As such, our desires are now in conflict with what God has clearly revealed in His Word and the only response for the Christian is to submit our sexuality to God like we are called to do in every other area of our life.

Readings for tomorrow: None

The Commandment We Can’t Seem to Keep

Readings for today: 1 Corinthians 1-4

Unity. The Bible makes it clear that God’s people are to be one even as He is one. We are to experience unity in community even as He experiences unity in community - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We are called to ground our identity in Christ crucified. Nothing more. Nothing less. Nothing else. In Psalm 133, God declares it to be good when brothers and sisters dwell together in unity. In fact, He even says He commands His blessing upon the unity of His people. In John 17, Jesus prays for our unity. He asks the Father to send the Spirit to make us one with each other even as we are one with Him. And here in 1 Corinthians, Paul challenges the early church to overcome their divisions and lean into their unity in Christ together.

What is it about us human beings that makes us so prone to division and why is it that Christians often seem to lead the way? There are over 26,000 different denominations in the Western Church and we seem to have exported division to the Global South. We go our separate ways so easily. Some divide over the fine points of theology. Some divide over church government and organization. Some divide over church hurt and disappointment. Some divide over ethnicity or culture. Some divide because relationships with other believers have gone south. Some divide simply because they like the newest preacher and/or newest church in town. I am absolutely convinced it breaks the heart of God and brings down His judgment because division, simply put, is sin.

Paul is direct with his Corinthian brothers and sisters. They have fallen prey to the temptation to divide over personality. Some claim to follow Apollos. Some claim to follow Peter. Some claim to follow Paul. And the super-spiritual claim to follow the Messiah but clearly at the expense of the other groups! This kind of behavior cannot be tolerated! Not in the family of God! Paul makes it clear towards the end of chapter one that the root of division is pride. Listen to how he describes it and think about your own experience with the church, “Take a good look, friends, at who you were when you got called into this life. I don’t see many of “the brightest and the best” among you, not many influential, not many from high-society families. Isn’t it obvious that God deliberately chose men and women that the culture overlooks and exploits and abuses, chose these “nobodies” to expose the hollow pretensions of the “somebodies”? That makes it quite clear that none of you can get by with blowing your own horn before God. Everything that we have—right thinking and right living, a clean slate and a fresh start—comes from God by way of Jesus Christ. That’s why we have the saying, “If you’re going to blow a horn, blow a trumpet for God.” (1 Corinthians‬ ‭1‬:‭26‬-‭31‬ ‭MSG‬‬) God clearly had done a mighty work in saving them from the powers of hell and death and the devil but still it was not enough. The Corinthians were engaged in the age-old sin of self-promotion. They were fighting over status and power and influence and control. And the result was devastating to their witness in the larger community.

Sadly, not much has changed in two thousand years. Christians are still fighting the same battles. Still engaged in the age-old sin of self-promotion only now this particular sin has been super-charged by social media. We are still engaged in fights over status, power, wealth, influence, and control. We continue to leave churches over the smallest of slights rather than forgive. We constantly major in the minors and make non-essentials of theology essential. Meanwhile, the Great Commission continues to go largely unfulfilled. The Great Commandment to love God and love each other seems largely forgotten. And that’s why the Great Declaration about the gates of hell not being able to stand against the church no longer seems to apply as churches in the West decline and even die in many cases.

That’s the bad news. What’s the good news? Paul is clear. It’s right in front of us. “Just think—you don’t need a thing, you’ve got it all! All God’s gifts are right in front of you as you wait expectantly for our Master Jesus to arrive on the scene for the Finale. And not only that, but God himself is right alongside to keep you steady and on track until things are all wrapped up by Jesus. God, who got you started in this spiritual adventure, shares with us the life of his Son and our Master Jesus. He will never give up on you. Never forget that.” (1 Corinthians‬ ‭1‬:‭7‬-‭9‬ ‭MSG‬‬) If we keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, He will hold us together when everything else in the world threatens to tear us apart.

Readings for tomorrow: 1 Corinthians 5-8