A
sermon based upon 1 Corinthians 3: 1-16
By
Rev. Dr. Charles J. Tomlin, BA, MDiv, DMin.
Flat
Rock-Zion Baptist Partnership,
Sunday
August, 9th, 2020 (Growing In Grace)
Bill Self, a retired Baptist pastor, tells about taking his two grandsons
to their swimming lessons. He thought
this would be the routine trip, but he was wrong. The pool was enclosed in a
rather large building, and the sounds of all those excited children of
different ages and abilities were deafening.
He also noticed something else unusual. All the noise was coming from the shallow end
of the pool. The only sound coming from
the deep end was the sound of experienced swimmers swimming with discipline and
confidence. There was no yelling, no crying, no complaining, no evidence of
fear or frustration. They were following
the instructions of their leader.
Then, Dr. Self gave his church a lesson he observed in that
Swimming Hall. He said, “After a
lifetime of (church) ministry, I have concluded that all the noise comes from
the shallow end of the pool, from those who haven't learned to swim with
confidence or are not secure enough to venture into the deep water.”*
This was certainly true in Corinth, Paul’s most notorious
church. The book of Corinthians is filled
with a church making a lot of noise. It’s coming from the ‘shallow end of the pool’. Paul’s own description is that most in the
church were still living like infants
when they should have already been on solid food, growing up to become God’s
mature people doing God’s work in the world.
But instead of growing up and going deeper in their faith, they were
still a bunch of babies splashing around, making all kinds of unpleasant noise
in the shallow water of a childish faith..
YOU
ARE STILL IN THE FLESH... (v. 3).
Pastors
see this a lot; in both people in and in churches. In a
recent copy of a Christian Magazine (Christian Century, Jan 2020), a British
Pastor named Sam Wells, tells of getting a very nasty letter from one of his
members. That woman scolded him over
and over because he wasn’t like their last pastor. “Shame on you, she says. Don’t sleep easy in your bed tonight. Roll up your sleeves and do some of the dirty
work around here.” She thought she
was so smart, but she didn’t have a clue. She was splashing a bunch of water in his
face, but it wasn’t doing anyone any good.
Interestingly,
that letter came to Pastor Wells on the very same day he got a call from another
church member. He had gotten to know this
person very well, because he had only recently performed the funeral for his
vivacious daughter who tragically died too young. The call was to ask his pastor to go by and
see his brother, who was really struggling with his niece’s death. “You have been there for me,” He said. “I wondered if you could go by sometime and
talk to my brother.”
It
was then, that the pastor recalled the sermon he had preached at the young
girl’s funeral. It was based on a line
from the Song of Solomon, chapter 8, verse 6: “Set me as a seal upon your heart,
a seal upon your arm, for love is as strong as death,
passion fierce as the grace.”
He preached this is as pointing to the Christian faith...saying that no
matter what happens to us in life or death, we too, are a seal upon God’s
heart. The way we know that, he said, is
because Jesus love for us was ‘as strong as death’. Jesus did the ‘dirty work’ we can never
do. Jesus ‘rolled up his sleeves’ and revealed
the marks of love on his hands and side that are in God’s heart.
What
that shallow swimming, milk-drinking, fleshly, jealous woman could not
understand is that doing the work of ‘love’ is the hard ‘dirty work’ of God’s
church. It’s not just the job of a
certain pastor, working in the cookie-cutter image of another. No, it’s all of us participating in how we
work, how we talk, and in how we express ourselves, doing the deeper work of
love, understanding, and having compassion with and for others. But of course, you don’t understand this when
you are living a shallow, fleshly, self-focused life. You have to get out there into the deep to
understand. You have to mature. You have to move beyond living only for
yourself to live for God.
When
Paul talks about people ‘still of the flesh’ (3) and still being ‘fed
with milk’ and ‘not ready for solid food’ he’s talking about not growing
or going deeper in faith to live in tune with God’s indwelling Spirit. We see this a lot in some churches these days,
don’t we? Churches and Christians who are content to
hold on to their ‘bottles’ and pacifiers, living in shallow places. Sometimes this comes from empty places in
their own lives, living with old wounds that still need healing. Often that person can’t move forward, get
stuck and can’t get on with life, because
they haven’t dealt with the pain, the loss, or hurt in their past. They may get this ‘flesh-focused’,
‘infantile’ spirit very honestly. It’s
may not be all their fault, but because they are afraid and unable to face life
and take responsibility, they become ‘dishonest’ with themselves and with
others. They often hide in
passive-aggressive behaviors, acting very compassionate, but at the same time sneaking
around, and then unexpectedly lashing out and attacking. And it’s all because of the pain and hurt they
don’t want to bear alone. They want to
take somebody down with them so they become hateful, vindictive, and some, like
the lady in England become ‘clergy killers’.
I’ve
spoken about my cat, who is still a kitten in some ways, because she was
abandoned by her mother and didn’t have a normal ‘kittenhood’. We rescued her, but she’s still in
recovery. She’s stuck in some very
infantile, kitten ways. When the dog is
walking, the cat will hide, then suddenly spring out and jump on the back of
the dog. The cat’s behavior keeps the
dog walking on pins and needles, wondering when it will get attacked next. It will keep on happening until the dog
‘puts her foot down’, shows her teeth and snaps back with true authority.
Because
church’s are rescue stations, if a church doesn’t have strong, mature
leadership, a can be held captive to people’s pain, living in constant, crippling fear and dread’
of the weakest, loudest, most infantile member, who ‘attacks’, ‘yells’ and
‘splashes’ against others who don’t agree with them. This must have been part of what was
happening in Corinth, because the church was broken into factions, with each
one screaming they were best, struggling to move forward.
Negativity
is one way to to spot an infantile faith, but not the only way. As Paul says in this text, this didn’t start
out as ‘jealousy and quarreling’ but was simple ‘human inclinations’
(4). This arguing over ‘preachers’ had a
lot more to do with what was entertaining and fun, rather what was edifying. People in Corinth said Apollos was the best
preacher. To the infantile mind it’s all
about who can tickle the ears, not what the truth is. We see this a lot in today’s world. If you want to succeed in growing a church you
have to get out of the spiritual growth business and get into show business. And in some of these very ‘noisy’ churches, you
can find increasing attendance, but you don’t find discipleship increasing, Sunday
School growing, Small groups based on spiritual growth or godliness growing. You might find a lot of attenders, but less
and less of these people are able to swim in the deep or maintain a steady diet
of solid, healthy food.
Also,
if you look closely, there’s also not a lot of Christlikeness and commitment in
these places either Many of them don’t
even look much like church’s anymore. And
I’m not simple talking about architecture or ascetics, but I’m talking about
community and connection. It’s easy to
draw a crowd to these buildings, but the crowd most often looks just like them. Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey
Circus have taught churches how to draw a crowd. But it's still very tough to build a Christian,
family-oriented, multi-generational, community cross-sectional congregation,
and even harder to build a person into a Christian. One pastor, with tongue and cheek, put it this
way: "Our people are deeply committed in every area except three: they
way they live, the way they think and the what they value in life. Other than that, they are deeply committed to
the Jesus."
Jack
Hayford, a California pastor, recently said in an article, "They come
for the show, but they refuse to grow." As Bill Self concluded, “People breeze in and
out of our churches as though they are going through a fast food restaurant, or
are at a salad bar, selecting the items they want, taking nothing that is
unpleasant or challenging and, at best, paying only the minimum. They think they are getting a good deal, and
they might be feeding their flesh, but they are starving to death for the kind
of food that will feed their souls.”
ONLY
GOD GIVES THE GROWTH (v. 7)
Throughout
my ministry, I seen all kinds of ideas on how to grow a church. Early in my ministry the charismatic
approach was a hot item. Churches all
around were trying to grow by feeling, expressing the Spirit in emotional ways.
But it spilt up a lot of congregations too, breaking up well established
relationships.
Later
on, fundamentalism took over the Southern Baptist Convention. The way to grow was to be ultra conservative focus
on the childlike literal reading of Scripture.
Conservative churches grew larger and faster than traditional, socially
liberal or even moderate churches. The way to grow was to lose your head.
In
more recent years, the trend has been toward building mega churches with
contemporary music and non-traditional approaches. This has led to a decline in both traditional
fundamental, liberal or moderate churches and whole denominations. These ‘contemporary’ churches focus on reaching and ministering to
young people and worshipping in buildings that don’t look like traditional
churches. They reject most any thing
that looks like traditional, establish, or historic Christianity.
When
I was a missionary pastor in Europe, we got word that a revival broke out in
Canada that was drawing large crowds and gaining much attention. The movement was called ‘The Toronto
Blessing’. People were working
themselves into ecstatic fits the as non traditional, spiritual music was being
played and they would get up and dance, not just alone, but often together.
This sparked revivals and the growth of Charismatic churches across European
culture, in which people were reported to be ‘slain in the Spirit and spoking
in tongues. The movement was strongest
in old cultures where the established cathedral like churches were already
dying. It shocked me when the leadership
in our little house church actually entertained the idea that this might be an
approach to be considered. ‘I don’t
dance’, I joke. They didn’t laugh.
When I realized how many methods, gimmicks and styles churches use
to try to grow, I though about the fair, which came to my hometown every fall. When you walked down the midway, you’d hear
the pitch man say, "Step right up! Pay your money, knock out the balloons
with the darts, and you'll win the wonderful prizes!" No one ever knocked
them out or won the prize. Another man
would entice us to take the baseball and knock down the bottles. The next man
would say, "Pay your money and come in to see the tallest person, the
shortest person, the fattest person, see all the freaks, including the man with
the reptile body."
It reminds me of what I found many American churches doing when
I returned from Europe in 1996. In
Greensboro, where I landed, churches, including mine, had taken a ‘consumers’ approach
to church. If you wanted contemporary
music with a praise team, not a choir, or you wanted to play golf all day, come
early, without a tie or coat, or even in shorts in the summer. The preacher would preach wearing
jeans. But if you wanted a more
traditional approach, come at 11 wearing a tie, coat, singing hymns with a
choir. The preacher would put on his
coat and tie. Come, pick what you like. I
once visited an ‘a la carte’ church in California that had nine different
worship styles going on at once. A lot
of churches are doing this ‘niche’, satellite approach today: “Come to our
church. Our preacher doesn't wear a tie. Our preacher wears golf shirts and
jogging shoes."
"Come to our church! We wear shorts and sandals."
"We're fundamental.". "We're liturgical." “We're liberal." "We're moderate."
"We're denominational.". “We're mainline.". “We're dispensational."
"We have video.". “We have snare drums and screens." "We're into political reform and are politically active”." “We have a religious superstar preaching today."
"Come to our church! We wear shorts and sandals."
"We're fundamental.". "We're liturgical." “We're liberal." "We're moderate."
"We're denominational.". “We're mainline.". “We're dispensational."
"We have video.". “We have snare drums and screens." "We're into political reform and are politically active”." “We have a religious superstar preaching today."
Everyone is proudly ‘hawking there wares’ like carnival barkers,
pushing their style, their religious product, but when you get inside you find,
just like the carnival, that no one knocks out the balloons or knocks down the
bottles. No one wins the prize. No lives
are really changed. The church of the big idea, the church of the big action,
and the church of the big show somehow leave us empty. Something is missing.
Paul tells us what too many churches have forgotten. It’s not the style, the approach or the
method that matters. Paul says, ‘only
God gives the growth’. The real
growth. It’s not numbers, it’s maturity
he means.
Are many of today’s churches functioning as if there is no God? I’ve heard of a few new types of churches that
are actually secular, non-religious, and agnostic, if not atheistic. There approach is to take God out of the
picture all together and just have community and good works without a
particular god who complicates things.
This is where the culture seems headed, so I’m not faulting the
leadership or desire to grow and reach out in this churches, as much as they
are trying to survive ‘‘as if there is no God’ because God is absent in the
hearts of the growing majority of people.
THAT
FOUNDATION IS JESUS CHRIST (v.
11)
What kind of future does a ‘church’ have when it’s being built
on the wrong foundation? This is the main
issue Paul was addressing in this letter.
Churches that are built only on ideas or actions or style are doomed to
die. This is why Paul says,, "I
gave you a good foundation, Jesus
Christ. You build on Jesus Christ. Because
if you build with gold and silver or straw, it will fade. You must build on Jesus Christ." Only a church built on Jesus will remain.
In Matthew 16, Jesus said, "On this rock (the
confession of Peter) I will build my church." During his last week
of ministry, he said to his disciples, "I am the vine. Ye are the
branches." In other words, if you stay connected to me, you will grow
and bear fruit. If you get severed from me, you won't grow and bear fruit. If you want to live and grow, remain in me,
Jesus said. Only through Jesus does God
give true growth and life.
I love to go to the Wilkes County to buy apples from my Mr.
Weston. His family harvests beautiful
apples every year starting in late August through September into early
October. The Weston’s have apples only
a few weeks every year but they have a lifetime of investing in cultivating the
trees and pruning the branches. He has a year’s worth of work invested in
helping the trees to reach their optimum maturity. Apples do not come out of nowhere. They come
from apple trees and it takes a lot of work to get apple trees to produce great
apples. You can’t ‘fake’ a good,
nourishing apple.
You can’t fake true faith either. And the fruit of the Christian faith does not
come full-blown out of nowhere. It comes out of a branch that is connected to
Jesus Christ. It comes out of a church that is built on the foundation of Jesus
Christ. I am not speaking against
methods, against actions, or against ideas, IF those methods, IF those actions, and IF
those ideas flow out of a vital, current, connection to Jesus Christ. But we live in a world in which some people
don’t realize where apples’ come from, and so even think you can get apples
without a tree.
Some people also think you can have successful methods, ideas,
actions and the excitement of life and church without having any kind of real connection
to Christ or to the tree Jesus died upon. As one theologian said, too many people today
think you can have ‘God without wrath’, ‘people without sin, ‘a kingdom without
judgment’, and a ‘Christ without a cross.’
But without the real Jesus, all we really do when we try to establish a niche
for our church market is to cover empty hearts, shallow commitments, and a self-serving
mindset.
What we ought to do, however, is to start the right way to establish
and grow a church. Build on the true
foundation by having a strong commitment to Jesus Christ. What do you think would happen if we tried
this? For without the church's
foundation being Jesus Christ, there is no substance, no power. If the Spirit of Jesus is not there, no
gimmick will make anything lasting happen.
It might fly for a while, but like that helicopter flying Kobe Byrant in
the fog, a church in the fog will eventually hit a wall and crash too.
...GOD’S
SPIRIT DWELLS IN YOU (v. 16)
But there is an alternative.
The Scripture makes it clear that the church is supposed to be Christ's
body on earth. And the way to get Christ
in the church body is by inviting Christ to rule our hearts. If the church of Jesus wants to survive the
spiritual fog of these challenging, changing, and difficult times, the church
needs a passionate commitment to Jesus, not to wave political, ideological, or
stylistic flags.
If we rediscover Jesus Christ, our worship will be revitalized.
We'll not be concerned about style as much as we'll be excited about content. We must rediscover the beauty, the majesty,
and the power of a strong commitment to Jesus Christ. When that happens, we
will not get bent out of shape about style. The central question will be,
"Did we meet Jesus?" not “Did I like the sermon or the song”? When we have Christ’s Spirit dwelling in us
we will say like Peter and the disciples, “Lord, is it I, rather than “Lord, I
want my opinion or style supported?”
To say that Jesus Christ is the root and foundation, the
cornerstone, the vine, calls the church to understand that we are Jesus people
first of all. We are members of his
body, and if the church needs power and strength to make a difference, in a
darkening world, it needs to rediscover Jesus.
When we rediscover Jesus, our mission will be sharpened. We will want to
give a cold cup of water in Jesus name. When we rediscover Jesus Christ, we'll
be liberated from so many other questions of process or style..
The Doonesbury cartoon is a serious comic that appears on the
editorial pages of many newspapers. In
one cartoon, Mike, the central character, was looking for a church, so he
interviewed the pastor of the Little Church at Walden.
He asked, "How did you get your church started?"
The pastor replied, "I took a survey in the community, and
they all wanted aerobics, so we started an aerobics class. Then they said they
all wanted basket weaving, so we started basket weaving. Then they wanted
jogging, and we started jogging. And the next thing we knew, we had a church.
It's getting so big now that we have a whole denomination."
In the last frame, Mike, who knows nothing about the Gospel,
scratches his head and said, "So that's how religion is spread."
No, the gospel is spread because Jesus Christ changes lives.
Anything else will die. It may have its day, but it will die.
When we rediscover Jesus Christ, our belief will be strengthened
and focused. When the church rediscovers Jesus Christ, the people might come
for the show, but they will stay to grow. The only noise we will hear in a
church will be people swimming from the shallow end to the deep end of the pool
because they feel safe in deep water of God’s redeeming love.
Amen.
*This
sermon relies heavily on ideas from a sermon preached by Bill Self of
Atlanta. Any mistakes or weakness are my
own.
