1 Corinthians 01-11-10

No Compromise Radio. Thanks for tuning in to No Compromise Radio with pastor and author, Dr. Mike Abendroth. Today on No Compromise Radio, we'll be hearing Pastor Mike open the Word of God in a recent message he preached at Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts.

Now let's join Pastor Mike in progress as he preaches through the scriptures, verse by verse, with no compromise.

The Holiness of God and the Futility of Happiness-First Religion

I think many people at the Church of Corinth would agree with Heinrich Hepp's saying. Here's what Heinrich Hepp said. Things are admirably arranged. God likes forgiving sins, and I like committing them.

Heinrich Hepp, things are admirably arranged. God likes forgiving sins, and I like committing them. How arrogant, how besmirching of the holiness of God and His goodness. What a low view of God. What a low view of holiness.

What a high view of mankind. I think many at the Church of Corinth would like this slogan. We are looking for a message from God that would make us happy. What they really needed was not happiness, but holiness.

God saves people to make them holy, not necessarily happy. Makes sense, doesn't it? Since God is holy, doesn't He call His people to be holy? Goes without saying. I can just imagine in my mind's eye, Revelation 4, 8, the living creatures around God's throne never stop saying, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty.

We would expect His image bearers. We would expect those who follow Him, who name His name to be holy as well. Holiness means to mark off or to cut, to make it a cut apart, set apart for something special.

You all will probably get something out of your house very holy in the next couple months. You have regular dishes for when your family eats, and they could be plastic dishes. They could be paper dishes.

They could be kind of the kind you get at Ikea. And then you have special ones in that cupboard. Marked off for only special times of the year, you have your holy dishes for Thanksgiving and for Christmas, don't you?

Something special, something different. God is holy, God is set apart, and He has expectations for His people to be the same. So much so, did you ever think about it? One whole book of the Bible is talking about holiness, and it's not just Hebrews, even the book of Leviticus.

The holiness of God just oozes out of Scripture, as it were. You can't suppress it. You can't somehow push it down under water to the degree that the Bible says God's name is holy. Do you believe that?

God's unchangeableness is holy. His kindness is holy. His wrath is holy. His patience is holy. His justice is holy. Holy is the name of the Lord. And in our minds, we like to think of somebody holy, and then we think, well, God is just to a greater degree than that person holy.

If you think of degrees when it comes to God's holiness, you're not thinking properly about the holiness of God. There are no degrees, there are no decimal points, there are no fractions. God is holy.

There's no room in God's economy to be more holy. God can get holier. Tozer said, we cannot grasp the true meaning of divine holiness by thinking of someone or something very pure, and then raising the concept to the highest degree we are capable of.

I love Exodus. The Bible says God is glorious in His holiness. Isaiah says that God is high and exalted. He lives forever, and His name is holy. God is so holy, things around Him are required to be holy.

Things that aren't even people. The burning bush, Exodus 3, Moses is required to take off his what? Sandals. This is holy ground. Mark off the bottom of the mountain in Exodus 19, because if some kind of cattle or livestock strays upon God's holy mountain, they will be obliterated.

The holy place in the temple, mark it off, set it apart, cordon it off, so only once a year the high priest walks in because God is holy. My question today is, since God is holy, what does He require of you?

Is God's main goal for your life for you to be happy, fulfilled, content? I think certainly a byproduct of holiness is happiness. But we've got a culture today that says, I will do anything to be happy.

I will do anything to be relieved of these pressures in my life. Family pressures, marriage pressures, financial pressures, and then people run to hear sermons preached by pastors who will somehow give them a how-to list to get those things relieved.

But the problem is, it doesn't really go away because it doesn't affect the root problem, it only affects the things that grow up. It's like just coming to the church and saying, you know what, I've got problems, so give me some Novocain, but the problems are still there.

It's like the time, I think I've told the story, I was running across the University of Nebraska campus and there was a large door with glass there. It was eight foot tall and it was raining, so I ran up, I didn't want to get wet, and I slipped on the pavement and my legs went straight through that pane of glass and bleeding all over and I didn't know what to do.

And so I just went back to my room and I thought, well, do I go to the doctor, am I insured? I don't know why I wasn't thinking to just go to the ER, my leg was all bleeding and everything and so my roommate came in and he said, I've got a solution to your problem.

Great. What's my 18-year-old roommate know? It's a bottle of Jack Daniels. I felt better by the end of the night, my leg didn't hurt at all. But the next morning I had a bad leg and a bad headache. No, the goodness of God is He shows us His holiness so we respond with holy thinking and holy living and the byproduct is happiness.

You can't really be happy unless you're holy. And so what we want and what I'm so thankful this church comes to expect is God, tell us the truth, we want to learn about you, we want to know you, and we want to be holy more than we want to be happy.

It is not always a good thing to walk out of a service saying, I really feel good. That made me feel nice. And as you know, if you're a regular attender here or a member, I'm probably better at afflicting the comfortable than I am comforting the afflicted.

The Church of Corinth, which one do you think they needed more, comforting or afflicting? At the end of the day, we know inside of our hearts what kind of sin factory we have inside of even our redeemed hearts and we want to come to the text, at least I do, and say God, do damage to my system that is full of sin.

Excise, cut. The first time I was ever in an operating room and I was standing there, I'm trying to keep my hands behind my back since I'm not supposed to get up to the sterile field and the doctor said to the nurse, scalpel.

I just thought, here we go. You know, you see somebody getting a shot on TV, you turn, forget the shot, scalpel, somebody's abdomen's right here, ready to go, and the doctor put down that scalpel and began to, what, apply a little bit of pressure and then pull back.

I thought, I'm going to pass out. Was it loving to do? I just looked at that doctor and I thought, you're the most unloving person I've ever met in my life. No, it was for the person's good. And don't we love that as a church?

Haven't we been taught of God? And as your pastor, I love it that you want to be taught the truth. We say, we have a hard heart, God, use your word to excise that hardness out. I want to have a soft heart.

I want to have a Christ-honoring heart. I want to have a heart that runs so far away from the problems that Corinth has. Help my heart sick, desperately sick. You know my heart and so now God, it's not like we give him permission, but it's nice to affirm with God, God, just take your word and just, take it like a battering ram and just destroy that calcified heart that I have.

Isn't that what we want? Isn't that how God uses his word to do that? By the way, that's what God uses, not some kind of two-bit drama thing up here. You go, well, I really like the drama. Of course you like the drama because it wasn't doing this.

I can just think of those goats. You ever see male goats? They just back up and it's one after another. Why am I doing this? Turn your Bibles to 1 Corinthians. What am I thinking? This is what the word does.

And it's not because I hate you and I want to be ornery and I'm scolding you. As I said last week, this isn't the church of Corinth, hallelujah. But we can learn from this book so we don't become like Corinth.

God's Holiness: Conceptual Distinction and Ethical Purity

When it comes to God's holiness, there's two aspects of holiness as you're turning to 1 Corinthians chapter 1. One is a conceptual aspect. That is, conceptually, God is distinct from all his creation.

He is different. He is not like us. He is above us. 1 Samuel 2, there is no one holy like the Lord. God in his infinite greatness is exalted and we're not on the same plane level. It's like apples and oranges, if you will.

God is conceptually holy. But more than that, God is ethically holy. God has separated himself from iniquity, from sin, from that which is unholy. Habakkuk 1 says, you are of pure eyes to look upon evil.

You cannot look upon evil. And so, when we come to this passage, if you were the pastor, if you were the Apostle Paul and you wanted to deal with the sins at Corinth, what would you tell the people at Corinth?

And if you're like me, you'd do the exact opposite of what Paul did. If you're like most of Christianity, you would do the exact opposite. Friends, we are a how-to people. We are a can-do people, but we are a how-to people.

And in our immaturity sometimes, and me as well as you, we want a sermon that just says, give me the five steps and I can take care of it. I want to have a better marriage, just tell me something to do.

Just give me, tell me, you know, what to do and how to write that love letter and how to buy that teddy bear and put it in the freezer and all these other things. Just tell me what to do. My finances are a wreck.

Could you please just give me a list? I'm having a hard time at work. I'm not a very good evangelist. Please give me the formula. And if you have a conference speaker that says, let me give you six easy steps to help your marriage, that place is packed out.

So when Paul writes to the church of Corinth, does he give them a to-do list first? Now for granted, I'll tell you, granted. He tells them a lot of things to do. He gives them lots of imperatives. He says, I've heard from Chloe's household, 1 Corinthians 1, verse 10, you've got a lot of issues.

You've got issues of divisiveness. You've got issues of suing each other. You've got issues of sexual immorality in the church. You've got issues of no church discipline. And he says, stop it, repent.

But does he say that first? He says, I've gotten a letter from you, and I want to address some of the things in the letter, chapter 7, verse 1, now concerning, he deals with it. And he says in chapter 11, now concerning.

He says in chapter 15, now concerning. He tells us those things, but what does Paul do first? You want to know what my purpose is today for preaching this passage? Here's my purpose. When it comes to your own sanctification as a Christian, don't put your life into how-to gear before you recognize that you have to think about who you are in Christ first.

Now, let's analyze ourselves for a minute. Could it be that the problem with lots of people, as they want to be holy, they begin to do the how-to's before they understand the why's? I want you to be after why I'm to do what I'm supposed to do, and who am I in Christ before you get to the how-to's.

But what do we do? I remember I was teaching Maddie the other day, we were in the car or whatever, and she's like, what's...or maybe it was Gracie. D, what's that? Drive. You know, R, what's that? Reverse, P, park.

And then I said, because some of them are, you know, reverse, oh, that's the name of it, you go backwards. Neutral, how do you explain neutral? Well, neutral, you just don't do anything. It just kind of stays there.

You give it gas and it's neutral. We're too quick to get in the car and jam it into drive, and off we go. I just need the list to be more holy. And Paul says it's not how-to first, it's who you are and why you need to do these things.

So let's take a look at 1 Corinthians chapter 1. We're not going to get very far, but my goal today is that if you'd like to live a holy life unto God, and I think for the most part people here want to, if you want to respond to the Holy One of Israel, if you'd like to be a worshiper who doesn't bring defective animals for worship, you want your life to be without blemish and without spot, and you say, I want to run from the problems of Corinth, and I would like to be a better wife, a better husband, a better child, a better student, a better worker, a better church member, then it's not just, here's your list, get at it.

We're a can-do people, sweat, toil, work, check things off. There's nothing wrong with the checklist as long as we figure out the who and the why before we get to the how. Got it? You said you just said that.

I know. I'm going to repeat that over and over and over. The key to your sanctification if you're a Christian is not how well you do the how-to list, is if you do the how-to list in light of the who list.

The who list and the why list come before the how-to list. And that's what we'll learn in 1 Corinthians. God does want a holy church. God does want a holy home. God does want a holy person at work, whether you wake up at work as a mom or you go into the office.

But it's a counterintuitive kind of thing. How do you correct behavior? Well, you don't just start off and say, by the way, begin to do this, Church of Corinth. There's an introduction. And that introduction is not to be read with speed and alacrity, it's to be thought about, why did Paul put this here?

Did you know every word in the Bible is there for a reason? Paul doesn't say this to start. How could you? After all the time I've spent there, 18 months, you did that? He doesn't guilt trip them. He doesn't shame them.

He doesn't say, try harder. He doesn't say, well, I'm kind of like a senile grandfather and just, you know, whatever you do, fine. I helped birth you and just go do whatever. He doesn't say, just really be good.

He doesn't say, it's good to be good and it's nice to be nice. Just keep getting gooder and keep getting nicer. I said that on purpose, by the way. He didn't say, you know what you could do? Just get lots of things that you light, incense, get all kinds of smells and bells and do all kinds of things.

And then you kind of forget about real internal holiness. You just do external superstitious things. He doesn't say that, does he? When you study the Bible, ask yourself this question, what does he say?

And then ask yourself the question, what does he not say? And basically, here's what Paul says. In 1 Corinthians 1, verses 1 through 9. Before you begin to do these holy things, church, remember God has called you as holy people.

You are holy. You are holy. Can you imagine? Let's take a look. Paul 1, verse 1 of 1 Corinthians. Paul, called as an apostle of Jesus Christ, the Savior, who is Israel's Messiah, by the will of God. And Sothenes, he's in agreement, our brother.

To the church of God, this is God's church, which is at Corinth. To those who have been, can you believe this is said of Corinth? To those who have been, past, present, or future tense. To those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, sinners by action.

Is that what the text says? Saints by what? Calling. If I met the church of Corinth, what would I call them? A bunch of sinners. If I used kind of Midwest Nebraska language from the 50s, I would say, you're a bunch of spiritual louses, is what you are.

That's your name. I've got a name for you, and you're spiritual louses. Paul says what? To those who have been sanctified, past tense, in Christ Jesus, saints by calling. Do you want to please the Lord in your holiness?

Then the first thing you need to remember every single day of your life is who you are in Christ Jesus. You want to motivate people for ministry? You motivate them by telling them who they are in Christ Jesus before you give them the list of things to do.

On my best days of parenting, I've said this story many times, but on my best days of parenting, I would be different than my worst days. Obviously, my worst days, you parent like this. I mean, I could just hear myself say it.

Pick up your room. Didn't I already tell you that? Clean the windows. Clean your bathroom. Pick up the trash. Finish your homework. And the list of how-tos and what-tos is a mile long. And what have I forgotten?

If this is the way saints are to be encouraged, I think the way our homes should be run would be the same thing. Shouldn't we say, daughter, Daddy loves you. Daddy's provided for you. Daddy protects you.

Daddy's given you everything that you own in this room. Daddy's done all these things for you, along with Mom, and we pray for you. And in light of who you are, then what do you think you should do when it comes to fighting with your sister?

What's the answer? Excel still more. No, that's not the answer. The answer is, I shouldn't. You don't even have to answer the question for the kid because they will answer it. Here's who we are. Here's what God has told us about what he has done.

And in light of who you are, then do these things. Conduct befitting an officer. Be who you are. You wanna know Christian sanctification? In a slogan, be who you are. Act like who you are. You can imagine a father saying to his son, son, you're a chip off the old block.

You need to make me proud. You need to act in such a way that when you act this way, people will say of the last name, Abendroth. Yes, that's right. In a much greater way, Paul, before he gets to this list of things to do, says, remember not how to, but remember who you are.

That's the key. That's the key. When we say to ourselves, I don't want doctrine. I don't want a bunch of theological words. I don't need to know about things like mystical union with Christ. I just wanna do some things.

Friends, you're betraying the whole idea of sanctification because the way to flesh out your sanctification is to remember doctrine. It's to remember all these things. And we're gonna look at that today.

The reason why I'm gonna just park right here and just wait right here is before we get our life in action and going, we have to remember who we are in Christ Jesus. And it's important. J .C. Ryle said, the subject before us is of such deep and vast importance that it requires fencing, guarding, clearing up, and marking out on every side.

I agree with that. I agree with that. While I want to get to the next section, I wanna just park here and remind us that the issue for sanctification is never primarily how to, it is who you are in Christ Jesus.

Definitive Sanctification in Christ Jesus

Now, look at our focus here today. Take a look at how Paul reminds them, and let's dig through this a little bit, to those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus. Let's look at that phrase first. And then secondly, let's look at saints by calling phrase.

So first, those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, chapter one, verse two. There's different kinds of sanctification. There's a sanctification where I say no to sin and yes to righteousness. But there's a sanctification that happens already.

There's a sanctification that progresses over time, is ongoing, and there's a sanctification that's good as done in God's eyes. It's definite, it happens right away. Which one do you think this one is?

Certainly chapter one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, have mostly progressive sanctification. Do this, do this, ongoing, stop that. But chapter one, verse two is what?

Definitive sanctification. This is a done fact, it's in the past, and you can easily read that. Turn with me, if you would, to chapter six, verse 11. You see the same kind of information. And if anything's in you saying, yeah, but I just wanna get on with the series.

Friends, I don't want you to just get on with the series because you miss the whole thing if you don't remember that it's a who before a how-to. Chapter six, verse 11. Such were some of you, but you were washed, but you were what?

Sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and the Spirit of our God. Is that a ongoing progressive sanctification, our definitive act of God in the past? Well, you know the answer.

It happened in the past, and Paul reminds them of the fact that this is an accomplished event. You are sanctified. You are, to use Roman six language, you are free from the power of sin. Do you know, as an unbeliever, you aren't free from the power of sin.

If you're an unbeliever today, you can't say, today I'll say no to sin and yes to righteousness. But do you know if you're a Christian and you are sanctified definitively, positionally by a work of Christ Jesus through the Spirit's power, you're set apart for sin, do you know you can say no to sin?

Corinth, you can say no to sin. You just can't go, well, I'm only human. I can't do it. I lose my temper. I'm from an Italian heritage, and all these kind of excuses we have. Paul says, you are sanctified by God.

You can say no to sin. Paul could have said, do you know why you sin? It's not because you have to, it's because you what? Want to. We are sanctified definitively in Christ Jesus. When God saves us, we are called sanctified.

We are enabled to live the new life, the Christian life. We are new creatures in Christ. And I'll say it once again. I think the problem with life is we have a to-do list in the morning and we forget about who we are in Christ Jesus.

The resources we have, the Spirit of God who dwells within us, the power we have now because of Christ to say no to sin and yes to righteousness. Do you know what we do? We forget to preach the gospel to ourselves every day.

Jerry Bridges says that's a good thing. And Paul doesn't do it like the other letters because he's been there for 18 months. He knows that when he says in chapter one, verse two of 1 Corinthians, you're sanctified, what floods through their mind.

Can you imagine having Paul at your church for 18 months teaching you? I mean, our church is revolutionized by Steve Lawson coming in for five messages and preaching. 18 months, the apostle Paul. And you think when he said to them, you're sanctified, they all thought.

I wonder what that means.

No, they knew it. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at six. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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