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Source: https://www.sermonindex.net/speakers/aj-higgins/1-corinthians-think/
1 Corinthians 3, verse 1, I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as to babes in Christ. I have fed you with milk, and not with meat, for hitherto you were not able to bear it.
Neither yet now are ye able, for ye are yet carnal. For where is there among you envying, and strife, and contentions? Are ye not carnal, and walk as men? Then, look at verse number 9, we are laborers together with God, ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building.
According to the grace of God which was given unto me as a wise master builder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon, but let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon. For other foundation can no man lay, than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.
Now if any man build upon this foundation, gold, silver, precious stone, wood, hay, stubble, every man's work shall be made manifest. For the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire, and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is.
Verse number 18, let no man deceive himself. If any man among you seemeth, or any man among you thinks himself to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God, for it is written, he taketh the wise in their own craftiness.
And again, the Lord knoweth the thoughts of the wise, that they are vain. Now turn next, if you will, to chapter 8. Verse number 1, 1 Corinthians 8, verse number 1, now is touching things offered to idols.
We know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth. And if any man think that he knoweth anything, he knoweth nothing yet, as he ought to know. Chapter 10, verse number 12, wherefore, let him that thinketh, he standeth.
Take heed, lest he fall. Chapter 12, and verse number, just for the sake of time, verse number 22, nay, much more those members of the body which seem, or which we think to be more feeble are necessary.
And finally, chapter 14, and verse number 36, what came the word of God out from you, or came it unto you only? If any man think himself to be a prophet or spiritual, let him acknowledge the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord.
But if any man be ignorant, let him be ignorant still. Now I'm sure that God will add his rich blessing to the reading of his word. Now as you can see, the theme of what is before us are the biases, the slants in the thinking of these believers that had permeated the assembly.
It's amazing how much Paul has to say in this letter about their minds and how they think. Actually, there are three different words that he uses for the idea of thinking, or the mind, or an opinion, and so on.
We have just chosen one of them and read the five occasions where he uses a word which means the way they thought, or the way they estimated, or the way they valued things. It's obvious that Paul is dealing with their biased thinking and the blindness in their minds.
If we had nothing else but the ten occasions where Paul uses the same expression. He says, no ye not, ten times over. Paul says to the assembly at Corinth, don't you know? In other words, here was a church that was claiming to know certain things, but their behavior was totally contrary to it.
Know ye not that Christ our Passover was sacrificed? How can you live lives marked by unholiness, by immorality, if what you say is true? So he is reminding them of what they knew and the dichotomy, the divorce between what they knew and how they acted.
In these five occasions that we have looked at, he is drawing attention to very specific things. We will spend almost all of our time in chapter three. I have just read the others for completeness. We may touch on one or two of them.
But in chapter three, it's how I think and how I build. How I think is going to affect what I put into God's assembly. So he says in chapter three in verse number 18, let no man deceive himself. If any man among you thinks himself to be wise in this world, let him become a fool.
Now, we'll look at how that affected the building that was going on or the lack of building that was going on in chapter three. So in chapter three, it's how I think and how I build. When you come to chapter eight, it's how I think and how I behave.
How I treat other believers, how I value the well-being of another believer, whether I think it's my rights and my my own needs that have to be met or whether I recognize a responsibility towards other believers.
So it's how I think. And how I behave in God's assembly, when I come to chapter 10, it's how I think and how I boast, if any man among you or rather in chapter 10, he is saying there, let him not think it.
Let the man who thinks that he can stand, take heed lest he fall. In chapter 12, it is how I think and my brother, those members which I know he's referring to the human body, but the analogy, of course, is with a local assembly, those members which we think to be just insignificant.
He says, really, we bestow upon them more honor. And finally, in chapter 14, how I think and this book. Paul says, I've delivered to you the word of God. Do you think that you're the source of it or you're the ones that have a right to interpret it for yourselves?
No. He says, let a man, if any man among you thinks himself to be spiritual, let him acknowledge the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord. How I think and this book. So let me come then to chapter three, and if we have time, we'll touch on one or two others.
How I think and how I build for God. The great danger at Corinth. We can speak of immorality. We can speak of false doctrine. We can speak of a lack of love. We can speak of disputes and going to court.
We can speak of their theological problems. But I suggested last night that I think the key difficulty in Corinth is seen in chapter three. That the root of all of their problems, Paul unerringly and with tremendous skill, led by the spirit of God, puts his finger upon it in chapter three.
He says, you are carnal and you walk according to men. In other words, the wisdom of Corinth had gotten into the wisdom, had gotten into the assembly of Corinth. Corinth was judging everything by the values of a society that was outside, everything that Corinth thought valuable, everything that Corinth thought important.
The assembly had imbibed, they had bought into it. And so Paul says, you know what the problem in Corinth is? The value of an ungodly society all around you. Has become your values. Oh, you might say, can that happen today?
Listen, wake up. Wake up. Do you know how many messages you are bombarded with every day from an ungodly world trying to sell its values to you? It's billboards, it's newspapers, it's magazines. It's radio announcements.
Everything that you see and hear has some moral weight involved with it. It's value laden is the word that is used in society. Everything that you hear is value laden. Even the way the newscaster will tell you about a crime has a certain value laden message with it.
Even the way people will advertise their goods on the radio or in a newspaper or in a magazine. Everything is conveying value to you and to me. And gradually, subtly, skillfully, the God of this age is dulling our minds to divine values and making us buy into the values of a godless society all around us.
And we become more and more inured by sin. More and more hardened by the way people think in the world. More and more conformed to the world's standard. And so what was it at Corinth? At least three things stamped themselves upon the values of our world, don't they?
Names, numbers, and natural ability. And they were going mad at Corinth over names. Paul, Apollos, and all the rest. Natural ability? My, Apollos, the great orator and the ability to speak with tongues and everything else.
All of the talent show that they wanted on display in their assembly. They had bought into the values of a godless age. Now look, this isn't something divorced from 21st century North America. Names. Why is it?
Now let me just, you know, and we're all the same. Why is it when some great celebrity, be he in the sports world or the entertainment world, or be he a political figure or be he a national figure, when some great celebrity claims to be saved, the so-called Christian world goes mad over it.
I want to tell you, it's just as much a work of grace if some 10-year-old Sunday school child gets saved. Just as important to heaven. Just as important to heaven for the most nondescript believer to be in an assembly fellowship as someone with a string of degrees after their name.
We do not have to go and follow the world's idea that we need great names. We need great degrees. Nothing against education. Nothing against people that God has saved to have places of importance in the world.
But Paul tells them in chapter 1, not many. Doesn't say not any. Not many noble. Not many mighty. No, God is not necessarily interested in names. But what about numbers? I take no comfort in smallness of numbers.
I don't find it encouraging to tell myself, well, you know, we're only 10 of us and that means we must be right because if you were big, you must be wrong. So the smaller we are, the righter we are. I don't take any comfort in smallness.
But I do not find that God is concerned. God does not have a consuming concern with numbers. We do not sacrifice truth for the sake of numbers. We do not compromise divine standards for the sake of numbers.
We do not use methods which are contrary to the mind of God for the sake of numbers. You could have, even on a day like this probably, you could have numbers here if you entertain them. You might say it's a bad day, the snow is bad.
Listen, they're predicting back where I live tomorrow, outside the city of Philadelphia, a foot of snow and blizzard conditions. But there's a football game going on and there will be 66 ,000 people filling that stadium regardless of what the weather is like.
So you want numbers? Entertain people. It doesn't matter about the weather. It doesn't matter about conditions. They'll come. Entertain them if you want numbers. But that's, Paul is saying, that's not the business of God's assembly.
Yes, we should do all we can to attract as many as we can. We should do all we can to fill our halls for gospel meeting and for other meetings. But Paul says the values of Corinth were names and numbers and natural ability.
They had bought into the values of their society. Let me just mention something, and older believers will not maybe be aware of this, but I think it maybe fits in here. So let me just mention it. Younger believers in many assemblies are reading a group of books, Purpose Driven Church.
Purpose Driven Life. And you know, it sounds pretty good. And you read it and there's a certain attractiveness to what's being said and a certain plausibility to what's being said. And the wise, careful reader could take certain things from what is being written and find value in them.
But the emphasis is upon numbers, impressions made, size, bigness, clout, how to be big, how to have a mega church. And so people don't have to bring Bibles. We flash a verse up on the wall with our overhead projector and we have a kind of an entertaining kind of service.
Keep things moving, keep things lively. People don't like to read. People don't like to think. Just keep things going. Active, excitement, change, innovation. And it comes back to what we talked about last night briefly, that the whole goal of that kind of a church is supposedly meeting the needs of people.
When the whole purpose of God's assembly is satisfying the heart of God. The purpose of a local testimony is not to meet my needs. It does. It meets them in remarkable ways. But I should never link myself with a testimony because, well now, here are where my needs are being met.
And I should never leave a testimony because here is where my needs are not being met. Paul is telling us in this chapter, it's not the main theme I want to take up, but Paul is telling us in this chapter, the main purpose of an assembly is to please God.
To satisfy God. You take the seven illustrations, whether you want to think of the building, the husbandry, the temple, the chaste virgin, the lampstand, house of God, pillar and ground of truth. What are they all?
They are all Godward, aren't they? They are all bringing something to God. All satisfying and delighting the heart of God. Not necessarily meeting your need in mine. And so we are always seeking with God's help to remember that the purpose of an assembly is primarily Godward.
So it is not a matter then of numbers, not a matter of the needs of people and entertaining people, but rather it is seeking to have divine values. It affects the view I take of others as well. This man who is so wise in his own conceits is looking down upon others.
And there could be the tendency, couldn't there, for my generation and generations coming after me to disdain a past generation. They didn't know Greek and Hebrew. They hardly knew what the Aorist tense was and present participles and passive and active.
They were just, you know, didn't know anything. Listen, they may not have known what you know technically, but they knew God. And they gave us the truths that we hold so sacred and so dear to our souls.
And we owe an incalculable debt to a generation that didn't have 10 of the privileges and the helps and the potential that we have before us with God's word. So we should never disdain a past generation.
Never disdain the leadership in God's assembly because maybe it's not quite so progressive. Now, I am not for, you know, this is the way it is. We're not going to never do anything different and, you know, just we're in our rut and this is the rut we want to stay in until we stop and fall over and they can just throw the dirt over us and bury us in this rut, becomes a nice grave.
I'm not for that either. But just be patient with leadership and be patient with your brethren, the view I take of others. But now let me just look at the vanity here he speaks of. The vanity of building on the wrong foundation, with the wrong materials, with the wrong methods.
I don't want this to sound, how can I put it? I don't want this to sound like we are the people and wisdom dies with us and we are the only Christians pleasing God. Every believer wherever he is found, every child of God who is seeking to please God, whatever they are involved in, to the measure in which they are faithful to the light God has given them and to the measure in which they are doing it out of love for Christ.
Thank God at the judgment seat of Christ, they will be rewarded. No question. We're not talking about that. What I am talking about is what a tragedy to build on the wrong foundation. Paul says, I have laid the foundation.
In other words, everything that is building up something which is on the wrong foundation. The individual may get reward and honor and appreciation from the Lord for his efforts, his exercise, his motivation, his faithfulness.
But as far as what he has built, it's on the wrong foundation. It won't last. It won't stand the test. Building on the right foundation for God. Did you notice something about this foundation? Other foundation can no man lay than that which is laid, which is the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now that's what I would have expected because this epistle time and again as perhaps few other epistles other than maybe first Thessalonians bring before us the full title, the Lord Jesus Christ. But that's not what he says here.
He says other foundation can no man lay than that which is laid, which is Christ Jesus. I would have expected at least that because that's how that's Pauline language. That's how Paul refers to the person of the Lord Jesus because he knew him first as the risen Lord and then as the man that was despised and rejected here upon earth.
So that's the way Paul usually refers to it. But Paul says no, no. He says the foundation I laid is Jesus Christ. What does that mean? Why the change? Is it just, you know, like when you're writing your essays at school or university, you kind of have to use some variation and so you mix words a little bit and look up your synonyms just to try to give variety.
No, Paul doesn't need variety. The Spirit of God isn't at a loss for what to say. So when he says Jesus Christ, he's bringing before us a very valuable lesson. As Jesus Christ, he is the one whom the world rejected and scorned and disowned, whom God has exalted.
So Paul says the foundation of the church at Corinth is a despised, disowned, left that man. But that man is the one that brought pleasure to heaven. You know what he's saying? Now, you know, don't you?
That a building takes character from its foundation so that an assembly is going to have the same character as the foundation. It is not going to seem wise to the world to gather as an assembly. It is not going to be impressive to the world to gather as a local company of believers.
They are going to think it just as foolish as they thought Christ. They are going to think it just as insignificant as they thought Christ to be. They are going to think it just as weak as they thought Christ was.
They are going to think it just as foolish as they thought he was. His family said he's mad. Herod and his men of war played with him as though he was nothing. The people of the world laughed him to scorn.
Paul says, don't strive. Don't make it your goal to have the assembly some respected and revered and honored member of the community. Now, I don't mean we go out of our way to insult people and to be disliked.
But Paul says the very character of an assembly is this, the world will think it insignificant. Don't try to put your assembly on the map. Don't try to make it some political power in the community or some social force in the community.
Can't do it. It does not imbibe the wisdom of the world. It does not go in the way of the world. It takes character from its foundation. Building on the wrong foundation will lead to loss. Building with the wrong on the wrong manner.
Notice what it says in verse number 10. Let every man take heed how he builds, how he builds, the manner in which I build. Paul says elsewhere, striving lawfully, following the rules, going by the word of God.
How do we build into God's assembly? Does the end justify the means? Does the idea, well, you know, we can compromise here because we could see so many more people saved if we link ourselves with others.
If we break down these boundaries you've been talking about and link ourselves with other evangelicals, we can see so many other people saved and reached. Take heed how, how you build. Do you think that you can break down walls of separation for the purpose of seeing someone saved and once you see them saved, build the walls up again?
You know that's impossible. And do you really think, now just be honest about the kind of God you know, do you really think that there will be one soul in hell because you were faithful to the word of God?
Now think of the implications of that. Do you think there will be anyone perish because you obeyed the word of God? Because you were faithful to what God? Now I'm not speaking about doing it in a callous, indifferent manner.
That's our responsibility to do it to the very most loving way we can and we have to carry out the word of God. But do you really think that if I obey God and I am faithful to God that someone is going to perish because I didn't disobey God?
The folly of it. We can leave divine blessing with God. We do not need to change the manner in which we are building up God's assembly. Do not need to compromise divine principles for the sake of numbers or growth or what we view as being gospel outreach work.
To carry out the word of God in dependence upon God with a loving desire for others in the very best way possible. God will see to blessing. So the manner in which I build and then the materials with which I build gold, silver, precious stone versus wood, hay, stubble.
What are you building? Now come on. Younger believer, do you realize that you're part of those who are building? I know this may refer specifically to teachers but every one of us is having some impact in God's assembly.
You are having some impact in the assembly in which you are in by your prayer life that no one may see by your attendance, by your interest, by your activity. What are you building? Building something that can withstand fire or building just what is meaningless in light of the judgment seat of Christ.
But what of the verdict of God here that is seen in this section? God uses three words to label building which is according to the world's wisdom. He speaks here of foolishness, craftiness and worthlessness.
Foolishness. The wisdom of the world is foolishness with God. Bigness. Numbers. Entertainment. Foolishness with God. And he says as well that the Lord taketh the wise in their own craftiness. My, all this compromising of the word of God and all of this trying to fit Christianity into a godless world, trying to make it more palatable, trying to make it somehow more contemporary with the world around us.
And there are people that have done that and the thing has gotten far beyond what they ever intended. Lost total control over everything and things have gone far beyond. You could fill this hall with men who have tried, tried to wed Christianity with the world and have found out to their utter disaster.
Can't be done. Can't take divine principles and meld them with a world that is totally anti-God. Whatever the face it may put on, taketh them in their own craftiness. And then he says, at the end of chapter three, that they are all in vain.
Worthlessness. How tragic. On the contrary, what a tremendous privilege. What an honor to be building for God and to have something which will stand. I don't want to minimize the awfulness of a soul perishing for eternity.
You don't understand what I mean in just a moment. I don't want to minimize the reality and the awfulness of what that must be like. But coupled with that, coupled with that, I cannot imagine the remorse of a person that spends his whole life building a company, building his own little empire, going into eternity and realizing it was all for nothing.
Spent his whole life for nothing. What a tremendous thing to be able to do something for God that will have eternal, eternal consequences. What a privilege. What a privilege to be part of God's assembly and in some little way, maybe it's just a Sunday school class.
Maybe it's just your own personal exercise to visit those who are shut in. Maybe it's a quiet ministry of going door to door with tracks and invitations. And, you know, you're not a public person, but you're trying to the very best of your ability to have your testimony, the assembly testimony in the neighborhood, count for God, trying in your own way to build into God's assembly that gold and silver and precious stone and to have that last and have value for eternity.
Man, is there anything else worth putting all your effort into? Yes, you've got to make a living. Yes, you've got your business. Yes, you've got your home and all that. But what a tremendous thing to have this privilege to be able to build for God and have it last at the judgment seat of Christ.
Let me just, if I can, encapsulate what I have said in three very simple statements. We are building conducive to God's habitation. We want the presence of God. Far more important than numbers and men is the presence of God.
So the way we are building should be conducive to God's habitation amongst us. That would bring you back to the tabernacle and you can develop that. We are building as well, consistent with God's holiness.
Does the assembly in which I am a part, are we consistent with the holy character of God? Does he find something in us compatible with his very nature? Something compatible with his holiness? Are we unleavened lump, which is the word really that Paul uses in chapter five.
So we are building conducive to his habitation. We are building consistent with his holiness. And the building we are doing is being carried out for his heart, not to please men, not to attract men, not to somehow make ourselves appealing to men.
We are primarily building for the heart of God, for his pleasure, for his presence, for his approval in a coming day. Now having said that, and having seven minutes left, let me just mention quickly how I think and my behavior in God's assembly in chapter eight.
The man of chapter eight, obviously his thinking is mistaken. Self becomes more important than others. Rights become more important than other believers. My conscience becomes superior to another's. And a piece of meat becomes more important than a brother's testimony.
Now you can just follow that down. Time doesn't permit developing it. But his thinking is mistaken. His thinking is marring others as well. And you can see that here. He causes a weak brother to stumble.
He wounds a weak brother. He offends a conscience. He causes him to perish. He sins against Christ. All of that is in that portion. What I am learning from this is just simply this. How I think is going to have a bearing upon how I treat other believers.
I'll just leave that with you because I just want to highlight one or two things in each of these. In chapter 12, how I think and my brother. Self-importance. Independence. Indispensability. Now there is somewhere, and I struggle with it.
I have to be honest. So you'll realize I'm preaching to myself as well as others. There is a line somewhere between being indispensable and being responsible. I don't like to be away from my assembly very much.
And I hope, I hope it's not because I think I'm indispensable, but rather that I feel a responsibility to my local assembly. But there is the possibility here that the thinking of the man of chapter 12 who feels he has the gifts and he is the only one that has the gifts and he is the one that is indispensable, he is independent of others, doesn't need others.
Everyone needs him. Nothing could run without him. Nothing could get along without him. And he is absolutely invincible. Nothing can happen to me. And so Paul puts his finger upon that man and warns him that that kind of an attitude, first of all, not only is it an attitude which smacks of carnality, but as he develops it in this passage he makes clear, it is actually going to influence my ability to use my gift if I do have a gift.
Because if I think I have all the gifts, I am going to be running in so many different directions that I will really be failing to focus whatever gift God has given me for the good of others. So it will first of all influence my ability to be a help to others.
It will impede the functioning of that entire company of believers because it leads to chaos. That was the chaos of Corinth. Everyone wanted to participate and have every gift. And so he has to deal with that.
But something else about that as well, it is going to interfere with others finding their gift and their gift becoming useful. So this wrong thinking that I do everything, I have to do everything. Don't be afraid to give responsibility to younger believers.
Listen, you older brethren, I'm thankful that we were taught this as young Christians and as young men beginning to take some responsibility in the assembly. You're not going to be here forever. A day is going to come when the Lord is going to call you home.
Would you rather someone step into your shoes without any of your influence upon them? Or would you rather begin giving them responsibility now when you can begin to tweak that ability and that influence and how they respond to it?
Begin to have some genuine input into how they will lead the assembly, how they will open a Bible reading, how they will preach the gospel. Or it's just a matter of waiting until the Lord takes an older generation home and suddenly young men are handed responsibility that no one ever taught them how to use.
Never think that somehow any one of us is indispensable to an assembly. I remember a godly overseer and conference time was coming and he was a very active person at the conference, very responsible for all that occurred at the conference.
And just a few days before the conference had a fall. And as the conference began, he was laying in a hospital bed. And he remembered being, you know, as you would imagine, if you've been there, you know what it's like, filled with worry and consternation.
What's going to happen? What's going to be this? And he was just reading in the book of Job to comfort himself. Where was thou when I laid the foundation of the world? Somehow God can run his universe pretty well without any of us.
Somehow things will not fold up when we are no longer on the scene. Be good to be able to put into the hands of a younger generation, the responsibility and to have some ability to guide them as they begin to take that responsibility in different spheres in God's assembly.
Now, time is gone. We could look at chapter 14 and just consider something of how I think and the word of God, the book that is given to me. I will just leave it with you to trace. You can go back to chapter two and trace how Paul uses the Old Testament through the book of First Corinthians.
It's accuracy. It's adequacy. It's relevancy. It's our responsibility. It's authority. Paul will use the Old Testament and all those ways to show the place the word of God should have in a local assembly.
What's your attitude to this book? What is your attitude to the word of God? Years ago, there was a woman at a college out east. Her name was Judy DeBona. She was a professor and she was rummaging through a safe that they had on the university and way, way in the back, she dragged out some things that had been sitting back there, gathering dust for years.
She was a music teacher, and when she opened them, she could hardly believe her eyes. They were rare, original copies of some of Chopin's in his own hands, some of Chopin's piano works. And when she realized what she had, she held them in her hand.
She says, I was in awe. I had the works of a master in my hands. Is that how you hold the word of God in your hand? You have the work of a master in your hand. Is your soul in awe of this book? To go to it, to find in it your adequacy for life, to go in it and to find God's authority for his assembly, to go in it and to find everything that is relevant for your life, that God may help us to appreciate it and to value it.
Shall we pray?