Boasting in the Lord

Unity in the Church and the Problem of Divisiveness

Well a message this morning will come from 1st Corinthians chapter 1 verses 26 to 31. And with today's message we are now halfway through this 12-part series on 1st Corinthians chapters 1 2. And our purpose has been Lord willing the Apostles purpose unity in the Church of Christ.

That's what these first two chapters of this letter this book in the Bible are about unity in the church. I want to remind you that the first nine verses of this letter the greeting from Paul. Hello, it's Paul the Apostle to you the church and very quickly.

He says let's get down to the problem here. Divisiveness and unity that's the whole first two chapters. And he gets right to the point and from verse 10 to the end of chapter 2 he rebukes he proves he encourages.

He commands he cajoles all manner of persuasion. Employed towards this one goal this goal the pastor and Owens and I have had in picking these two Chapters to preach through in this 12-part series unity in the church that they would repent of.

Recognize and then repent of their divisive ways and show forth to the world the wisdom and the power of God. How in their unity in their unity in their mutual love and fellowship they prove then as we prove.

Today no less than they did then the power and the wisdom of God to unite and to save. To unite and to save this is Paul's purpose. This is where we've been in this series as we're now halfway through and before we begin Verses 26 to 31.

I want to lock this purpose in your mind. I Want you to understand this is what we're doing here. Churches that are unified need to be strengthened in their unity. Churches that are being divided need to repent and become unified.

This is the purpose. This is why Paul wrote these first two chapters before we got into all those other things that were going on in Corinth. There are many lessons that can be drawn from the passages here these sections.

They're good lessons. They're enduring lessons, but too often when we simply draw lessons We lose sight of the context and we turn the Bible into sort of a life coach. This is all introductory. We'll get to the message in a moment and.

So I want you to remember. I want to remind you how we got to where we are here in this preaching and Lord willing. You will see that my and pastor Owens Unrelenting emphasis on unity is following the inspired apostles pen.

In his emphasis on this one subject Verse 110 he said I appeal to you brothers by the name of the Lord Jesus Christ that you all agree. By the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Hear those words. That you all agree.

Then verses 11 and 12. He says I've heard there's quarreling among you. Remember how pastor Owens taught how low the bar is for what quarreling is in the church. We don't have to be at each other's throat to be in quarreling.

What I mean is that each one of you says I follow and then put in the name of a man. And two weeks ago pastor Owens taught us the error of vesting so much spiritual authority in mere mortals. Sacerdotalism was the name of that.

Verses 18 to 20 human wisdom and techniques were disgraced by house God's wisdom on the cross verse 20 says who. Where is the one who is wise. Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of the age that implied question is?

Why are you following men? Why are you? De-unifying as you follow men. Paul Apollos Cephas around whom you're gathering. Only vehicles for proclaiming God's wisdom and unifying the church. Verses 21 to 25.

The cross is the sign that God gives of his power and his wisdom. And doing anything more is Unfaithfulness of the worst kind it is spiritual adultery. This is where Paul's been taking us. Unity was his concern.

Unity was his goal for the Corinthian Church unity must be our goal. Paul accomplished this by the positive by driving us to the cross of Jesus Christ and in the negative by exposing to us our divisive tendencies.

Boasting Against the Lord and God's Sovereign Choice

So the this morning Verses 26 to 31 in 1st Corinthians 1 are going to force us to take a deeper look at ourselves and the things in us. That cause division in the church. To put another way we look for those those things within us that fail to promote unity and This morning is about boasting.

The title of the message is boasting in the Lord. I Could have just as easily as you will see as we go through it title it boasting against the Lord. So with no more introduction Let's read 1st Corinthians 1 26 to 31.

For consider your calling brothers not many of you were wise according to worldly standards. Not many were powerful not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise.

God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong. God chose what is low and despised in the world. Even things that are not to bring to nothing things that are that no human being might boast in the presence of God.

He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus whom God made our wisdom and our righteousness and sanctification and redemption. Therefore as it is written let the one who boasts boast in the Lord. You know the late Muhammad Ali arguably the greatest boxer of all time actually declared himself the greatest of all time and When he was confronted with the magnitude of that boast, you know what he said he said it ain't bragging if you can back it up and Back it up.

He did against some of the best fighters the world had seen up to that time and soon after his I'm the greatest Boast he was hoisting a world championship belt. Well his braggadocio Was sort of fun. Yeah, it was entertainment and it was entertaining.

The boasting Paul writes of isn't fun at all. The boasting Paul writes of it wasn't entertainment and it wasn't amusing. Well one can sort of wink at an athlete or an entertainer. Self-promotion in church.

There's nothing funny about it. You see the Corinthians were boasters. They were boasters and you might ask how. So how are they boasters? There are boasters by aligning themselves with men those I Follows that I reminded you of from chapter 1 verse 11.

They were boasting in what that they had picked the best leader that they had picked the most erudite. They had picked the purest the best in some way. They were boasting that they knew more than the other guy who picked the other leader and neither should have picked a man at all.

Now this is not how we usually view this but it follows the Apostles thought lines by boasting in themselves. They were boasting against the Lord. They're boasting in themselves by picking the best leader.

My leader is better than your leader and in essence That was boasting against the Lord against God's choices against God's wisdom boasting is divisiveness. Boasting is a failure to believe God. Boasting is a failure to promote unity, which is what we should all be doing.

And boasting comes very easily to us all. The Corinthians might have been shocked to hear that by picking such a great leader as even Paul the great apostle to the Gentiles. That the Bible that God through the Apostle defines that as boastfulness.

Boasting brethren is Divisive and it comes so easily to us. Verse 26 removes any Basis for boasting by showing us that God's choice of you or me had nothing to do with anything intrinsic in us. He chose us for his own good pleasure, which is informed by his own sovereign will.

That's verse 26. Verses 27 to 29. Tell us the purpose that God had in mind which is to bring to shame the unbelievers worldview and to eliminate any cause for anyone to boast before him. And finally verses 30 and 31.

Tell of our total dependence on the Lord Jesus Christ for anything and it leaves us boasting in him and in him alone. For there's no one else worth boasting about. Certainly, not us. So these three basic divisions will Bring us to an understanding of how easily boasting comes to us and how bad it is in the church to be boasting.

I Want you to see how easily we cross that line. Verse 26 for consider your calling brothers. Not many of you were wise according to worldly standards. Not many powerful not many were of noble birth. The question is how can you boast when God chose you like this?

What do you have to boast about when you were chosen from not wise not powerful and not noble. Now no one would actually say I would hope that God chose me to be in Christ Jesus because I'm so grand. Nobody would say that.

I mean, you know, it's a the Lord really needed someone like me. Paul says to think about this think about this carefully. Consider your calling. Calling by from Paul always means your salvation your election your call.

You're being drawn out of the world. Jesus Christ says I will draw all to me that the Father has given me. Consider that calling. Consider that you were the passive recipient of it consider your calling and it didn't come from anything in you That made God attracted to you.

He said I'm gonna call this one. Consider it carefully says the Apostle Paul as you gather around your favorite Apostle or evangelist or pastor or author or whoever is attracted your laud and attention.

Have you ever Been the victim of one of those kind of sorts Who always seem to have to poke a hole in? Something that robbed from you the share the pleasure of sharing something they're always erecting these boundaries.

I Think about that as I think about this verse, you know when you say yeah, I want to share something with you. Did you hear on the radio station this morning where this preacher said and you say? No, you know that guy's got some Arminian tendencies.

I'm not very blessed by him. Whoa, what is that? Putting up a boundary putting up a barrier saying well, I follow the the better guy the better reformed guy. I can't be blessed by one. Well, it's just this one thing.

He said yeah, I know he's Arminian and I know but he just said okay. Well, go ahead if you have to be blessed by somebody who's so off the rails is that. Have you known that yourself where you bring something up and You find that the person you're talking to just knows there's one problem with that guy or with that book or with that author.

You violated this doctrine. You forgot this part of the systematic theology. Okay. Well, go ahead and tell me if you must. That's sort of what this is like. I Don't mean taking away someone's joy. That's not the point here.

It's the erecting of boundaries that are unnecessary. Is these people gathering around? I'm gonna follow Paul. I'm gonna fall see if it's I'm gonna follow Paul's. I'm going to Make sure that you know that you're lesser because you're not following the one that I follow.

This is what the Apostle was speaking of here to the Corinthians. We fall into this so easily erecting these boundaries that need not be made. What have all those not many's that I read you born 26 have to do with boasting?

Remember that the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. Remember that you received the calling you didn't generate the calling. Remember that only a few of those who were called were wise or powerful or noble and keep in mind what the Apostle does not say.

He does not say the recalled because you're unwise or lacking in worldly power and influence or are less than blue blood by birth. Any more than he says that that's the reason those qualities or advantages were chosen for those reasons.

He simply says not many not many were chosen. We're here because we've chosen. You know in World War one the English and I think was mostly the Scottish regiments had this song that they sang as. They're there on the western front in the trenches with that.

No man's land being surveyed by machine guns. They sang we're here because we're here because we're here because we're here. Sort of a fatalistic thing. Well, we're here because we're here because we're here and so forth and sort of like that.

We're chosen because we're chosen because we're chosen because we're chosen. We're chosen because God chose us. How can we boast about that when we're chosen simply because because God chose? What are these not many's have to do this not many were chosen for power or influence or wealth or noble birth?

I mean a strictly practical level it makes perfect sense. Why not many. Because there aren't many of them. God didn't choose many wise because there aren't many to choose from look at us. Not many wise.

There aren't a lot of wise people and if everyone knows wise then really no one is wise. Not many powerful. Because if everyone is powerful nobody's powerful. Not many powerful because by definition. There aren't many of them and so forth with the nobility and all the other things.

It could be just that simple. That there just aren't many of those to choose from. You know, there's an anecdote about this verse. That most commentators cite and almost all preachers use and I don't want you to feel left out.

So I want to give it to you in the mid 1800s. There was a lady Huntington and she was of noble birth. She was a wealthy English aristocrat and she was an avid supporter of George Witchfield and some of the other good preachers of his day.

She financed over 60 churches and when she read this verse. She's the one who said that she was saved by an M by the letter M. The Apostle she would quip didn't say not any but he had an M and said not many like me.

Well, she was chosen it wasn't because she was wise or powerful or noble. God doesn't need her or our skills. He chooses whom and he chooses why he will. And so the Apostle here is following kind of an old pattern.

He's describing God's choice in the negative. He's saying this is why God this is not why God chose you. This is what he didn't find in you that caused him to choose you. We're being reminded here that we are the recipients of the calling and God did it for his own purposes and not because he saw anything in you or me or anyone else that said Oh, I need that one.

Deuteronomy chapter 7 verse 7 has Moses telling Israel about their election about their calling. And he says why it was not it was not because you were more in number than any other people. No, there's you're not more impressive.

You're not smarter. You're not wiser. You're not anything better than anyone else that would cause me to have picked you. It was not for that reason that the Lord said his love on you and chose you. For you were the fewest of all people.

You were the least impressive of all peoples. You are the least likely of all choices but it's because the Lord loves you and is keeping an oath that he swore to your fathers that the Lord has brought you out With a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery from the hand of the Pharaoh king of Egypt.

Why did God choose Israel. Because he chose them. What caused him to choose them? His own free sovereign choice. That's not exactly the self-esteem credo of the world, but it's God's own truth for them and it's God's truth for us.

Ephesians chapter 4 verse 1 says to us God chose us in Christ from before the foundation of the world. From before the foundation of the world before we existed God's sovereign decree had been made and That's when he chose us before we had any skill any talent anything to offer to anyone.

God chose us in Christ from before the foundation world. Now, there's purpose to it. There's purpose to it. But there's nothing in it to boast about. There's no hint that anyone impressed God so much that he just had to have that one.

Have you or me on the team. It's not like professional sports drafts like in the NFL they have the draft they just had it a few months ago didn't they and teams. Gathered together the the coaches and the management and they look at what they need.

They look at where their weaknesses are. They look what they'll need in three or four years when this guy retires and then they draft according to that need. Well, God's choices are not because he needs anything from us is it's not that we actually do anything that he can't do without us.

He works his will on earth through people like you and me because he chooses to he chooses to work that way. And we know also that brings him the most glory. How does that bring him the most glory? Well, I'm not really sure we can answer that.

But we know it does. Because the scripture says so. So does he need you or me? In order to glorify himself, he doesn't need us. He's chosen to work that way. He's not that he needs to do that. He's chosen to do that.

So he doesn't need you. Who needs you. Well, we need you. God placed you here. That's first Corinthians 12 just as it pleased him. We all have purpose. We all have function. We all have ministry. We're all here because God placed us here for his glory.

He chooses to work through vehicles vessels like you and me, but that's his own sovereign choice. It's not out of necessity. It's not God who needs you. Here's we who need you here. God is working his will in his people.

He's forming his people into the image of his son Jesus Christ. You take the wisest the most powerful the most noble man or woman who ever lived. Well, how far are they from the image of Christ? Well the ones who are part of the many are as far as way the one who are the Ennies if I can put it that Way, I mean we're closer to being the mix next Muhammad Ali than any of any of us are to being fully into the image of Christ.

So what's the point here? That you're chosen. You're chosen by God's sovereign decree by his will freely exercised and Brought about by nothing in you or me. By nothing that you and I have to offer to him other than our faith our humility our service.

God Chooses the Foolish, Weak, and Despised to Shame the World

Verse 27, but God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong God chose what is low and despised in the world. Even things that are not now notice that we're being called things here.

He's reduced us to that impersonal of a level. This is God's working through us and in us in order to bring shame to those outside of Christ. God chose was low and despised in the world even things that are not to bring nothing things that are.

So that no human being might boast in the presence of God. How can you boast? When you're very inadequacies to accomplish anything that makes you useful to God's purposes. Or what He brings out here. It is your very inadequacies to accomplish anything that makes you useful in God's kingdom.

How can we boast about that. Would we boast and say look how grand I am. God chose me because he doesn't need me at all. Well, the second part would be perfectly true. God chose me not needing me for anything leave out the how grand I am part.

We've got a pretty good statement. Even knowing there was nothing in me that incited God to choose me does not deny that. God has purpose in you or me. He has purpose in the church. The foolish and the weak the low and despised that's you and me in the world's eyes are his chosen vessels of bringing shame.

To the world's wisdom this purposeness. God chose what is foolish. God chose us to shame the wise. God chose the weak to shame the strong. The world's wisdom was back in verse 118 for the word of the cross is folly to those who are preaching is foolishness.

But we fools we believe in that cross and everything it means. That God so loved the world that he gave his only Son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. We weaklings see in the cross all our strength.

We feed on Jesus Christ by his Spirit. We draw life from the vine in whom we've been placed as branches. And I ask which is going to prevail. Those inside or outside the church. Those who see the cross as folly or we who see it as our strength.

Which one will prevail? Well the church will prevail. The church. Christ is building his church. That's you and me together. We the church being built up together into a spiritual house. It's us being joined together and growing into a holy temple of the Lord and by that by us by we weak and foolish people.

God is going to glorify himself and shame the quote-unquote wise. Does that really shame the others? Shame in the Bible has the idea of a misplaced trust of hopes invested, but never realized. The word is used in Romans 1 16.

I am NOT ashamed of the gospel. Why is he not ashamed of the gospel. For it is the power of God for salvation for everyone who believes in other words? Like the rain that God sends which does not return to him except that it accomplishes that for which he sent it.

God's Word in the gospel Actually saves it accomplishes what it was sent for. It doesn't bring shame because if you put your hope and your trust in it. It does what God says it will do. It actually saves.

It doesn't bring shame it will save you. If you will repent of your sin. If you will believe that Jesus Christ died for my sins and God raised him up on the third day. I am NOT ashamed of the gospel. I'm not ashamed to tell you that that will save you.

It is the power of God for salvation for everyone who believes. And That gospel will in fact save if you believe in your heart that Christ died for you and God raised him up on the third day. What's the biblical idea of shame?

I'm ashamed. Because what I invested my hope and my trust or my money or myself in the promise that I had hoped for Didn't come about. And I'm standing there bereft of my money of my hope of whatever it is I put into it.

The gospel does not bring shame. But the Apostle Paul says here in verses 27 28 of 1st Corinthians. That the church that you and I. God's intent is for us to shame the world. How does that happen? Well begins with the world's hatred of the church.

The world has always hated the church. The world is confounded and frustrated by the church's Endurance if you will in the second century, there's a Roman philosopher named Celsus. He was very famous very influential and he wrote this of the church.

He said the Christians injunction is like this. In other words, this is what they say. This is what you and I say quote let no one educated. No one wise no one sensible drawn near. For these abilities are thought by us to be evils.

But as for anyone stupid anyone ignorant anyone uneducated anyone who is a child let him come boldly. By the fact that they themselves admit that these people are worthy of their God. They show that they want and are able to convince only the foolish dishonorable and stupid and only slaves women and children.

This was his view of the church. And he thought the whole thing should just collapse way back then in the second century. In the 1800s in the mid -1800s and Edward Gibbon who was author of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire?

He blamed that decline and fall on Christianity now to be fair. He also attributed their decline and fall to confiscatory tax rates levied against a shrinking base in order to prop up a growing population of dependents.

But he did also blame it on the church. Frederick Frederick Nietzsche who died in 1900 the darling of the Enlightenment the darling of those humanistic philosophies. He said Christianity robbed us of the harvest of the culture of the ancient world.

So I bring all this up to ask a question. How is this? How is this worldly wisdom brought to shame? There's wise and powerful noble out there. Who are so despising of the church? How do we bring them to shame?

God said he's gonna use the weak and the despised and the lowly and the ignoble. You and me to bring to shame those outside who seem to be the opposite of all those things. How do we bring that shame?

How is God using us to bring shame to them? If shame means that what you would hope for didn't happen. Your promises weren't met is by the church's durability is by the very fact that Jesus Christ is still building his church.

He is still calling sinners to repent and his spirit is still giving them faith to believe and Closer to home such worldly wisdom is shamed by our unity. And this becomes the Apostle Paul's point and the focus of these first two chapters of 1st Corinthians.

The world out there is brought to shame by our unity by you and me the dregs of the world. And if you came from the heights of worldly praise to become a Christian. You've become that the dregs of the world with the rest of us.

We are a body of believers unified in Christ. You and I in the face of an exasperated world. Holding true to our faith to our foolish faith to our weaknesses that force us to find a crutch. And yet here we are.

Few in number. Sitting apart from one another. What are we doing? Enduring as a church by the power of the Spirit of God calling out his praises. And Being the church by being here is Christ. Jesus himself by his spirit is building his church and for 20 centuries a Confounded world has been shamed.

Because try as they might to be rid of us here. We are because we're pugnacious. Because we're smart. No because God is Faithful to his word. Because God is working in this place and keeping us together.

Because our unity small as we are. Shames the world out there. This is we ought not even exist. Everything we believe is foolishness to them. And they could see no reason for us to hang together as we have.

Why do we do this? Well, we don't is God by his spirit working in us in you and keeping us together. The administration as I said earlier today is going to change. And I want to ask you. We have we will soon have a President who's not a supporter of the church and a vice president who is antagonistic towards the church.

What would happen brethren? If let's say abortions quadrupled. Abortions and even a small rate is a disgrace, but let's say they quadrupled. What would happen to the church? Christ would still be building his church.

Christ by his spirit and what he is doing in this place is bigger than anything that's happening outside this place. It doesn't mean we don't care about it. It doesn't mean we can't be active against it.

Our confidence is in Christ Jesus. And we don't let these things shake us. We don't let these things divide us. What shames the world Is when despite all the attacks when despite all the derision all the mockings.

We hold true to our faith. Come together as a body and worship and call out the praises of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior. Your constancy in the faith is how God brings shame to the worldly wise and powerful.

Says no human being will boast before him. You and I won't boast because we know we stand before him spotless and unblemished. Not by works of righteousness, which we have done but according to his mercy.

He saved us. Will bow down in humble adoration, which is the opposite of boasting the wise and the powerful will not boast. If the church's enduring character didn't shame them in this life. Their shame will be eternal in the next their wisdom their strength and nobility which guarded their egos and brought forth their boasting.

Will not gain for them what they had hoped. That will bring their shame. Their antagonistic attitude did not kill God. It did not destroy your faith. The eternal life they denied will now stretch before them in all its awesome Reality and this is how God brings shame to them through us.

It could be just as simple as because we endure. Because we endure as a body unified as a body who refuses to bring Artificial boundaries between us as a body who does not say I follow him or her or this author or this preacher.

I follow Christ we together. And that brings shame. Because whatever hope they had to destroy this church. To rattle this church. I don't mean this church. I mean Christ's Church in the largest sense.

Will not come true as long as Christ Jesus who is building his church and that through us the verse 30 says he is the source of your life in Christ Jesus whom God made our wisdom and our righteousness and Sanctification and redemption.

Therefore as it is written let the one who boasts boast in the Lord and so the question again. How can you boast when you are totally dependent on Christ? I who can boast when they're totally dependent on another for our very life.

We are dependent on Christ Jesus. And so we're going to brag. Even to each other much less before him. Let's ties us back to verse 26 where it's God who did all the choosing. Here God is the source of your life in Christ Jesus.

It is God who chose you it is God who in choosing you placed you in his Son. And his choice of who would be in his Son as we said was made before the world was created. His actual placement of you in his Son is when he gave you faith to believe when you confess yourself a sinner in need of salvation.

When you put your hope in Christ and his cross this happened in time and space but God's choice Was an eternity past so we're dependent and Dependency has to eliminate boasting. Jesus said apart from me.

You can do nothing. That's from John chapter 15 where the Lord tells us that we only bear fruit insofar as we remain in him. Branches attached to the true vine you simply cannot boast against someone on whom you are totally dependent.

And Paul wraps this all up with let the one who boasts boast in the Lord. And Now you will see how Boasting has been the point here. And we're gonna go back to where Paul drew this from which is Jeremiah chapter 9 verse 24.

Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord. And I'm gonna read to you Jeremiah 9 beginning of verse 17 because I want us to get the context. I want us to understand that Paul didn't just hunt around in his Bible to find something that sounded right.

He saw a direct connection between Jeremiah 9 24 and the situation in correct Corinth back in the first century. He didn't just find a verse that sounded good. He found a Passage that related to the situation that he was dealing with.

Now it's not going what we have in first Corinthians 10 and 31. It's gonna be a little different from what we're gonna read in Jeremiah 9. I'm not gonna sort out that difference. That would be good for Sunday school, but not for this message.

Just understand that Paul appropriated it. He didn't quote it exactly and we'll just leave it at that. Jeremiah 9 17. Thus says the Lord of hosts. Consider and call for more the morning women morning women to come.

Send for the skillful woman to come. Let them make haste and raise a wailing over us that our eyes may run down with tears and our eyelids flow with water. For a sound of wailing is heard in Zion how we are ruined we are utterly shamed.

Let's stop for a moment. They were utterly shamed Because they believed that God's judgment was not coming. They were listening to false prophets prophets false priests who are calling peace in their time when Jeremiah the Word of God was calling out Destruction and you better submit now.

Who was shamed? Those who did not believe God. Remember that this relates to 1st Corinthians 131. So we are utterly shamed because we have left the land because they have cast down our dwellings. Here are women the word of the Lord and lay your ear receive the word of his mouth.