Consider Your Calling

Consider Your Calling and the Wisdom of God in 1 Corinthians 1

I want to invite you to take out your Bibles while you remain standing and turn with me to the first chapter of Paul's first letter to the Corinthian church, 1 Corinthians chapter 1. And this morning we are going to be finishing chapter 1, at least that is the plan, we shall see how it goes, but we are going to be looking at verses 26 through 31.

And the title of the message is Consider Your Calling, Consider Your Calling. First Corinthians 1 .26 says this, 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, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.

And because of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption. So that as it is written, let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord. Father in heaven I thank you for your word, and now as I am preparing in my heart to preach Father I pray Lord as I do every time I enter the pulpit, Lord keep me from error.

There is so much false teaching in the world, there is so much error in the church. Father I pray for the sake of my conscience, for the sake of your people, for the sake of their own hearts and hearing, that you would protect us from false teaching, that we would be tied as it were to the post of the word of God and not wandering off into myths and fables and false teaching.

And I pray this morning Lord as we focus on the subject of the fact that you called us not because we were wise, not because we were powerful, not because we were of status, but Lord you called us by your mere mercy and grace and we know now as the hymn writer has said, nothing in our hands we bring only to the cross we cling.

I pray Father that we would truly understand this morning the value of the calling that you have given to us, undeserved, unmerited, fully gracious and completely merciful. Lord help us to understand your word this morning in Jesus name.

Amen. This morning I want to do something a little bit out of character. I'm not given to long drawn out illustrations in my messages and yet this morning I want to spend some time in the first part of the message with a long illustration to sort of help make the point that I'm going to try to drive home in today's sermon.

It's not going to be a long illustration taken from a book or a news story or even a personal anecdote, but it's going to be an illustration taken directly from the Bible. I want to talk this morning about the life of King David.

Most of us are familiar with King David and the events of his life at least from birth or from childhood most of us have probably heard the narrative story of David and Goliath. But I want to focus on some aspects of David's life this morning because I do believe that it relates to the subject at hand when we look at 1 Corinthians chapter 1 verses 26 to 31.

David Chosen from Obscurity in 1 Samuel 16

So if you want to take your Bible and open it back to the Old Testament and go to the book of 1 Samuel and go to 1 Samuel chapter 16. 1 Samuel 16 and 17 we're going to look over these passages today and as I said it's going to be sort of a lengthy illustration but we're not going to be reading everything verbatim but we're going to be looking at some certain particular parts of this section.

We see in chapter 16 the choosing of David and we see in chapter 17 the challenge of against the giant Goliath and we're going to be looking at these two sections of scripture as like I said as an introduction to our lesson.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the life of King David at least prior to his becoming king it's a bit important that we would understand at least some of the history of Israel. God established Israel first through Moses and at the Sinai covenant God created a covenant with Moses and the people of Israel in the law of God and after that covenant was established God did not set up a monarchy under which the people should live.

It was essentially a theocracy. God's rule was supposed to be among the people. They had his law that had been written by Moses. They had a standard by which to live and God provided for them what we would call judges.

That's what the book of Judges is about. These leaders who would rise up in times of crisis and provide leadership and prophecy and help to the people of God as they needed and we know all throughout the book of Judges there are various judges that were rose up by God and used by God to do that leadership that was needed at the time.

Then God brings to the people of Israel a prophet named Samuel and I don't have time to get into how God rose him up and how his mother prayed for him and gave him as an offering to God once she had him all of that is wonderful stories and I wish I had the time to go into all of those things but the important part is that under Samuel the people of Israel began to cry out for a king.

They saw the nations around them wanting a king or having a king and they wanted a king for themselves and so they cried out to Samuel for a king and Samuel said no we don't need a king and he went to God and he prayed to God and God said no we'll give them a king we'll give them what they want but that king will not be to them a blessing that king will be to them a judgment.

He's going to rule over them, he's going to have authority over them, he's going to take taxes from them, he's not going to be what they think and the king that was chosen was a man by the name of Saul and the Bible describes Saul in a very interesting way it says Saul was heads above all the other men he was a tall handsome regal individual he was the people's choice in the sense that he was the type of person who would have won the contest had there been a king contest who's going to be king.

It's it's Saul. He's got this appearance he's got this magnitude about him. He's got a certain regal presence. So Saul is the people's king. And yet Saul was a man who was given to bad decisions and given to rejecting God's law and doing things his way and Saul did those things.

And so what we see in the book of Samuel is we see a rise of Saul's kingdom and we see successes. But then we see Saul rejecting God's will and we see the fall of Saul's kingdom. At one point we actually see God come in and and and through the prophet Samuel take the kingdom away from Saul and that's where we get to in chapter 16 because in chapter 16 Samuel is grieving over the fact that Saul has lost God's favor.

So let's read verses. We'll read verses 1 to 13 because this tells the narrative that I want to address. The Lord said to Samuel how long will you grieve over Saul since I have rejected him from being king over Israel.

Fill your horn with oil and go. I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite for I have provided for myself a king among his sons. And Samuel said how how can I go. If Saul hears of it he will kill me. And the Lord said take a heifer with you and say I've come to sacrifice to the Lord.

Invite Jesse to the sacrifice and I will show you what you shall do and you shall anoint for me him whom I declare to you. Samuel did what the Lord commanded and came to Bethlehem. The elders of the city came to meet him trembling and said do you come peaceably.

And he said peaceably I've come to sacrifice to the Lord. Consecrate yourselves and come with me to the sacrifice. And he consecrated Jesse and his sons and invited them to the sacrifice. So here he is in he's come to Jesse.

This man who honestly is not mentioned up until this point except in Ruth and Ruth I believe is written because well it's obviously written under the under the Holy Spirit of God. But Ruth is is written as as a prelude to this because it tells David's lineage right.

So so here we have this is the first mention of Jesse in the sense of of him having any any place or import. And here he's mentioned in the text. And Samuel's bringing to him uh this this heifer so they can do this offering.

In verse six it says when they came he looked on Eliab. Eliab is the first son of Samuel or of the the father Jesse. When they came he looked on Eliab and thought surely the Lord's anointed is before him.

But the Lord said to Samuel do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature because I have rejected him for the Lord sees not as man sees. Man looks on the outward appearance but the Lord looks on the heart.

Now what was it about Eliab that made Samuel think that he was the one who's going to be anointed king. I think he reminded him of Saul. It says don't look on his stature meaning his height. Don't look on the fact that he has an appearance that that makes you think king because you're looking on the outside God looks on the inside.

You're looking at what the world would see is valuable. God knows what's truly valuable. And that's what's in the heart. So then we go on to verse eight. Then Jesse called Abinadab and made him pass before Samuel.

This is another son. And he said neither has the Lord chosen this one. Then Jesse made Shammah pass by and he said neither has the Lord chosen this one. And Jesse made seven of his sons pass before Samuel.

And Samuel said to Jesse the Lord has not chosen these. Then Samuel said to Jesse are all of your sons here. And he said there remains yet the youngest. But behold he's keeping the sheep. I didn't even call him.

I didn't even bring him to the event. He's busy. He's doing the grunt work. He's the youngest. He's the he's the low man on the totem pole. We didn't even bring him to the party. And Samuel said to Jesse send and get him for we will not sit down till he comes.

And he sent and brought him in. Now he was ruddy and had beautiful eyes and was handsome. And the Lord said arise anoint him for this is he. Then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers.

And the spirit of the Lord rushed upon David from that day forward. And Samuel rose up and went to Rama all right. So we'll stop there with the reading for just a minute and again getting the picture of what has happened.

Jesse has brought his sons and left out the last one the youngest one who is handsome but it but doesn't have any anything else that's mentioned about him as far as regality or height or strength or anything like that.

He's the young one. And God says that's the one. This is the one that I've chosen. God has an interesting way of doing that. If you go through the Old Testament you'll see over and over and over again God choosing the one that the world would have rejected.

The probably the best example of this is in the story of Jacob and Esau. Esau is the oldest but what does the Bible say. Jacob is the one God chose. Even though he was the youngest he would be the one who would carry on the line.

It would be Abraham Isaac and Jacob not Abraham Isaac and Esau. Jacob would carry on that line even though he was not the one that the world would have chosen. He's not the one the family would have chosen.

He wasn't the one that had the preeminence in the position. That's the one God chose. And we see the same with David. Eliab or the other brothers would have certainly been a better choice from man's perspective.

But from God's perspective they were not the choice. Why does God do this. Why does God choose differently than the way we choose. Well that's the focus of today and that's going to be part of the lesson as we go.

David and Goliath as an Illustration of God's Power

But I want to immediately quickly turn over to chapter 17 and just make a few comments now I'm notice one thing though I as I was preparing my lesson this is 13 years of preaching ministry here. I've never preached on David and Goliath ever.

I just I don't know why that just caught my attention. I went back and looked through all my notes. I've never preached on this text before and and I don't feel like I'm doing it today because I'm just mentioning the narrative.

But one day I've got to preach this text. This is an important text and I've never even preached on it. But in 1st Samuel 17 we see David and his brothers and the armies of Israel are fighting the armies of the Philistines and a champion of the Philistines has been brought out a champion of the Philistines who it says was six cubits and a span.

Six cubits and a span is about nine feet and some change. So for us to imagine someone that tall we know there have been people that tall. If you ever go to the Ripley's museum or things like that you know there are people that have parts of their brain that are overactive and cause great growth in their body and their bones are big and strong.

So it's not impossible that a person could be nine foot tall. But it's certainly irregular. Even in basketball when we see these giants like Shaquille O 'Neal that are that are seven eight feet tall. You know these guys are not normal today and they weren't normal then.

But they existed and Goliath was the champion. And there was a there was a time in ancient world where when two warring factions would come together rather than destroying a lot of their men they would come together and they would have one champion fight the other champion for a winner take all.

And so that was the option given by the Philistines. We have a champion. If you bring out your best warrior he'll fight our champion. And winner take all. If we win you will be we will be your slaves.

And if you win we'll be your slaves. Wait. I said that the same time I said if we win you'll be our slaves. Who should have been in the fight. Who should have been the people's champion. Saul. Saul's a king.

Saul's the warrior king. Right. Read some of the rest of first Samuel see he's a warrior king but he's not. He's back in his tent. He sees that nine foot fella and he says it's not a good idea. And none of the other guys of Israel willing to fight either.

None of them are willing to go. David's not even there. David's back with his father. He comes to the line comes to the fight and he hears this man shouting obscenities against God. And he asked the question who is this Philistine who would blaspheme against the God of Israel.

And he goes and he says I'll fight him now remember David's the youngest. I don't believe he was a weak person and I don't think he was a small child as often as seen in the pictures that often account as I don't think he was eight years old or something.

And by this point he was leading he was. He was guarding the sheep and there's a he tells Sam or he sells King Saul that he had he had battled with animals. That's how he felt. Like he knew he could beat Goliath because he says he says yes I'll go up against him.

I've gone against animals and I have prospered and I have prevailed because God was with me. And if God was with me then God's going to be with me now. So I'm not afraid to tackle the giant. I'm not afraid to go up against this monster.

I've faced down other monsters and I've never had to worry because God was always with me. They tried to give him armor and if you read the story you'll see the armor was too big. So he wasn't a large person.

I don't think he was eight years old but I don't think he was big rough and tough either. He was just a small person. So the narrative goes. David goes and he goes to us Brooke. He picks five smooth stones and there's a lot of people have tried to make issue of the five stones and whether that number represents something or the five stones represents I'm going to get into all that.

I think it's sort of like a magazine that carries more than one round. It's a good idea just in case one misses not. You know Derringer's a good job but if you got an AR -15 that works a little better when you're going into battle all right.

So he picked five stones for his sling and the sling back then we I think a lot of people think of like a slingshot like we have looks like a fork that you pull back a string. It's not what it was. It was a leather strap or a leather pouch rather hooked to two leather straps that were long and skinny and they would spin and you would hold one end very tight and the other end was held loosely in the fingers and you would spin it and you would let go of one side and the other side you hold on to and it would.

It would shoot out like a rocket. And he comes out and when he comes out Goliath laughs at him. When he comes out Goliath is offended. What am I a dog. You're a youth and I've been a warrior since my youth.

Goliath says David doesn't matter. I do want to read what he said there. Let's look at verse 45. Go down to verse 45. This is right after Goliath that said what he has said. I want you to hear what David responds with in verse 43 says the Philistine that's Goliath said to David am I a dog that you come to me with sticks.

And the Philistine cursed David by his gods. And the Philistine said to David come to me and I will give your flesh to the birds of the air and to the beasts of the field. Come on. I'm gonna kill you quick.

Verse 45. This is David. Then David said to the Philistine you come to me with a sword and with a spear and with a javelin. But I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts the God of the armies of Israel whom you have defied this day the Lord will deliver you into my hand and I will strike you down and cut off your head.

And I will give the dead bodies of the hosts of the Philistines this day to the birds of the air and to the wild beasts of the earth that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel and all this assembly may know that the Lord saves not with sword and spear.

For the battle is the Lord's. And he will give you into my hand. Boy that's a that's power that's confidence. And he said it and he walks right out. He spins that sling shoots it bang right between the eyes.

In fact the text says that it hit him in the forehead and the stone sank into his forehead and he fell on his face to the ground. And David came to him took his sword from him and lopped off his head right there.

Battle over fight done. Now so much more can be said. But to drive to the point of where I'm trying to get to today. Why did I talk about David. Why did I bring up David. David's entire life up until this point.

And David everything that we've read today makes a grand point that will take us back to first Corinthians 1. And here it is. David was a relatively obscure person prior to God choosing him. He was from a relatively obscure family.

He had no particular physical or mental prowess that would cause him to be notable among the people. Yet he rose to be one of the most powerful and influential kings not only in Israel but in all of human history.

And all of this is to demonstrate one thing. It was God and not David who was responsible for his success. It was God and not David that was responsible for his victory. Why would God choose a nobody to demonstrate his power.

That's why. Now go back to first Corinthians and we'll see how that connects. I hope it makes sense to you. Because in first Corinthians 1 and 26 Paul says this. He says consider your calling. And remember last week we talked about the call.

We talked about that God's called us to salvation. We talked about the fact that that calling includes regeneration bringing us to faith and causing us to walk in the ways of the Lord. We talked about the calling.

And Paul now says consider your calling. Not many of you were wise according to worldly standards. Not many of you were powerful. And not many of you 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. Why. To show that he is the one doing it. Why does God use the David to destroy the Goliath to show it's his strength and not David's. If there was an equally strong Israelite who fought against an equally strong Goliath people would think well that was his power.

And might that won the victory. But the fact that it was a youth the fact that he was young and small and he didn't have the training and he didn't even wear the armor was proof that it was God doing it and not him.

God chooses the weak the simple the normal so that he can demonstrate his power and receive all the glory. When we read 1st Corinthians 1 .26 I find it very interesting that Paul provides three things that he says we have not much of that the world counts as very valuable.

He says not many are wise. Not many are powerful. Not many are of noble birth. Guess what. Those three categories 2 ,000 years later where we sit today reading Paul's words those three categories are still the three categories people use to determine the value of an individual.

Even today think about the first one. Not many of you are wise. What's this referencing education. Now I know there's a difference between knowledge and wisdom. But in this sense Paul is talking about the highly educated.

And he says not many of you are highly educated. The world is enamored with education. You realize that right. People say all what you can have all the money in the world. But without education you're nothing.

And they put a premium on education. And we spend thousands and hundreds of thousands of dollars to go off and receive this education. And we spend four years six years eight years to get these educations countless amounts of money on a single individual to pour all the information that we can into someone.

And often times someone's social status is determined by that. In fact more often than we like to admit social status is determined by the level of education. I remember I'll never forget this. I was speaking at a funeral for a friend and I was one of two ministers who was asked to speak and when I arrived I had never met the other minister before.

We were not friends or anything but we were connected together simply because of the man who had died. And I walked in and he introduced himself to me and he was hi. You're pastor Keith. Yes sir I'm pastor Keith.

He was pastor so and so I don't remember his name but he said to me he says well where'd you go to school. Jacksonville Baptist Theological Seminary. And I've never seen this but I up until that moment I'd heard about people sticking their nose up at you.

It literally happened. He went huh. And his nose if it had been raining he'd have drowned. It was that high. And he turned around and he never spoke to me again the whole service or even afterward. You see for a lot of people that education and where you went to school is is all they want to know.

And that's how they rate you in level of importance. But the other thing he says not many of you were powerful. And when he talks about power here it can be talked about in various different ways. I was thinking about it this week and I got to thinking about the fact that I think he's talking about mostly influential power.

The the not many of you were were like politically powerful. But I got to thinking about how we as people hoist up the powerful as being great during things like the Olympics or during things like today.

What's today everyone you got to know it's Super Bowl Sunday. We're going to watch two gangs of monsters try to carry a pigskin 100 yards for 30 minutes 40 or yeah. So yeah it's going to take four hours.

But but we're going to watch these monsters these powerful men. You know the most the the highest paid individuals in our society are not our doctors our nurses our our police. The highest paid individuals in our society are wearing numbers on their chest and it's in how hard they can hit each other.

And we're so enamored by their power. We're so enamored by their strength. And Paul says not many of you are powerful. I think somebody won't sin. Don't worry about that. Okay. But the third thing he says and this one I think is super important.

He says not many of you were of noble birth. Not many of you were of noble birth. And when I read that I got to thinking what does that mean. Well in the ancient world your birth and where you were born and to whom you were born was very.

It was a big part of your status in the world even today in certain nations they have the nobility or the noble class. Where if you're born into a family you're automatically part of that group. You're part of the the regal or the royal class.

But I thought about in America it's different in America we have a royalty that people aren't really born into. Sometimes they are. But the royalty in America is what I call the celebrities. Celebrities are like royalty in America because they have so much influence on people's life.

In fact what's interesting about celebrities. You can be a celebrity without being particularly smart or particularly strong. You can be dumb as a stick and be knocked over with a feather and still have your own reality show.

We've created this sort of celebrity mindset where these people have the ability to speak into people's lives and people listen. They exercise tremendous influence because of their status. I remember years ago I'll never forget this conversation.

I was talking to a man he's no longer here but he was here and I was talking to him about our church and he said pastor Keith he said I sure wish we could have some important people join our church. He said I sure wish somebody like a doctor or a politician or maybe even a judge would join our church because it might help put us on the map now.

I was appalled physically. I got sick hearing that but I got to tell you something. I don't think he was alone. I think there's such a cult of celebrity today. I'll give you a test right now. I got a call this week from a person said he wanted to come visit our church now if I told you that was Tim Tebow would you be excited.

I don't have anything against Tim Tebow. I think he's a great guy. I'm not. I'm using him as an example. I could use any celebrity but you get what I'm saying. The cult of celebrity runs so deep in our culture that we place.

Let me tell you something. The church wasn't built on Tim Tebow's. The church wasn't built on Kirk Cameron's. The church wasn't built on celebrity. The church was built on people who died and were forgotten but God used them at that moment in that time to build his church.

You know why the church isn't built on wisdom because at the end of the day the world would say it's because of the wisdom the church has grown. You know why the church isn't built on power because at the end of the day the world would say it's because of the power that the church has grown.

You know why the church isn't built on status and celebrity because at the end End of the day, the world would say it's status and celebrity that grew that church. No, the church of the living God has only one reason for her success and that is that Jesus Christ said, I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.

Why did God use only trumpets to bring down the walls of Jericho? To prove He had done it. Why did God reduce Gideon's army from 32 ,000 to 300 to beat the armies of Midian? To prove that He had done it.

Why did God use only an ox goat in the hand of Shamgard to defeat the Philistines? To prove He had done it. Why did God only give to Samson the jawbone of a mule? To prove that He had done it. Why did Jesus feed 5 ,000 people with five loaves and two fish?

To prove that it was God. The more God uses the basic, the simple, the normal, the unremarkable, the more He demonstrates His glory. It's like this, if you had two artisans and you gave one artisan an entire palette to work with and you gave him all of the different tools to work with and you gave him all the knives and the brushes to work with and you had another artisan and all you gave him was a stick and a thing of ink and they both produced the same beautiful piece of art, which one would you say was greater?

The one who had less to work with, the one who had only the stick and the ink, because he demonstrated His power and His glory in what he did. Now again, we're not against the educated. I like the fact that it says not many.

It doesn't say not any. We're not against education. We're certainly not against someone who has power in whatever way. We're not against notoriety or celebrity. But let me tell you this, if you're educated, that's great, but your education is not what brought you to Christ.

If you're powerful, that's wonderful, but that ain't what brought you to Christ. And if you are a celebrity, dandy, that's not what brought you to Christ. And let me tell you this, none of them will guarantee your influence in God's church either.

Many of the most precious ministers in the history of God's church have had no letters after their name. Many of the most influential soul winners in Christ's church have been men who were physically frail.

You know from birth, John Calvin was physically frail as an individual. He had asthma and several other problems that plagued him until his death, and he died a young man by our standards. Some of the most thoughtful pastors have died with only a few church members knowing their names.

In fact, Paul Washer said this, it was encouraging to me, he said, God has some of the most beautiful flowers in the world bloom where no one will ever see them but Him. God chooses the low, the weak, and the unremarkable to demonstrate His glory in them.

And that's why in the grand scheme of things, God chose David. From relative obscurity came the most powerful and influential king in Israel's history, proving beyond doubt it was God doing it and not David himself.

Pride, Repentance, and the Call to Humble Faith

But I want to, if you would indulge me just for a few more minutes, I want to go back and talk about David one more time. Because remember, 1 Corinthians has a context, and the context of 1 Corinthians 1, 26 -31 is in the context of a church that's biting itself to death.

It's in the context of a church that's fighting itself and is killing itself. And Paul's concerned about all these divisions that have cropped up, he's concerned about all this drama that's cropped up in the church and all these people saying, I follow Paul and I follow Apollos and I follow Peter and I follow Christ, all these different groups have cropped up.

That's the context of this. What was the root of their division? Pride. Now go back to the life of David. David was a powerful king. He was used of God in mighty ways. He didn't just kill Goliath. The Bible says there were women who would sing songs about David, about how many tens of thousands he killed in battle.

But then one day, David was on his roof, and he saw through a window something he shouldn't have saw, something he shouldn't have continued to see, something he shouldn't have pursued. And that led David to sin against God.

And that sin would go on to haunt him the rest of his life. That sin brought about death. It brought about division. It brought about destruction. That sin, I would argue, even was the reason why David himself didn't build God's temple, but it was his son.

Now why do I bring this up? Because the sin of David was from the root of pride. I see it. I want it. It belongs to another man. I'm going to take it. And if it comes to the end of the day, I'll kill him to have it.

Beloved, the root of that is pride. And I would argue that in that moment, David forgot his calling. David forgot where he came from. David forgot the obscurity out of which God called him. David forgot the position out of which God called him.

And David forgot the God who rose him up. And it took some time, but the prophet Nathan came to him. And he said, Imagine a man who doesn't have anything but one animal that he loves. And a rich man with all that he has came and stole that animal away from him.

What should be done to that man? And David said, That man is to be brought to me, and that man is going to be punished for his transgression. And Nathan, I imagine he had a bony prophet's finger, and he looked him right in the face, and he said, You are the man.

Beloved, in 1 Corinthians 1, Paul is talking to a church, and he's saying, Consider your calling. Not many of you are wise. Not many of you are powerful. Not many of you are noble. God chose what is weak to demonstrate His strength.

And instead of demonstrating His strength, you're demonstrating your pride. Instead of giving God the glory, you want it for yourself. Beloved, the greatest sin in Scripture is pride. It's what led Eve to take of the fruit.