Book of 1 Corinthians - Ch. 4, Vs. 19-Ch. 5, Vs. 9 (12/10/2000)

The Power of God in the Apostolic Church

In the fourth chapter of the book of Galatians, 1st Galatians, verse 19, But I will come to you shortly, if the Lord will, and will know not the speech of them which are puffed up, but the power. For the kingdom of God is not word, but power.

The word of God is power. That is, Christianity does not consist in talking, but in doing. Not in vaunting, but in performing great things. To convince men at first of the truth of Christianity, the dead were raised, the devils cast out, and many mighty wonders wrought by the apostles.

It was the wisdom of God that gave the power to the apostles. They had the power to raise the dead, the power to perform all kinds of miracles, by which the gospel doctrine was planted, propagated, established, and confirmed.

We don't have that today. The gospel has been fully confirmed. It is 2 ,000 years of history. Thus, the kingdom of God was not in word. Verse 21, What will ye? Shall I come unto you with a rod, or in love, in the spirit of meekness?

It is as though Paul had said, Come, I will, among you, to regulate disorders, to rectify abuses, to choose how I shall come, whether in the milder way of kindness, love, and meekness toward you, or in existing, exercising the power of God.

This is a great thing that Paul was doing, of inflicting corporal punishment on offenders, by defending them, delivering them to Satan as God's executioner of the bodies of Christ. The power given at that time, if it were not as it is today, it would have had a very difficult time of getting started.

The Church has been in existence, we have no excuse. It has been in existence for a long, long time. At that time, it was very new, and the world was mostly set against it. Most of the world was a type of superstition.

Confirmation of the gospel was difficult, and we have all of that leading up to the fifth chapter now. And you are puffed up, and have not rather mourned that you have done that this deed might be taken away from you.

Church Discipline and the Scandal in Corinth

In the face of such a scandal as this, a disgrace among the Church as this, of which he is a member, you are still puffed up. Instead of being mournful, instead of trying to correct the situation, the apostles, or the disciples in this case, were very, very—well, they would try to sweep it under the rug, instead of being humiliated.

And what? I thought there was something missing. It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles that one should have his father's wife.

My, such a—we do not even like to talk about it, do we? Members of the Church who, in opposition to their profession and to all the light which they enjoyed, live in sin, if you can imagine such a thing.

Do we have such a thing today? If we know it, why don't we correct it? Well, that's true, but we're to judge only what we can see. We're not to judge what we cannot see. We cannot see the salvation of the person.

We can see his effects. We can see the—well, whether he's saved or not is almost beside the point. He's a member of the.

Church. And what do you want to say, Diane? I dare say that nobody saw it. Well, we don't know that. He said it's talked among you. I think that if the Lord reveals something to you, and either you see it, you hear it, and it burns your heart, I believe, and this is just me, and I've been known to talk too much, but I believe that the Lord requires it of me to say something so that that burden is lifted off of me, because it stays on me until I either confess it, go to the person, or correct it so that then I have his peace.

All right.

When it comes to judging.

All right. I can tell you the name of something similar like this happened in the community in which I live, and it was certainly pure gossip because this stepmother loved this guy just like her own child.

And because of their closeness, gossip got out that that was going on, and there was—it was certainly a big lie.

In this case, and this is what we're talking about, it was commonly known that one has had his father's wife, his stepmother. We cannot assume that this applies to every case. If this did apply to every case, if everything—if this was going on, and if it was as sure as you can be, then you should go and talk to the individual.

If not, if talking to the individual didn't change it, I assume that that was done. But Paul is making a point with something very, very real, and this goes on. Members of the church who, in opposition to their profession and all the light which they enjoy, live in sin or sometimes suffer to commit crimes which are viewed with abhorrence even by the heathen.

Now, the heathen, in that case, trying to correlate it with something today, there's not much difference. There should be, but there isn't. And you are puffed up and have not rather mourned that he that hath done this deed might be taken away from among you in the face of such a scandal, such a disgrace upon the church of which he is a member.

You are still puffed up. Now, we have things to a lesser degree. We may have the same thing. I don't know. But the church members act as though there's nothing wrong, and that's the ones to whom he's talking.

You're still puffed up instead of being humiliated and covered with a sense of shame to manifest sorrow as your duty and to take such steps that the evildoer might be taken away from among you by means of church discipline.

How many of you have seen church discipline? One. You have? Two out of how many? Thirty? Thirty-five? I don't think we're that pure. I don't think that we are above reproach. But it has become a way of, well, we hide behind not judging by not disciplining.

The early church mourned those who fell into obscene or other grievous sins as dead, and they repented, receiving them from the dead. Now, if everybody, if we were 100 percent toe of the line as the scripture indicates that we should, how many of us could be here today?

How many of us would not have sin in our life for which that's a private sin? And I'm not going to confess this in front of people. If it involves one person, then you should confess to one person. If it involves the church, you should confess to the church.

This is what had happened. It had been a lack of discipline. It had involved the church. The church was, well, the church was responsible for each member. It's hard to discuss such a in front of a church that you know is all right.

I know in my heart that there is not any of that going on. I know that that particular sin is not rampant in the church. We just don't have it in some of the churches they do. In this one, we don't. For I barely as absent in body, but present in the spirit, have judged already as though I were present concerning him that hath so done this deed.

He was judging as he, as though he were there, though absent, yet with them in spirit. Paul judged the case as present and commanded the church as a body to take action by withdrawal at once from the evil done.

Paul is simply saying that it makes no difference whether I'm there or whether I'm not. I know what's going on, and I would admonish you to take steps toward correcting it. And the first step you take would be to put that one out.

Not to put him into losing his salvation. We're not talking about that. We're talking about his fellowship, his communion with the church. If one person is overlooked, then very soon it will spread into others.

And he did it, why can't I? And that's just natural. It just comes to that. So the best time to correct a fault is when? Just as soon as possible. Just as soon as it was known. For in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we are gathered together in my spirit with the power of the Lord Jesus Christ, to deliver such a one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, not the soul, the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.

We have to be sure that we deliver such a one to Satan for the flesh destruction. This could mean his death, it could mean sickness, it could mean any number of things. To deliver such a one, this was the highest degree of punishment in the Christian church, this is the highest.

For that person to be put out of the church doesn't affect his salvation. You remember the Bible says that if all of his works be burned up, he himself will be saved as though by fire. So he himself is saved.

That's right. And if the person is not saved, then he should be put out anyhow. But if he is saved, he should be put out, but with the regard of welcoming him back, we're putting him out for correction.

To me it's very clear that this preserves the purity of the church. Yes. And therefore we're we're given that command actually to to see that that one is put out so that he then is, God is in charge of him, and he would feel if he's saved, he will bring him back to repentance in his own way that we don't know.

But it will then be between him and God, and he's not standing by the church and saying it's okay, or in the church saying it's okay. Yes. So that part of judging, we are not to judge his spirit. God is in control of that.

Okay. His walk is what we're judging. Is he what the church stands for? Yes. Yes. Trudy?

I think that this is all true, and we shouldn't do that, but we live in a generation of tolerance, and we accept and tolerate people on the level of, for instance, I can think back, and there was a situation where this person lied all the time, constantly lying, constant, constant lying.

Everybody knew that this person lied, but no one brought it to his attention, and no one brought it to maybe his parents' attention. So we became tolerant of it, and I think we become tolerant of something on a small level that we become tolerant of something on a big level.

Yes. If you do see something, and you go to that person, within that person, it feels like you're judging, not that God actually showed you something in scripture, because I do believe there's a right way, but if you have scriptures that says, you know, you shouldn't lie, and you have Ananias and Sapphira as an example, well, then it wouldn't have hurt for us to go, you know, you've got a problem with lying, and it's going to end up destroying you in the long run.

Then he would have been aware that people around him knew he lied constantly, and that could have helped him, but instead, we all sat back and just watched it, and I think as a generation, that we have come to that point, that we all sit back as lukewarm Christians and watch, so that when someone does finally come to our presence and says, well, you see, that person's got a problem.

Maybe we should take him showing scripturally how he's doing wrong, but then we're going to judge that person, because who are they to say, but they're not saying it, it's the Bible, and I think we're.

All cowards where that's concerned. That's right. We need to use the scripture to prove the point. That's, out of all you said, that was it. That comes down to it, and if you don't know the scripture, how can you use it?

To know that the scripture does not condone anything that is irregular, that is unworthy of a Christian. It wants the church to be pure, not almost pure, not just a little bit pure, but pure. Absolutely.

Now, also, this action, we're talking about one particular action here. If the church sweeps it under the rug and goes on as though nothing's wrong, then that hurts the church, and the church also has to keep a good moral standard.

The individual has to keep a good moral standard, but combined as the church, we have to keep a good moral standard. You can't do that unless all the links are good. Solid. Solid. Thank you. Diane, you want to say something?

I think we have,.

I say this for myself, that you are part of it, and we have forgotten to listen to the foot, or the arm, or the leg, and we have to understand that each decision we make affects the other part of the body.

Right. And we, as a generation, have taught even our children to be self-sufficient, when Christ himself wants us to be sufficient as one body. And so, part of correcting, if I do not hurt when my arm is doing something wrong,.

Then I have to question, am I part of the body? That's right. That's right. So, if I see my.

Brother in a fall, and I do not go to him, then I have to question, is, am I part of the body? Has.

God connected me to the body, or am I pretending to be a Christian? Right. So, it behooves each one of us to go individually, and I would hope that that could correct it, if it doesn't, there are steps to take.

And one more thing. All right. He asked, and I taught this to the kids.

This week, if you have sin in your life, and he made you aware of it, go to your brother. Confess your sin to your brother, who loves the Lord. Ask him, he says, the prayer of the righteous man availeth much.

You go to him, you confess it, you pray with him, and that you may be healed. We won't even tell our spouses our sins, let alone the church body that God has connected us to. He would that we go to one another in Christian love, confess our flaws, whatever it is.

If it's lying, if you make it aware to him, and he repents of it, and he confesses.

It, and you pray with him, I believe that we're healed. Sure, absolutely. But how can we be healed if we don't do that? Yeah, well, all right. I see that this is such a big step for many Christians who are kind of within themselves, feel inadequate.

But the point of your thing is that we need to go with our confession to them, we've heard them, and not go and point our fingers at them. Yes, yes, yes. That's the difference. It's easy to sit back and point your finger.

If you can get somebody to listen. I think also, in the same respect, that if we're, if one of us should happen to be the person who was in need and another Christian comes to us, that we need to be open to hear what they're saying, and not feel like they're pointing a.

Finger, realize they're coming to us in Christian love. That's very difficult to do. Yes, it is.

But we, if we're truly Christians, we need to open our hearts to that and our ears to that, and be able to not take it as criticism, but take it as the help that it's meant to be.

Okay. Somebody in the body back there raised their hand. Absolutely. I was just going to say, probably because of what Trudy said a little earlier that it's difficult to do, to go and talk to a person.

I believe that's what generates the gossip. Yes. It's much easier to go to your buddy and tell him you're worried about this, this other person's done this, and you're worried about it. I get advice from you.

You don't need advice. No. It says that you go to that person. You don't talk to your other friends about it. You don't, like Jesse said, you don't include other people in it at all, because that is Satan's strategy.

Absolutely. And anytime we speak to a brother about another brother who's not present in a negative way, we're playing Satan's game, unless that other person you're speaking to happens to be the pastor.

And I think it is interesting that in this passage we're studying, there are several exceptions to the rule that allow them to come to Paul and tell them what they've been hearing, because they were doing that with the motive of knowing he could help fix it.

So you can't go to the pastor if you just are so fearful you don't want to have it or can't have it. But you shouldn't go to five other friends, or even one other friend. That's right. You can't go straight to the person, or to the pastor, and ask him to pray with you, and go with you to the person that's second best.

They didn't do that here with Paul. Right. You don't know what to do. This man's in the church doing this because they needed his counsel. So that gives a slight exception to the rule. The general rule is you go to the person only.

That's right, but the pastor should question whether that person has been to the person or not. And if so, then let's take it up. You want to say something? Yes, I'd like to say this. We have a scripture that says,.

Judge not as you be judged likewise. And we also have a scripture that they're known by their fruits. And sometimes, well, I know a man that, if I'm not judging, I'm just fruit picking. That's it. That's it right there.

Well, I'm pretty sure we'd better be careful how we're fruit picking.

If you're spending time nitpicking, you shouldn't. Period. You ought to just keep quiet. Go to the person and talk. If not, then go to the pastor and talk. All right? Let me make one more comment about certain characteristics.

And when you do that, you go through the grief and agony of hurt and pain and discomfort before you recognize it in the other party. And I think that's part of when we talk about, judge not as you be judged, because you yourself have to, before you go with that person, you have to look at your own lifestyle and agonize and grieve that you're going in the right spirit, not in the condemned manner, but in a manner that you're reaching out to a fellow, supposedly Christian.

And we're supposed to be talking to the Christian, not necessarily the secular world, because there are different rules. But you've got to search your own soul and see that you're going in the right manner.

And a lot of times you need to recognize the sin if you haven't done it or you haven't done it. It's like a person who's divorced can recognize the symptoms of another person who's going through a divorce much quicker than a person who has never been through that process.

And I think that's the agonies that you go through. And I think that's what the judge not unless you be judged is taking us through. So you have to be willing to judge yourself. To deliver such, and one, this was the highest degree of punishment, as we've said, and we may observe the passing, this sentence was the act of the apostle, not of the Corinthians.

It was the act of the apostle only. What Clarence said, we recognize nothing unless we have been through it or have read extensively on the subject, something of which we are completely void, we cannot and will not judge.

To Satan, who was usually permitted in such cases to inflict pain or sickness on the offender. Now it doesn't mean pain and sickness always comes from Satan. Don't misunderstand. For the destruction through slowly and gradually, for the destruction of the flesh means unless prevented by speedy repentance.

It becomes a problem when there is a problem in the church. It becomes a problem for the individuals that know about it to not talk about it, to not want somebody else to know what you know, to not be, well, over-informed, to not try, not, to not find fault with somebody else.

If there were no listeners to gossip, there'd be very little gossip. I think that the best way to to stand to correct all of our, to correct all of our difficulties in this church, and that this is the church that I'm talking to, that if there is someone, then it does affect all of you.

So if you're wrong and you don't know it, but you see something that you do not understand, go to the individual and talk. It might be you're wrong. It might be that they're wrong, but in any case, it has been cleared up one way or the other.

Leaven, Purity, and the Passover Lamb

Your glorying is not good, know you not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. And this is what Judy, what Trudy was talking about a moment ago. A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. What's that mean, Greg?

That's right. Your glorying is not good. Your boasting in such a state of affairs was unseemly. If you condone it, and if you keep quiet, you do. If you condone the little leaven, it's kind of like a cancer that feeds on itself.

Cancer is a group of cells that have gone wild. They grow on their own. They take on a characteristic completely foreign to the body, but they feed on themselves and they grow and grow and grow. So a little leaven is the same way.

As a little leaven leaveneth the whole mass of dough, so one sinner suffered to go on in in impurities since a corrupting influence through the whole church. Now it does that without anybody saying anything.

Just keeping quiet. Just trying to act like everything's normal. You can't do that. Purge out there for the old leaven, that you may be a new lump as you are unleavened, and for Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us.

The remnant of the old heathenish and natural corruption is present in every body. The image is taken from the extreme care of the Jews and searching every corner. You remember that the piece of leaven was hidden and children made a game out of it of finding it.

Every particle of leaven from the time of the killing of the lamb before the Passover. So Christians are continually to search and purify their hearts. Therefore let us keep the feasts. Now I must point out something there is no article in the Greek language.

So therefore let us keep feasts. Well feasts does not fit. Feast was translated, it should be festival. So with no article in front of the festival, the reference is not to the Lord's supper or to the Easter or some other supposed, as much of the duty of, as some suppose so much as to a constant duty.

Now they did not have a Paschal lamb that was all of the time. The Old Testament I'm talking about. The time when this was written. Hence it's always we have a Paschal lamb. Hence it is always proper for us to use the Paschal lamb.

Now for fear of talking in bunches let me back up. In the Old Testament, before the cross, the Christians were dependent upon the observance of the ritual to be their salvation. After the cross, it is not dependent upon the ritual being our salvation because we have experienced the real thing.

They look forward, we look back. They look forward only in a degree or in a picture. They can only look forward to it because they die. First one dies, then another before the lamb was slain. When the lamb was slain, Jesus Christ, the Paschal lamb, when he was slain, he was slain once both for the old and for the new.

He suffered one time. We have that Paschal lamb continually. We have it. They didn't. They had to look forward to it simply because they did not have it yet. But we have it. So any time that we need to, well we should live there.

We should live in the shadow of the Paschal lamb continually always knowing that the lamb forgives sin. But we don't. We run off this way and that way and some other way and we let leaven get caught up.

We have to confess our sin. We have to get rid of the leaven. We have to be more assured of who I am and where I am that the the leaven that is trying to get hold is stopped on the beginning. The best time to stop anything is at the beginning, the very beginning of it.

And would that it would never begin. But it does begin. And if we get angry, we get, I get angry with Greg because of something he said, then I'm angry at myself. But I take it out on Greg. And that's not right.

He shouldn't do that. He shouldn't say that. He should, I should talk to Greg and find out where he's coming from. He may be talking about something entirely different, but I just heard the tail end of it and therefore it offends me.

Well, I wrote to you an epistle not in company with the fornicators. It seems as though Paul had written another letter, at least one. We know he wrote many letters that were not included generally supposed to refer to an epistle, not handed down to us.

That's true as the apostle delivered many inspired discourses, which it did not please the Lord, the Holy Spirit to have recorded. Therefore, let us keep the feast, not with the old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread and sincerity and truth.

The unleavened bread, of course, speaks to the absence of leaven. If you've ever eaten that, it doesn't taste very good, but that's the picture. Sin tastes good at the beginning, but it soon becomes a deterrent and it's something we should not.

So it, he may have written letters, which the wisdom of God did not judge needful to make the sacred volume complete. We need to stop here. We'll go into verse 10 next week. Is there anything from anybody on this subject?

Christian Correction, Humility, and the Body of Christ

So should our goal not be, because as we don't listen to the Holy Spirit, as we don't go to those counting, does not that cause us not to hear from God? Yes. So if we stop hearing his voice, should that not hurt our heart?

And if we are afraid of that happening to.

Another body person as part of the body of Christ, is that wrong? Yes, it is. Trudy?

As a church, we need to be aware that if someone comes to us with a problem in the scripture, that we should not let our pride flare up and that we should be standing right now, just like Paul went into this church.

Paul wanted the church. The church didn't deal with it, so he had to. And the church we should deal with, if someone comes to us, be open to what they have to say. Maybe they, like you said, maybe they see things in a different way and you can explain yourself.

But if your pride flares up and you say, well, that's not me or I did that, da, da, da, da, I think, like Debbie said, that we should be humble and let, you know, let them show what.

They see and then explain it if you're in the right. That's certainly true. Are there any problems in the church I don't know, know not about? Now's the time to confess. I, I hope that we don't succumb to any of that.

If we do, there's somebody watching besides God. Let's stand and we'll be dismissed. Clarence, dismiss this please.