Bragging Rights (part 3) - [1 Corinthians 1:26-31]

Bethlehem Bible Church

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Michael Chang was 17 years old playing in the French Open, played against Stéphane Edberg in the championship round and won coming from behind to win 6 -1, 3 -6, 4 -6, 6 -4, 6 -2.

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Youngest male tennis champion in the French Open's history.

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People were ecstatic, screaming, yelling, cheering. They gave him the microphone, live audience, thousands of people.

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He said, I want to thank my mom and I want to thank my dad and most of all

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I'd like to thank the Lord Jesus Christ without whom

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I am nothing. The cheering turned into booing, the screaming turned into catcalls and the applause turned into whistling.

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The news mocked him as well by setting the interview against Handel's Messiah.

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We clap, we say way to go Michael and they say how dare you. I thought their attitudes just like Voltaire's who said not until the last priest is hanged with the entrails of the last king will mankind finally be free.

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Let's turn to 1st Corinthians and see what God says about boasting. 1st Corinthians, Paul's words to the

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Spirit of God echo Michael Chang. It's good to boast, it's proper to boast, it's right to brag as long as you have the right motives and the right object.

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For you see we've learned the last two weeks that our flesh, our carnal nature, just like the immature

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Corinthians want to brag about themselves, about who they are, their money, their power, their fame, their speakers, their apostles.

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It's not wrong to boast, it's just wrong to boast in the wrong person. I read one dictionary this week, it said boasting is considered a vice by such major religious groups as Christianity.

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That's only half true. It's only a vice when you're boasting in yourself or as Alistair Begg says, when you're boasting in your own brawn, your own bucks, and your own...

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there's three B's, I've got them here somewhere. Brains, that's it. And if I only could say them with a

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Scottish accent. Psalm 115, not to us

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O Lord, not to us, but to your name give glory. Boasting's good, it's proper.

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God made you to boast. He made you to praise. I used to watch Michael Jordan when

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I was growing up and I can remember people with the slow motion VCRs. You guys know what a

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VCR is? And you can go frame by frame, we thought that was a big deal back then. Replaying some kind of dunk, some kind of steal, some kind of defensive move on the basketball court and people would just be in silence.

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Can you get that? Let's re -watch that. Let's rewind that. Michael Jordan is awesome. And I look back and I think that is praise.

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We're good at it. We're great at it. So Paul says to the

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Corinthian church, when you're boasting and even people like Barnabas or Paul, somebody could be good and godly, boasting in the pastor, the apostle.

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Things get cockeyed, things are haywired, things are not right side up. And so Paul here in chapter 1 towards the end, he says you've got to boast in the right person.

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Now looking at chapter 1 as we've been in this chapter many, many weeks, I wanted to lay down the foundation of Corinthians, the 16 chapters, slowly in chapter 1.

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We'll go faster in chapter 2 and chapter 3. You're saying, yeah, prove it. But we really will.

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This is like climbing Mount Everest. And you've got to establish some base camps as you go up to Everest to kind of get yourself acclimated before you go any higher.

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And that's exactly what chapter 1 serves as. It's a good base camp to understand the Lordship of Christ, to understand how we're supposed to be unified, understand what's going on in the

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Corinthian church. So that's why we're just hovering there for a while before we go up later into other chapters that I guess if we're going to continue the analogy, move into the death zone.

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But here we want to just establish that God is King. The Corinthians were acting very carnally.

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And he says in chapters 1, 2, 3, and 4 that the church needs to be unified. And there was a split because if you follow different people, the church is going to break up.

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And if everybody's following Christ Jesus as Lord, they will be unified in their direction.

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God is Lord, follow him. If God is jealous, then give him all the glory.

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God calls himself jealous. The Pentateuch, Mosaic writing says that God's name is jealous.

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And he doesn't want his glory to going to creatures. So for us, we want to brag and boast in our triune

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God. And so in chapter 1, verse 18 through 25,

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Paul basically says God confounds the wisdom of the world by having a unique instrument for its salvation.

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That is to say, God makes all the worldly wisdom come to naught by having

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Jesus the Messiah die a ruthless death on Calvary and raise him from the dead.

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And the world says it's foolish, but God says this is the instrument of salvation. There's no other instrument.

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And people don't think that way. People wouldn't arrange a religion that way. And so God confounds wise people by choosing the instrument of salvation, the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ.

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But he gives kind of a double whammy here by saying he doesn't just confound them with the cross.

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He confounds them with the bride of Christ as well. In other words, the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but also the people that God saves are foolish to those who are perishing as well.

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The world looks at the church and says, that's not how I would arrange things. That's not what we would do.

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The cross is foolish to the perishing, but God then uses people that the world thinks is foolish as well.

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And this is all for a design. Do you see in verse 29 of chapter 1, so no man can boast.

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It's the cross and cross alone for salvation. We can't add anything to our salvation.

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It's the people of God who were publicans and sinners and corrupt people who

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God saved, so no one can say at the end of the day, look, we are pretty good and we pulled ourselves up by our own bootstraps.

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You know the solos of the Reformation, right? That's the sixth sola of the Reformation. Sola bootstrapsa, as they call it.

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That we somehow did it. No, all the boast should go away from us. And then verse 31, let him who boasts, boast in the

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Lord. God picks things to show he isn't concerned what men think at all.

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Actually, he does the opposite. And if you can get that into your mind, you will have an experience. And I call it being really slain in your spirit.

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Not being slain with the spirit or by the spirit, but slain in your spirit. That what God does, it's just otherworldly.

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It's alien. That's exactly right. We want to glorify ourselves somehow sliding

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God, ignoring God, refusing to give God the glory, kind of with this blasphemy that people have on their bumper sticker,

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God is my what? Co -pilot? That's just absolutely opposite of what

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Paul's trying to get after here in 1 Corinthians. He wants them to recognize through salvation and through the church, those who he picks, that you have to recognize

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God is at work. He has done this work. And he will do as he wills, as often as he wills, and only as he wills.

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So in verses 26 through 31, as we're just marching through 1 Corinthians, there are really three considerations

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Paul gives so that you boast properly. And everything stems from that word in verse 26, for consider.

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So let me give you three considerations, two we've seen last two weeks, and we'll get through the third today. And Lord willing,

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I think I can do it. We'll finish chapter one this morning. Three considerations from 1

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Corinthians 1 26 through 31 that help you put your boast in Jesus Christ alone, just like Michael Chang.

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Number one, if you consider God's choice of people, you will never again boast in those people.

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Paul just says, now just take a look at your pedigree. You've kind of got a humble background

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Corinth, don't you? The same would apply to us as well. Verse 26, for consider your calling brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh.

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The worldly wisdom would not say there are a lot of wise people in Corinth. The movers and the shakers of Corinth wouldn't look at the church and say, you know what, there's a lot of mighty people and there's a lot of noble people there.

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No, they would look and they would say there's riffraff. There are not the best people there, common people.

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And the world says they look weak and therefore they think it's a foolish operation. So Paul says, consider that calling.

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The foolishness and weakness that was in the cross is shown also in the church. So how can we boast in ourselves or boast in our leaders?

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There are a few movers and shakers in the church. And I even did a little study. Dionysius was at Athens in Acts 17.

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Sergius Paulus was a pro -council of Crete, Acts 13. There were the noble ladies at Thessalonica and Berea in Acts 17.

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So some in the upper strata, but not many. God isn't concerned with strong people who have political clout.

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And Paul is not saying never boast. He's just saying don't boast in yourself. Number two, if you consider

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God's choice as sovereign, you will never boast in people. Now he moves more into a theological statement.

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And look at the three times in verses 27 and 28, God has chosen, God has chosen,

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God has chosen. And it's a choice not because of, it's a choice in spite of. It's a choice not because of, it's a choice in spite of to magnify

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His wisdom, to magnify His glory. Look at verses in verses 27 through 28.

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And if you're a visitor today, we just march through a text, verse by verse by verse, and now we're up to verse 27.

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But God has chosen, see the contrast, but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise.

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And God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong. And the base things of the world and the despised,

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God has chosen. Do you think he's trying to drive a point home there? The things that are not that he might nullify, the things that are.

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This is a God who's choosing people from a lower stratus, a lower strata, because he's going to get all the glory when that church does invade the world, pervade the world, to turn the world upside down and acts.

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And so we see here God is not some deist God. Everything's wound up and he lets it go.

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What kind of God is that, by the way? No God at all. There's no deist God here. He's always at work.

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He's imperceptibly at work. And here he's choosing the kind of people that are on the lowest part of the totem pole by purpose, by his own will, by his own sovereign will.

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He chooses the nothings. You see that in verse 28?

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He's chosen the things that are not. He's chosen the nothings. You know what, when

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I choose, you know who I choose when I want to win? I choose not the nothings. I choose the somethings.

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He doesn't choose the somethings. He chooses the nothings. Little value.

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So much so, we saw last week, he doesn't even use a personal pronoun. Here in this part of the text, he doesn't choose a him and a her and a them and a they.

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He chooses its to just show you how low they are. The world chooses the wise.

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God chooses the foolish things. The world chooses the strong. God chooses the weak. The world chooses the things that are.

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God chooses the no ones. For what purpose do you see that he might nullify the things that are?

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Boy, this shoots right against the heretic Robert Schuller who says, the most serious sin is the one that causes me to say

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I am unworthy. That's the most serious sin. You look at this and you think, does

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God pick the worthies or the unworthies? If he picked the worthies, then there's something for us to brag about and to boast about.

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We are something, therefore God chose us. What kind of God would God be if he looks at people and says,

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I'll just choose the best because they're the best. He wouldn't be the God of the Bible. Schuller goes on to say, for once one believes he is an unworthy sinner, it is doubtless if he can really honestly accept the saving grace

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God offers in Jesus Christ. I don't think anything has been done in the name of Christ and under the banner of Christianity that has proven more destructive to human personality and hence counterproductive to evangelistic enterprise.

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Are you ready for this? This is as bad as it gets for him. Then the un -Christian, uncouth strategy of attempting to make people aware of their lost and sinful condition.

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Maybe for the first time in my life I am speechless. He chooses the people that are not to make something of them.

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What did we just sing about today? To make a wretch his what? Treasure. That magnifies his grace.

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If you think you're pretty good and God's not that good, the in -between there is maybe ho -hum.

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But if you realize how bad you are and how great God is, the chasm in -between is called praise, thankfulness.

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God, that you would choose me, I'm nothing. Makes me want to praise you. If I'm the President of the

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United States and you chose me because I was a good politician, then I would have something to boast about, but just like in Abraham in Romans chapter 4, but not before God.

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You want to know why God does all this choosing? Verse 29, that no man should boast before God.

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It's got purpose to it. It's no boast. Every occasion for boasting, gone.

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Not Tuesdays, not birthdays, not leap years. We can't gain our own salvation, so what do we have to boast about besides Christ Jesus?

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There's not one person in this room who is a Christian who will stand before God and say,

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I deserve to be here and I contributed this little portion to my salvation.

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Not no one, not know how. And the Corinthians like to boast.

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Well, for that matter, we like to boast. Paul says, not a peep.

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It all should go to God. You should all be like Michael Chang, no matter what it costs you. So that, look at the text, no flesh, no flesh, no flesh, no created flesh, no flesh that was made out of the dust, no flesh that was finite, no flesh that's fallen, no flesh.

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Stand before God. Say, I saved myself. You chose me because I was good looking.

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That's pretty clear. Ephesians, it always talks about to the praise of the glory of His grace, to the praise of the glory of His grace, to the praise of the glory of His grace.

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Whether you're Jew or Gentile, rich or poor, it's God's greatness through His sovereign choice that should motivate your boasting.

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Anybody here save themself? Anybody here forgive themself? Anybody here redeem themself? Anybody here justify themself?

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Then the answer is no. If we've been redeemed, forgiven, justified, sanctified, we say, God, thank you.

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I think we're singing better as a church, by the way, because I think we're understanding the depth of our salvation. You meet a kid and they're saved and they'll be saved, maybe even when you're young in Christ.

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Jesus loves me, this I know for the Bible tells me so. Then you begin to understand the nuances of salvation.

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It colors it in. It fills in the blanks and it makes your singing more robust. That's what we do.

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We're boasting in Christ Jesus. I'm glad Charlie picked the song that did it. I think that second song. I will not boast in anything, no wisdom power or wisdom, but I will boast in Jesus Christ.

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His death and resurrection. Number three, if you consider

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God's grace in saving people, you'll never boast in those people.

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If you consider God's choice of placing people in Christ Jesus, you'll never boast in those people.

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Verses 30 and 31. It was about eight years ago I was walking down the street close to my house by Mossy Pond over in Lancaster Clinton area.

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I saw a bunch of commotion on the water, on the lake. I was just going for an exercise kind of walk.

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I saw it looked like two men were drowning. I saw a guy come over in a pontoon boat frantically trying to rescue these two people.

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They were kind of going up for a breath and kind of going down. You could see the capsized canoe over there.

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I thought, okay, I'm a swimmer. I was a lifeguard. I know what to do, but there could be some help that's needed.

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I thought I'll call first before I just set my stuff down and swim out. It wasn't that far. It was a hundred yards out.

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I got on the phone and I called 9 -1 -1 on my cell phone. They transferred me to the

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Boston Harbor. They said, where are you? I'm in Lancaster Clinton, Mossy Pond on the causeway.

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They answered, this is Boston Harbor. I'm on the phone. I'm trying to figure out what to do, trying to go through all the details and everything.

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Do I go? Do I help? The guy's over there pulling the guy out. Is he going to pull him in? Sometimes when people are drowning, they'll try to kill you as you go.

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What do I end up doing? I'm on the phone. We need some help. Send an ambulance. Send some police out. I don't know. Who do you send?

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Help. One thing led to another. As I'm on hold thinking, do I go? Don't I go? I wasn't afraid to go, but what do

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I end up doing? Finally, the guy pulled out the last guy and brought him up on the pontoon.

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I hollered out, is that the last guy? Yes, we got him. I didn't see anything in the paper.

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I made sure everything was fine. I called the paper and said, you've got to hear a great story.

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There's so much bad news in the world. Here's a great story. This guy who was a fireman, he was off -duty.

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He saw, he went over there and risked his own life and saved those two guys. Neither of them could swim. It was a windy day and they're in the canoe.

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Let's have a few drinks and go for a canoe ride. I mean, that's not part of the story. So they printed the story in the local paper.

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And I was so mad they didn't say a bunch of good things about me. Brave Pastor Abendroth with all his life skills, life -saving skills, frantically yet persistently called 911 until they answered.

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Picture of me sitting there. Who got the praise?

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And rightfully so. The guy who rescued. I didn't get the praise, nor should

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I have. The guys being rescued? Good job for being drunk and going on a canoe ride.

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You know, they were that close from eternal hell. The one who rescued gets the praise.

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The contribution for those two guys who were swimming was stupidity, sinfulness, and drunkenness.

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And so what are we going to do? Good job. You kind of put your arm up, he put his arm down. Together we can.

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All for one, one for all. Doesn't it sound stupid when you look at a context like that?

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But then when it comes to salvation, it should even be more stupid, but we're so close to it, we sometimes forget that we contribute nothing to our salvation.

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So why do we praise? Why do we boast in ourselves? Pat our own selves on the back that we know?

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So Paul now turns from the negative. Here's who he chooses. The nothings.

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And now he focuses here in verse 30 and 31 on the one who does the choosing, and he is the one to receive all the praise.

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And all our boasting should be done to God. We should be singing from verse 30 and 31.

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Praise him, praise him, Jesus our blessed Redeemer. Paul says, you Church of Corinth, and if it applies to BBC, quit singing.

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Praise me, praise me, I am my blessed Redeemer. Verse 30, but by his doing, by his doing, there's a contrast there as well, but by his doing, you are in Christ Jesus.

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Some might want a glory in the flesh, verse 29, but by his doing, you are a

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Christian. By his agency, by his power.

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If anybody here is a Christian, you're not a Christian because of your power. If you're a

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Christian, it's not because of your wisdom. If you're a Christian, it's not because of your money. If you're a Christian, it's not because you're smarter.

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If you're a Christian, it's not because you're baptized. If you're a Christian, it's not because you've taken the sacraments.

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If you're a Christian, it's not because you're a member of the church. That's why this whole kind of idea of you're saved by faith plus sacraments results in the robbing of God's glory and we don't boast in Him.

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If it is God's grace plus the sacrament of baptism, then the knob on the dial of volume for praise goes down.

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People say, well, you're just bashing Catholics and other people because they believe that it's baptism plus faith.

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Friends, A, truth isn't bashing. B, love tells the truth, but more importantly at the top of the list.

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I don't like it when people steal from God and His glory. I hope that's a righteous indignation where here is the praise and the honor and the glory due to God and then people go, no, but you know,

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I contributed. It's God plus. When you turn from Christ plus to Christ, your boasting goes out the window properly with enthusiasm.

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There's a whole book of the Bible, Colossians, written on how it's Christ and Christ alone. I know people who study

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Colossians and memorize Colossians. They can't stop talking about Christ because they realize how great He is.

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Has nothing to do with us. It's of Him. Not our philosophy, not our statement of faith, not our parents.

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It's of Him. Now, let's turn to Ephesians chapter 2 for a moment and I show you the same

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Greek language, but set in the negative. It says here in 1

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Corinthians chapter 1 that by His doing, you are in Christ. In Ephesians chapter 2, the exact opposite language is used, but the same kind of Greek construction.

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It's of Him we're saved, from Him we're saved, not of us we're saved, not from us we're saved.

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In Ephesians chapter 2, it's one of the most popular verses of all time, rightfully so. It's got this language.

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And you'll see that if you are a Christian, there's one reason you're a Christian. It's by, for God's glory, not you.

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We don't contribute one atom to our salvation. Ephesians chapter 2 verse 8, you know the verse, for by grace you have been saved through faith and this not, they're the words, from you.

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This not of you. In 1 Corinthians chapter 1 verse 30, but by His doing, we're in Christ Jesus and here it's not by you.

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It's not of you. It's not from you. It's not of your doing. It's a gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should.

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Same kind of language. Lest anyone should boast. If you're a

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Christian, you are a Christian to eternally display the favor and grace of God.

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And you'll look at how even Ephesians chapter 2, I can't just switch back to 1 Corinthians yet, I must just take a look at this.

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Ephesians chapter 2 verse 8, by grace, to put it at the front of the sentence for emphasis.

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He could say you're saved by grace. No, no, no, the word order is important. By grace, to push it to the front so everybody goes, it's

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God's sure grace, sheer grace. One man calls grace God's utter generosity.

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The same man called grace God's recklessly prodigal generosity. Grace is something that princes give to their people in their kingdom.

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And Paul hammers on grace all the time. Why? I can't be certain, but one of the reasons could be he lived in such a law -keeping, pharisaical kind of system.

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When he got a whiff of grace, it changed his life. That's why you read so often,

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Pastor Steve preached on this a few Sunday nights ago. Paul just all of a sudden starts writing some kind of thing about the law, and then he's like, time out.

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Twenty -second time out. I just need to praise God. To him, immortal, invisible, God only wise. Jesus, my only

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Savior, amen. All right, back where I was. You see those interjections where Paul goes, I used to be burdened by the law, and now grace has captivated me.

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And he goes, it's an amazing thing, grace, because I knew what I deserved, and I know what I get, and the difference is boasting.

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Take a look at Ephesians chapter 2, verse 8. For by grace you have been saved. And even that language, have been saved.

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The construction is passive. It's something done to you. I hit the ball. The ball was hit by me.

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The second one is passive. The first one's active. Here's passive. We have been saved by God.

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He entirely did it, 100%. From start to finish. There's no nook or cranny available for people to go,

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I've contributed, I can praise myself. For you've been saved by grace through faith.

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Yeah, yeah, I know God saved me, but I came up with my faith. So everything else

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I didn't do, but I came up with my faith, and after I came up with my faith, God said, because of your faith, now

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I'll save you. True or false? If that's true, the boasting meter's coming down a notch.

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Why does it say through faith here and not because of faith? You want to know why you're saved? You can go back up to verse 4.

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But God being rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved us. The why he saved us is verse 4, his love.

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But this is how, and it's through the instrument, the non -meritorious instrument of faith.

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If Ephesians 2 .8 says you've been saved by grace because of faith, it's not Christianity, it's not grace, and therefore it's not worth boasting.

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Faith is the result. Faith is the instrument. It's the means, it's not the cause.

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The cause is grace, love, mercy. Acts chapter 18, he helped greatly those who had believed through faith.

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Faith is not some kind of meritorious work. 2 Peter chapter 1, those who have received a faith.

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And that's exactly what 2 .8 goes on to say. Save through faith, and that not of yourself. Not the faith, not the grace, not the salvation process.

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None of this is of you. It is the gift of God. This grace through salvation, all of,

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I like what Spurgeon said, at every point of the process of salvation, this word is appropriate, not of yourselves.

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From the first desire after it to the full reception of it by faith, it is forevermore of the

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Lord alone, and not of ourselves. The man believes, but that belief is only one result among many of the implantation of divine life within the man's soul by God himself.

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Mark this, in the day of cooperation, self -help, salvation is done only by God.

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And even the faith that we have exercised, certainly God doesn't believe for us, but the faith that we have is even a gift of God.

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It's a gift. It's not of you, you didn't earn it. Not a result of works, verse 9.

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Not a result of works. R. Ken Hughes has an interesting illustration of how people try to mess around kind of self -salvation.

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He talks about a frog that fell into a large milk can, and the frog paddled around so much with its webbed feet and everything, it did so much work in the milk can that it churned itself a little pat of butter and then jumped out of the butter.

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Nothing we do contributes to our salvation, so no one should boast. Back to 1

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Corinthians chapter 1. Back to 1 Corinthians chapter 1. If we don't save ourselves, if no one ever saves themselves, then why would we want to follow

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Corinth, Paul? Why would we want to follow Barnabas? They didn't save themselves.

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They're an object. They're a trophy of the grace of God. So as they point to Christ, you follow them, but you don't follow them, you follow

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Christ. That's the problem in 1 Corinthians 1, 2, 3, and 4. 1

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Corinthians chapter 1, verse 30, but by His doing, you are in Christ Jesus. All new life comes from Christ Jesus.

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The cause, this word in the Greek expresses cause and source. You're in Christ because of His doing.

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It's not of your will, James chapter 1, verse 18. It's by His will, His doing,

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His cause, His action, His call, as we've seen in 1 Corinthians chapter 1, over and over and over.

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Efficient cause of salvation? God. If you're a

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Christian, you're a Christian because God made you one. You say, we get it, saying it over and over and over. Well, it's true

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I'm saying it over and over, but for some, maybe they haven't heard it. It's not ourselves causing ourselves to be

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Christians or some cooperation. No, because God is jealous for our praise. And 1

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Peter chapter 1 says, God caused you to be born again. John 1, 12,

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I don't know why people don't read verse 13, but as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, comma, who were born not of blood nor of the will nor of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.

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You notice the text here in 1 Corinthians 1, 30? Let me read it this way. But by your own doing and Adam's doing, you used to be in Adam, but by his doing, you are in Christ Jesus.

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He loves to talk about Christ. And the second he talks about Christ, he says, who became, verse 32, us wisdom from God.

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You want Socrates. You want Plato. You want one of the other 200 kinds of philosophy and wisdom that you so love and long for in chapter 1?

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The Greeks want what? Wisdom. You want all this wisdom? I'll show you wisdom.

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The personification of Christ Jesus. He's wisdom, who became to us wisdom from God.

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You want wisdom? Paul finally says, I'll give you wisdom. And he says in verse 19 of the same chapter,

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I'll destroy the wisdom of the wise and the cleverness of the clever. I'll set aside. And here's how he does it. Salvation is all of God, and he is wisdom,

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Christ Jesus. God made him to become wisdom. And then he gives these metaphors, three metaphors of what wisdom is.

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The way to improperly read this text is, who are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption.

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All four things. There's a four -part kind of description of God. The better way, NIV does it,

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ESV does it. God, the Son, becomes to us wisdom. That is, and then he gives three metaphors of salvation.

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Three metaphors that describe this salvation. And they're not going to be cleverness, brains, and a lot of money.

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It's not going to be, you want wisdom? Wisdom back in those days were intelligence, cleverness, clout.

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Here, when it comes to the wisdom of God and the wisdom from God, it's not foolish from God's perspective.

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The three metaphors for every person's salvation here even, not just Corinth, but for you too, number one, righteousness.

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God's wisdom gives you Christ's righteousness. You have a legal standing before God, not guilty, based on the work of another, confirmed by the resurrection.

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This is forensic. This is a legal standing before the judge, the holy judge.

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And we have been declared by the wisdom of God, through wisdom personified, not guilty. And we are in the state of being justified.

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We've broken the law. We have guilt. We're sinful. But Jesus has paid for that. And even though he never sinned, he paid for our sins.

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And now we stand with the righteous robe of Christ Jesus, all that he's ever done, keeping the law with the right motives and the right actions and the right attitudes.

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We have kept the law in Christ Jesus, and we're covered with the righteousness of Christ. You want to see wisdom?

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Then you say, real wisdom, Christ's wisdom, we are declared righteous.

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He gives another metaphor, sanctification. The second metaphor for your salvation is sanctification.

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Now that word can kind of have different meanings. Sanctification can be glorification.

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Sanctification can be growing in Christ. Our sanctification can mean this, which it means here.

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We used to be filthy, now we're clean. We used to be sinners, now we're saints. We used to be defiled, and now we are, because of Christ's work, holy.

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He became for us sanctification. We belong to the sphere of being holy, state of holiness, as the spirit of holiness dwells in us.

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He gives another metaphor, too, of our salvation, redemption. And of course the Jew would be thinking about Exodus and the weight of that word, rich history of that word as they're delivered from the bondage of Egypt.

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And here, slave trader. A while ago, we didn't get very far, but we rented the movie miniseries

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Roots. I hadn't seen it for a long time. We let the kids watch a little bit, and it didn't seem like it was done that well in terms of modern day production, but you could get a healthy feeling of what it was like to have someone who was ripped from family and placed in the slave market.

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And here, for us, slaves to sin, in bondage to sin.

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And instead of our own cleverness trying to figure out a way out, it would only drive us deeper.

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We have Christ, our wisdom, who became for us redemption. We're redeemed. Delivered from evil.

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Ransomed with a price. Christ Jesus' body. Eternal redemption, Hebrews talks about. Greek philosophy would give you cleverness, being influential, and high status.

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Christ Jesus gives righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. So then, who will you boast in?

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We're leading up to verse 31. Hey, I knew we could finish the chapter. 1 Corinthians chapter 1, verse 31.

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So that, it's a purpose statement. Now let me read you what it would sound like in the original language.

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So that, just as it is written, the boasting one in the

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Lord, boast. Command. The boasting one in the

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Lord, boast. This is taken right out of Jeremiah chapter 9.

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Right from Jeremiah chapter 9. Don't self -assert anymore. Don't desire for recognition anymore.

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Boast in God. Don't boast in your affluence or wisdom or where you went to school.

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You boast in God. If you would, turn to Jeremiah chapter 9. Sometimes you can see in your

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Bible that it's in capitals in 1 Corinthians chapter 1, verse 31.

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And that just means that it's coming from the Old Testament. So Jeremiah, you can just listen to me if you can't find it.

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Here we have this weeping prophet. And Jeremiah was sad because the

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Babylonians were going to invade. And he was sadder because the people were acting foolishly.

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We're okay. We're strong. We're not going to get attacked. If we do, our affluence and our power can hold off the hordes.

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We have safety manufactured by ourselves. And Jeremiah was sad because he knows there's safety in one and one alone.

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And here you get an idea. If this boasting that Jeremiah talks about is boasting that is in the context of Babylonian scourge, then how about the awful day of reckoning that people would have before a holy

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God without holiness, righteousness, and redemption. Jeremiah chapter 9, verse 23.

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You can see the context if you go back up to verse 11. I will make Jerusalem a heap of ruins, a haunt of jackals, and I will make the cities of Judah a desolation without an inhabitant.

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Verse 12, who is the wise man that may understand this? And who is he whom the mouth of the

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Lord has spoken that he may declare it? Verse 23, thus says

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Yahweh, the covenant keeping God of Israel, our God as well. Let not a wise man boast of his wisdom, and let not the mighty man boast of his might.

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Let not a rich man boast of his riches, but let him who boasts boast of this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the

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Lord who exercises loving kindness, justice, and righteousness on earth, for I what?

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Delight in these things. Side note,

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Jeremiah chapter 9 is speaking about God the Father as Lord.

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First Corinthians chapter 1, verse 30 and 31 is speaking about Christ Jesus, the

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Lord, the deity of Christ Jesus. Boasting in someone whose created being would be not apropos at all theologically.

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The Lord Yahweh is God, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. So we want to be boasting people.

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If I could just turn the dial up just a hair and we'll close. When you boast, would you boast in the

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Lord Jesus Christ? And would you try not to say the generic God when you talk about God, or the generic

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Lord? Especially in our society today. What do you think they would have done if he would have said, and I just want to thank

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God, big guy upstairs without whom I'm nothing. What do you think they would have done to Michael Chang?

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They might have gone, you know, as the typical Kurt Warner's got to do, you know, I want to just thank Jesus kind of thing.

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Or, you know, fine. I don't know if Kurt Warner says that. Maybe that's a bad illustration. But how about let's say the words that come so hard for some people.

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Jesus Christ. It's kind of like you meet somebody, you know, I believe in Jesus Christ. You know, you can tell and you can even see why

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Paul would say, I'm not ashamed of the gospel. There's something about it that makes us ashamed because we know the world is going to go, you're stupid, you're an idiot, you're not influential, you're all these things.

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And it's kind of like the nice pat on the forehead that the culture gives us because we're talking about Christ Jesus. So my charge to you is if you're going to boast, boast in Jesus Christ.

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And I plead with you to say the word Jesus Christ. Next time somebody says, well, what religion are you?

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You could say, well, I'm a Protestant. I'm a Christian. Why don't you just say,

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I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ without whom I'm nothing. I think you'll get a different reaction.

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I think the reaction might be that of a dog. I didn't say they're dogs. Although if they teach circumcision for salvation,

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Paul would call them dogs. But you know, when you say something to a dog and it doesn't know what you're saying, what do the dogs do? You're doing it.

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Look at the person to your left and go, I deserve this.

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I get this because of one person, Christ Jesus. In perfect unity with another person, the father and another person, the spirit, one

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God, three in one. It's because of them. You're going to have eternal bliss in the presence of Christ Jesus forever and ever.

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And why don't we do on earth what we will do in heaven? Worthy is the lamb that was slain.

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Swirling around the throne, praising Christ Jesus. What religion are you?

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Well, that's interesting. I'm a believer and follower in Christ Jesus, the Lord with whom I'm without whom

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I'm nothing. Let him who boasts, boast that he knows the

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Lord. Let's pray. Our father, what a joy it is to know that you have known us through Christ Jesus.

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And we want to boast today that we understand and know you because you have revealed yourself in Christ Jesus and through your word, that we know that you are the

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Lord who exercises loving kindness, justice and righteousness on earth. Lord, help us to delight you by your spirit's power this week, to delight you in speaking well of Christ Jesus.

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Lord, help us to be particular. Help us to be specific. Help us to talk about the only one who is wisdom.

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That is righteousness, holiness and redemption. And now,

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Lord, I pray that you'd help us to sing robustly into your name. We praise you. And for your name, we praise you.