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Pastor Mike Abendroth explicates 1 Corinthians.
No Compromise Radio. Thanks for tuning in to No Compromise Radio with pastor and author, Dr. Mike Abendroth. Today on No Compromise Radio, we'll be hearing Pastor Mike open the Word of God in a recent message he preached at Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts.
Now let's join Pastor Mike in progress as he preaches through the scriptures, verse by verse with no compromise.
Verse seven, because the mindset on flesh is hostile towards God, for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so. We used to please ourselves, now we please the Lord.
It's not just our behavior, it's our mind, it's our will. Verse eight, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. But friends, you now aren't in the flesh, you're in the spirit, and you can what?
You can please God. Why? Verse nine and ten. Help me. The spirit of God dwells inside of me. Verses nine and ten. However, you are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, if indeed the spirit of God dwells in you.
But if anyone does not have the spirit of Christ, he does not belong to him. And if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness. The Greek is, but as for you.
He switches to the second person, you. This is not just some kind of, you know, experimental scientific language. He wants the readers. I want you to say, I've got assurance because the spirit of God dwells in me.
I have the resources to obey. One day you're going to get new bodies, too, by the spirit. Verse eleven. But if the spirit of him who raised Christ or Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who indwells you.
Right thinking now and also for the future. Your body is going to be raised from the dead. And by the way, if I want to force the issue a little bit and there's nothing you can do to stop it. No, I don't think I want a new body, God.
My will, my free will will stop that. God has come to save you and he will save you to the very end. And one day you're going to get a glorified body. It's done. Spirit of God dwells in you. The future bodily resurrection depends on Christ's resurrection.
He was resurrected. You will be because of the spirit of God dwells in you. And he prompts you and he urges you and he convicts you to live God's way. Verse twelve. So then, brethren, we are under obligation.
Look what Jesus does through this ministry of the Holy Spirit. Verse thirteen. For if you are living according to the flesh, you must die. But if by the spirit, there it is, spirit, spirit, spirit, capitalist everywhere we go, you are putting to death the deeds of the body.
You will live. It's not just God does it all for you. Remember the old phrase, the pie, just lay back and what? Let God, G-A-W-D, lay back and let God, I'm just going to let him kind of do everything.
Well, chapter eight almost kind of sounds like that until we get to about right here, where we actively, based on the spirit's work, based on Christ's work, based on the regenerating power of the spirit, sanctified living, we still obey, we still do.
We work on our salvation with fear and trembling. We count the members of our body dead, as Colossians says, but we have the spirit of God. What if we just took away the spirit of God for just this next week?
What would happen, do you think? Well, just take the spirit of God and assuming that you could still be on the earth, assuming that you wouldn't lose your salvation, but just sanctification in terms of relating with your spouse, relating with your boss, relating with your kids, school, celebrating Christmas.
What kind of week would it be without the spirit of God, his restraining power, his enabling grace? You say, but I have the spirit of God and I am able to do that. By the way, if you say to yourself, I've always been a bad this, a bad parent, and I don't do this right and that right, well, you know what?
Today's a good day for you because I want to remind you, you have the spirit of God and you can be a parent to please God, a husband to please God, a spouse to please God because you have the spirit of God.
Promise number seven, a promise that you have if you're a Christian that should make you praise God is that you, because of Christ's work, have the inheritance of a lifetime and that is you're a child of God.
Verses 14 through 17, God is your father. Some people in this congregation have been adopted. Some people don't know who their fathers are. And here, will salvation last? Will I get kicked out of the family will because I've sinned?
I read about that. You've got these rich people and all of a sudden the son becomes a drug addict or does some kind of weird thing and then they get taken out of the will. Will you get taken out of the will of God because you sin?
The answer is no. We don't want to sin. May we sin to let grace abound? No. But look at this Holy Spirit indwelt chapter. Everywhere you go is the spirit of God, the inheritance of a lifetime, a child of God.
Back in the old days when you had children in a Jewish family, the rite of primogenitor means that the firstborn got double. So if there were three kids, you wouldn't say 33, 33, 33, you'd say what, 50, 25, 25.
I tried to employ that when we tried to split up my mom's estate since I was the oldest, but I only got 33 .34. Marcy got 33 .33 and my brother got 33 .33 because the lawyer said the oldest gets the .01 extra.
So I felt like I kind of got robbed. Just imagine if you had a really rich family member and you didn't even know you had them. This happened to us one time. It wasn't that rich of a person, but Kim had some relative in Arkansas or someplace and we got a little bit money.
We didn't even know they existed. Felt kind of bad taking money. We weren't even sad they died. I mean, how does that work? But what if there was somebody who was ultra rich and all of a sudden the lawyer called you, come in for the reading of the will and you're close to the top in terms of what you're going to get.
You get in this little room in a lawyer's office and he opens up the will and you're just waiting to hear that last name. You don't even care if they pronounce your name Abendroth. You're just, I just can't wait.
This passage here, in spite of our unbelief as unbelievers in chapter one, two, and three, in spite of our continuing struggle with sin in chapters six and seven, the best inheritance you can have is not necessarily stuff or things.
It's that you get the God of the universe as your dad, as your father. That is amazing. Look at where I have chapter four, chapter eight, verse 14, rather, for all who are being led by the spirit of God, these are sons of God.
These and these alone have been adopted, had the legal right, not just a legal right, but by nature as well. By legal right and by DNA spiritually, these are the sons of God and sons don't fear. They have great freedom.
Verse 15, for you have not received a spirit of slavery, leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, Abba, father, it's one thing for the judge to say, not guilty.
It's another thing for the judge to say, not guilty. I'll punish my own son instead and I'll take you and make you a son. We get to call him Abba, father, and you say, oh, this is kind of nice. A little baby kind of, you ever hold a baby and they kind of just cry out just a little bit.
It's kind of a weak little cry. What kind of cry is this? You don't kind of cry. This is revelation chapter 12, the screech of childbirth say what I don't get it, a screech of childbirth. Listen to Sinclair Ferguson.
The picture is not that of a believer resting quietly in his father's arms in childlike faith, but of the child who has tripped and fallen, crying out in pain, daddy, daddy, no matter how hard things get and no matter what the trials are and there's the spiritual knees are scraped.
You get to cry out with tears down your eyes, but you're my father and God says, yes, you're my son. You're my daughter. The father is there for us when we have a need. When we have a time of need, the father is there for us and what does the spirit of God do?
He confirms that in our hearts and assures us verse 16, the spirit himself emphatically bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. The security of your faith would be guaranteed even though God didn't give you assurance is the goodness of God to give you assurance.
He didn't need to give us assurance. He could have just said to himself, I'm saving that person to the end, but here he works that assurance out in our hearts. That's a gift of God gift from God assurance.
See how great a love the father has bestowed upon us that we should be called children of God and such we are. And if your children, you've got glory coming for it in an inheritance, verse 17 and if your children heirs also heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.
One man said that is a breathtaking provision from God. No second class citizens, no second class sons or daughters. Number four, the fourth great promise for every Christian that should cause you to praise him.
We've seen so far there's no condemnation for Christians versus one to four. We've seen that the spirit of God dwells in every Christian, so your salvation is secure. Five through 13. We've seen that we have the best inheritance of all having God as a father.
We are not orphaned in the kingdom of God versus 14 to 17 and now promise number four, the fourth lock jaw kind of vice grip promise that the hope of the greatness of the future glory should help you live in times of trouble.
Now knowing what's going to come should help you live in tough times. Now versus 18 through 27, our suffering, your suffering is going to reap glory one day. Too bad our society couldn't listen to this message, but they wouldn't have the resources to do anything about it anyway.
But for the Christian in tough times, despair, depression, hopelessness should never be part of your vocabulary. This section is Christian. Take heart, take heart. Even in huge trials, true or false, God takes away all your problems when he saves you from your sins.
Oh, I thought that's what they're telling me on TBN and 700 club and verse 18. I think the answer is found there. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time, I mean, for those who say, just be more godly and just do X, Y, and Z, and you'll have less trials here.
We have the most godly person on the planet, Paul, and he suffers and these sufferings at the present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. Paul said, I'm convinced I calculate this.
I get out my little HP calculator and I do a little slide chart and slide rule. I get everything out and I've calculated it all up and I conclude and I count and I calculate that when I look at this column here in the ledger suffering, it's going to look infinitesimally small to this ledger over here.
What I get, it's going to be revealed to me in glory. He said to the second and he said to the Corinthians in second Corinthians four for momentary light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison.
While we look not at the things which are seen, but the things are not seen for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal. One man said it this way. You'll like this language.
Glory dwarfs suffering. That's the mindset for a Christian. Glory dwarfs suffering. There's a lot of groaning, a lot of suffering. Verse 19, did you know creation groans for the future? Verse 19 for the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God.
Even creation is growing. Verse 20 for the creation was subject to fertility, not of its own will. Creation didn't have free will, but because of him who subjected it, the fall caused problems. There were no earthquakes.
There were no, no tornadoes. The fall caused the earth as pretty as it is. Who is the scholar who said, when you look at grand Canyon today, when you look at Mount Everest, it's beautiful, but it still sings in a what kind of key?
A minor key. That's exactly right. Thorns and thistles and earthquakes. Creation groans, but verse 21, that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption and the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
I'm pretty glad that the new heaven on the new earth is not going to have a lot of tsunami warnings for me to deal with. Verse 22, for we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now when Paul wrote it.
And until now, now 2009, matter of fact, we grown for the future, don't we? Verse 23, and not only this, but we ourselves having the first fruits of the spirits, even we ourselves grown with ourselves waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body.
Don't you groan and say, I'm tired of sinning. I'm tired of living in this world. I'm just tired of these things. I long for that day. That's what we do. Verse 24, though, for in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope for why does one also hope for what he sees true or false, there'll be a lot of hope in heaven.
You don't have to hope in heaven because you'll see, but we can't see the future yet with our own eyes. Maybe we see it in print. And so we grown, we have a hope. Holy spirit even groans verse 26 and in the same way, the spirit also helps our weakness.
We do not know how to pray as we should, but the spirit himself emphatically intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. Never feel like you can't pray and you don't know how to pray. Spirit knows your weakness and he prays not alone.
He helps comes alongside of the word to help means to take someone and to kind of turn the face towards you. Never forget a time I was standing up on my laptop. I had my laptop like this on my dresser and to Gracie wanted to play, Oh, I guess you just earned yourself a dollar.
Kids get a dollar. If I mentioned them in a sermon, somebody told me that I thought, Hey, that's a good idea. And she came up from underneath my arms and just popped her head right up where the computer screen was like, daddy, I'm here and there you are sitting by these electrodes and transmitters.
You know, I'm right here. That's kind of like when the kids were really little, when Gracie was little and I would talk to her and all of a sudden I'd be looking off over here and the kids like, Hey, I want you to look in my face.
I'd look right in my face and this isn't, well, you know, I'm busy running the universe as the spirit of God and you just kind of figure it out over there and I'll get going. The spirit of God turns his face towards us to help.
What a great picture that is. We have a hard time praying, but there's the spirit helping us. We're not alone. We have a perfect prayer partner. Christ is interceding in heaven. Spirit of God is interceding in us unto God and he knows exactly how to pray.
Verse 27 and he who searches the hearts knows the mind of this knows what the mind of the spirit is because he intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. I've had people in my life who have said, I pray for you every day and some of those people have actually died.
And I think who's going to replace some of those prayer partners and other people come along and say, but we want to pray for you every day tends to be older saints and they just say, we'll pray for you every day.
I love that. And if you want to pray for me every day, please do pray for the elders every day. But one thing I know about your prayers compared to the spirits prayers, sometimes you don't pray exactly right.
Sometimes you pray for things that aren't exactly the will of God, but the spirit of God, when he prays for you, he prays exactly the way God would have him pray because he is God. I've been in places before and I think, you know, Lord, how do I pray for this person?
Do I pray that they take, they're taken home by you in this horrible accident or that they get better? I don't know what to do, but the spirit knows and that should make us respond with praise. It's hard in our lives when we live with ourselves, live with a sinful spouse, live in a sinful fallen world.
How do we praise God? And the praise isn't found in us. It's not found laterally or horizontally. You go back to say, what has the triune God done? The father, the son, and in this particular case, Roman chapter eight, the spirit, what does the spirit do?
Promise number five is that everything works together for good. And since there's no tragedy in this world, from God's perspective, that we should praise God. You ought to say to yourself, God is accomplishing all his plans.
Even though it doesn't look like it, he is accomplishing all his plans. And now Paul kind of goes in a direction that one man has called, John Stott said, this section has been likened to a pillow on which to rest our weary heads.
And I'd go further. I'd say it was a down pillow. What can come into your life that can cause God's plan to backfire? And we know this passage is a passage. Maybe somebody, you know, goes to a hospital and quick blurts this verse out.
I'd say do a lot of hugging and crying and praying before you blurt the verse out. But the verse is true. And we know, we know there's different kinds of knowing in the Bible. This is an intuitive knowing.
We intuitively know. Why? Because he's God. He sits on the throne. He does whatever he pleases, as he pleases, always as he pleases, as often as he pleases. So how could something on earth change him?
You intuitively know if you're a Christian that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to his purpose. He causes. The language isn't he permits.
He does it if you let him. He does it if you appropriate the promises. This is, this is like Genesis 15 with Abraham, God and Abraham, we're going to have a little plan here and here's going to be a promise.
We're going to make a promise. Abraham, your job for the promise. You go over there and sleep. I'll promise to myself. And God says, I'm swearing by myself that this promise is going to be unconditional.
This is an unconditional promise from God. And he swears to it as he does in Jerem, uh, Genesis chapter 15, let's just start big and work small. How about does God cause Satan and all his demons to work together for the good of God, for his glory?
Can you imagine Satan? Let's just start at the very top. Luther said the hardest working servant in all the universe is named Satan because God will allow him to do certain things and Satan can go no further.
Genesis 50 verse 20 as for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good. Job, we could go to Job chapter one, providential God orchestrating every Adam, all things, not one thing excluded.
It's an all comprehensive plan. You say, yeah, but Paul's never been through what I've been through. You're right because Paul's been through worse. Everything bad works together for good. Everything evil works together for good.
Every sin works together for good and that doesn't mean we sin. So God makes it for good, but it's still true. By the way, affliction, God uses and causes to work together for good sickness, lack of jobs, and he has good things.
He doesn't just cause bad things to work together for good. The text says in Romans 8, 28, what he causes all things causes his word, his promises, his attributes, the prayers of the son, the prayers of the Holy spirit, saints, angels, good things too.
But no matter what has happened in your life, in your job, because of the fall, because of Satan, home health issues in the local church, God rides triumphant over all those. Listen to what Samuel Rutherford said, a dear Puritan writer who knew what it was like to suffer yet still focused on the Lord.
Let not the Lord's dealing seem harsh, rough, or unfatherly because it is unpleasant. When the Lord's blessed will blow, when the Lord's blessed will bloweth across your desires, it is best in humility to strike sail to him and be willing to be led any way our Lord pleaseth.
You know not what the Lord is working out of this, but you shall know it hereafter. Now when I get to heaven, there's lots of things I would like to do. I'd like to just see Jesus in his glory. Wouldn't that be great?
I don't think you're going to have three orbs, the Father, some kind of beard, and the Son over here on a throne, and the Spirit over here, you know, kind of a ghost. I think all the deity that we see, all the Godhead dwells in bodily form.
I think you're going to see Jesus, and when you see Jesus, have you seen the Father, have you seen the Son? You're going to see Jesus Christ with the nail-pierced hands. And I'm just going to, I'd love to see what Jesus looks like.
Wouldn't you? The glorified Christ? I'd just like to say, you know what, I always think to myself, well, am I going to know what to do? Am I supposed to get down on my knees? Can I stand, you know, I don't have to cringe, I'm sinless now, and is it okay to stand, sit, kneel?
Whatever I'm supposed to do, I just want to do. But you know what? We'll know what to do. We'll know what to do, and so you don't have to worry. No worries about, you know, don't sin now, worried about what you might do in heaven.
Will I have the right kind of social graces and etiquette? You know, Emily Barnes, what to do in heaven? You'll know what to do. So, after you're on your face and you want to get up, you're not going to have to look around, is it okay for me to get up now because I see, you know, Calvin finally got up after a while.
Okay, I'll get up now. It's okay. You're not going to have to do any of that. You can just go, I'm going to bow, and then I'm going to say, well, I probably should look around just for a quick second and just peek without doing the wrong thing.
There's Kim over there. There's my mom and my kids. That'll be great. But I'm going to want to know, and by the way, it won't have to be an education. It'll just, I'll be, I'll know, I'm sure you'll know.
But how did God take all those things in my life that I thought were a complete disaster and how did he make them for good? How did he plan that? I got laid off, get your back hurt, you have a miscarriage, you have these things go on, so-and-so loved one dies of cancer, there's this tragedy, and you go, you did it all so you would receive the glory and the honor, and you were right.
God, you're right. It all worked for good, and you're great. You're wonderful. Let's pray. Thank you, Father, for today. I, too, with Eric, thank you that we have the snow covering all the garbage and dirt.
What a great picture. Christ has done everything for us. We have his perfect righteousness like a wedding dress cloaked over us, and when you see that, you don't see any of our sins. Help us to be thankful, people.
Help us to be joyful. Help us to give praise to you, driven by the Spirit of God, for all your great promises in spite of our lives, in spite of the news, in spite of trouble, in spite of the trouble that will surely come.
In Jesus' name we pray. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life-transforming power of God's Word through verse-by-verse exposition of the sacred text.
Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on Route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.
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