The Christian’s True Identity

Grace Fellowship Church

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This sermon is from Grace Fellowship Church in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. To access other sermons or to learn more about us, please visit our website at graceedmonton .ca.

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All right, if you haven't already, please turn with me in your Bibles to 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 1.

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Probably already there because Jason read it. But as you know by now, we're commencing our study in the book of 1

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Corinthians. And when we consulted with this church plant core group, you guys, a few months ago, this was one of the books that emerged as one of the clear favorites.

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And so after we had made the formal decision to study this book, I thought it was quite interesting, exciting even.

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In a completely different context, I heard from a brother who I count as being far more wise than me.

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He said, the book of 1 Corinthians is the perfect book for a new church to study.

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And so I thought, praise the Lord, what confirmation, what encouragement. And if you know anything about the book of 1

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Corinthians, it's easy to see why this is the perfect book for a new church.

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This book, I hope to share my contagious, I hope it to be in contagious enthusiasm about this book.

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This book was written to a new church. It was written to a church plant of Paul's.

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It was written to a struggling church, a church that was straining, as it were, to live faithfully as they were challenged with separating themselves from their surrounding culture, a strong culture, a pervasive culture that we're going to talk about a little later.

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And this book, 1 Corinthians, is a practical book. It's down to earth, and it gives us practical details that are relevant, that are helpful, that are essential to the health and the vitality of the local church.

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So it covers issues like unity and division. You can see how that would be important for a new church.

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It covers ethical matters, Christian ethics, like sexual morality and immorality, lawsuits, marriage, singleness, idolatry.

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This book deals with orderly worship, something that's at the forefront of our minds as we begin worshipping as a corporate body.

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It deals with the practice of spiritual gifts, the necessity of Christian love, which we spoke about a few weeks ago, and a host of other things.

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It deals with theological concepts as well. And so we're going to learn about the gospel, about the nature of the church, and about the resurrection and other eschatological matters.

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So I can say with honesty that I've been steeping myself in this book of 1 Corinthians over the last month, and I can say with all honesty that I'm so glad that we're starting with 1

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Corinthians. I really am, and I trust that this is exactly what the

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Lord has for us at this time in our life as a new local church.

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So this afternoon, as Jason already has told us, has shared with us, we're going to hone in on the first nine verses of 1

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Corinthians chapter 1. And if you glance there, even for a moment, as you have your Bibles open, you'll see that we're going to look at two particular sections.

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We're going to look at Paul's greeting, if you have headings in your Bible. If it's the ESV, it says greeting, and then the second heading is thanksgiving.

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And those are the two sections that we're going to look at today. And some people might look at this, and immediately it comes to their mind, they think, why are we focusing just on this introductory section?

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You know, what can we really glean from this? This is almost like getting a letter in the mail and examining the address envelope on the envelope, rather than opening the letter.

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But I really do want to assure you at the onset, assure all of us at the onset, that this brief introduction is absolutely important, absolutely important to us here and now, and it's indispensable to us understanding the main thrust of this whole book of 1

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Corinthians. So in this brief introduction, this is kind of the big thought, if you want a summary thought of this particular passage, that in this brief introduction, the

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Apostle Paul is going to introduce us to himself, he's going to introduce us to the

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Corinthian church, and then he's going to introduce us to the central themes of the letter.

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And in doing so, as he does that, he's going to reveal the true calling, or what some people might want to say, the true identity of every

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Christian, whether that be in Corinth in the first century, or in Edmonton, here and now, or beyond.

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And so in this section, Paul is almost going to lay out, and I hope to show this to you, a table of contents for the entire letter.

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If you want to go back in ten years and ask yourself, what was 1 Corinthians about again?

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You can go to this section, and if you look carefully, you can see many of the main themes of this book emerge just in these first nine verses.

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And then he is going to remind the Corinthians, he's going to remind us of who we really are in Christ, of what our true spiritual identity is, and that is that we are men and women, us in this room, who have been called to be saints, and that in Christ, that is exactly who we are, and that's exactly who we must be, saints of God.

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So we're going to look, for the sake of simplicity, I've broken it up into three different areas. We're going to look at the

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Apostle Paul, God's messenger. These are the three big points. We're going to look at God's church in Corinth, and then we're going to look at God's saints.

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So God's messenger, God's church in Corinth, and God's saints. So let's look at chapter 1 and verse 1, and we'll read this together.

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It says, So here we find

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God's messenger. Paul opens the letter with a traditional introduction that you'd expect to find in almost any letter written in the

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Greco -Roman world. So an introduction in the Greco -Roman world would usually be threefold. It would consist of, first, the name of the writer.

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We see that in verse 1, the first word, Paul. It would include the addressee or the recipient of the letter, and then it's going to include some form of greeting and thanksgiving.

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And so in the Greco -Roman world, that was usually a prayer that was offered up to some Roman or Greek deity.

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And so Paul is going to follow that same path or pattern, if you want to say, if you're interested in literature.

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That's where he's going. And so Paul begins this letter by introducing himself. And maybe kids,

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I'm going to pick on you guys for a little bit. Both kids and adults should be thoroughly interested in memorizing the

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Bible. But if you want to memorize the first word in every letter that has ever been written by Paul, you only have to memorize one word or one name.

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Can you guys think of what that might be? Not quite. It's Paul.

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If you want to memorize the first word in every letter that Paul has ever written, all the canon of Scripture, you just memorize

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Paul. And what I challenge you guys to do is this week, go home, open your Bibles, and look.

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And if there's a book that doesn't start with Paul that was written by him, you let me know, okay? So Paul introduces us to himself.

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And this is probably, it might be as good a time as any, to ask ourselves, who is this man named the

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Apostle Paul? Who is Paul? Many of us know, but some of us don't. From the

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Apostle Paul's letters, if we look at the book of Acts and any number of his letters, we can learn a lot about Paul.

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For instance, we know that Paul was born in Tarsus. And biblical historian scholars figure that it was probably about 5

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AD. So about five years after Christ was born, give or take, Paul was born in Cilicia.

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So Tarsus was the capital city of the Roman province of Cilicia. And if you're looking for that on a map, just look for modern -day

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Turkey. It was in modern -day Turkey, just north of the Mediterranean Sea. And at birth,

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Paul was given the name Saul. And just like the king, the first king of Israel with the same name, he came from the tribe of Benjamin.

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And Paul grew up enjoying all the benefits of Roman citizenship from birth.

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So he was born a Roman citizen. We read about that in Acts 16 when they're in Philippi. And despite that, however, in his own words,

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Paul was a Hebrew of Hebrews. And so what he means when he says that he was a Hebrew of Hebrews means that he was educated at the feet of Gamaliel, who was one of the famous Jewish rabbis at the time.

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He was a zealous member of the strict Pharisee party. He was likely from a wealthy family, a family of prominent social status, where he was afforded the best possible education.

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So Paul had a lot of good things happening for him. But as we know, Paul was not always a

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Christian. In fact, the very first time that we lay eyes on him, we find him in Acts 7 violently opposing

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Christ's followers. So let's turn there to Acts 7 for a second. We're going to introduce ourselves here.

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So in Acts 7, in verse 58, it says this about the apostle

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Paul. This is the first time we hear about him. In verse 58, it says this,

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They cast him, that's Stephen, the first martyr of the church, out of the city and stoned him.

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And the witnesses laid down their garments at the feet of a young man named Saul. And as they were stoning

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Stephen, he called out, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. We read about Paul a little bit more in the next chapter, in chapter 8 and verse 1.

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It says this, And Saul, that's Paul, approved of his execution. And there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem.

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And they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria. So Paul was so zealous, so murderous in his persecution of the church that he went to the

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Sanhedrin and he got special approval from the chief priests, not only to persecute the church in Jerusalem, but to follow the

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Christians out of Jerusalem and to persecute even in Damascus. But we know, and we praise

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God for this, that what Paul and the Sanhedrin meant for evil, God planned for good.

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And so in Acts chapter 9, we're not going to read it, but we find Paul and the story of his miraculous conversion.

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Paul was going from Jerusalem to Damascus. That's about 240 kilometers. If you're traveling on foot like Paul, it's about a two -week journey.

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And at some point on this two -week journey to Damascus, the Lord Jesus gloriously, unmistakably, appears to Paul, and he's struck blind.

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And we know how this works. He was struck blind. Ananias came to Damascus.

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He regained his sight. And Acts tells us there that not only did

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Paul regain his sight, but there was a miraculous transformation in his heart.

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God not only removed the scales from his eyes, but he softened Paul's heart to receive

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Christ. And Acts chapter 9 and verse 20 reads this. Read these words with me,

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Acts 9 and verse 20. It says, immediately he, that's Paul, proclaimed

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Jesus in the synagogue, saying, He is the Son of God. So you had this apostle

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Paul, Saul, who was going to kill Christians. And within a couple days, he's now preaching

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Christ in the synagogue, saying, He is the Son of God. And listen to the verbiage here.

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He stupefied the Jews by proving that Jesus was the

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Christ. From there, Galatians 1 tells us that Paul spent about three years in Damascus with a little journey or a visit at some point across the

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Jordan River to Arabia. And during that time in Paul's ministry, he was so bold and he was so effective in his witness of Christ that the

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Jews began a plot, hatching a plot to kill him. So he had to escape. He was lowered from a basket through a crack in the walls of Damascus.

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And from there, we're told that he spent time in Jerusalem and then in his hometown of Tarsus, and then eventually in Antioch, where he ministered there.

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And he was sent out to preach the gospel to the Gentiles, including those who are at Corinth.

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And so over the course of Paul's missionary journeys, his three missionary journeys that are recounted in the book of Acts, and then his journey to a

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Roman jail cell, Paul traveled, scholars figure, about 16 ,000 kilometers.

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To put that into perspective, without modern transportation, Noah, without planes or trains or cars, he traveled from Victoria, BC, all the way to St.

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John's, Newfoundland, and then all the way back, just in the accounts that we read about in the book of Acts.

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So Paul went a long way, and he was moved by one great cause.

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And we're going to read about that in this letter in the coming weeks, and that was that he might preach Christ, that he might preach

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Christ and him crucified. So this is the Apostle Paul that is writing this letter, and he says, if we look back into our passage in 1

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Corinthians, he says, Paul called by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus.

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Paul did not volunteer for this office. He was not convinced of the truth of the gospel as he was on his way to Damascus by an evangelist on the road.

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No, it was Christ who appeared to him and brought about his conversion.

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He was, when Paul says that he is called by the will of God, Paul was effectually called.

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And what that means is that not only did God, not only did Christ extend the invitation, but he effected the response.

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It was an effectual calling. And this is a theme that we're going to find over and over and over again.

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Like I said, it reads like a table of contents. If you look in our passage, we're going to find some iteration of call at least three times, perhaps four, and if you include the word church, five times, because we know that the church are those who are called out ones, the called out assembly of God.

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And so Paul was called to this ministry. And I praise

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God that Paul was actually predestined. Paul was predestined for this office of apostle.

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It's by God's sovereign grace that Paul was saved. It's by God's sovereign grace that Paul was sent out and that he wrote this letter and many of the other ones that comprise much of the

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New Testament. Now someone might say if you're a little bit reluctant to accept words like predestined.

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Shane, isn't that a bit of a stretch to say that Paul was predestined to this? But if we look in passages like Galatians chapter one, in verse 13,

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Paul talks about his life and he talks about what God did in spite of that life.

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He said, For you have heard of my former life in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it.

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And I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own among my people. So extremely zealous was

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I for the traditions of my fathers. But, verse 15, but when he, that's

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God, when he who had set me apart before I was born and who had called me by his grace was pleased to reveal his son to me.

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I was on the road to Damascus that God revealed his son to Paul. I'm going to insert this word.

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He did this in order that I might preach him among the

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Gentiles. So God was called to be an apostle. That word apostle comes from the

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Greek word apostolos, which means messenger, a sent one.

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And it comes with apostolic authority. I can't get into, we're going to study apostles in the coming weeks and months, so I'm not going to get into all of it, but it is a special, it's a limited time office that God called the apostle

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Paul to. And why does Paul tell us all this? Why do you think

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Paul begins his letter with this? Could Paul not have just started the letter by saying,

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Paul and Sosthenes? Why does he say, Paul called by the will of God to be an apostle?

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Is he trying to pump his own tires? Is he trying to flex his biblical authority before the

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Corinthians? As we become more acquainted with this book, as we work our way through it, we're going to find that Paul does not make reference to this for his own glory, but to establish his biblical authority before the

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Corinthian church. He's going to address tough topics in this letter.

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He's going to address issues where people are actually beginning to question his leadership, his apostleship.

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He's going to confront critics to his ministry, something that's going to emerge many times.

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People that are questioning Paul's, both his apostleship and his ministerial credentials.

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And what Paul wants his readers to know is that he is not coming with his own opinions. He's not coming as some

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Greek philosopher, as an orator with philosophical rhetoric, which was apparently a big deal to the

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Corinthians. No. The apostle Paul is writing a letter that ought to be received for what it is.

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It is the authoritative word of God. It's the authoritative word of God.

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Paul is a messenger, and this letter of 1 Corinthians that he has written is none other than a message from God himself.

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And then the Corinthians are to understand this. And if I can just translate us into this story, we are to understand this.

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That as we study this Bible over the next few weeks, over the next several months, that we are not interacting with human philosophy, human wisdom.

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We are actually interacting with the authoritative, the sufficient, the inerrant word of God when we read 1

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Corinthians. And then Paul mentions here and our brother,

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Sosthenes. I find Sosthenes a really interesting character. We won't get to talk about him at length, but Sosthenes was likely the leader of the synagogue in Corinth.

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If you remember the story, in Corinth there was a big upheaval and they went before the proconsul and then someone ended up getting beat up at the end of that account.

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That was Sosthenes. And this is likely the Sosthenes from that account. We'll look at that a little bit later, but Sosthenes is a

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Corinthian. He would be familiar with the church. The church would be familiar with him. And he's likely acting as an amanuensis.

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An amanuensis is a secretary or a scribe. And so Paul would dictate this letter and Sosthenes would write it down as he dictates it.

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So this is God's messenger. This is the first section that we said we're going to look at. Next we're going to look at the church of God that is in Corinth.

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So Paul writes in verse 2, to the church of God that is in Corinth to those sanctified in Christ Jesus.

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So a little bit of a backstory. In A .D. 51, scholars think that Paul likely was born in 5

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A .D. that he was converted sometime around 34 A .D. and then 51

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A .D. as he's traveling on his second missionary journey. They make contact, first contact, with this pagan city that is in Corinth.

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And up to this point, this particular missionary trip has not been without its challenges. You'll remember a few weeks ago when we studied

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Philippians, or sorry, Acts chapter 16 and the establishment of the church in Philippi.

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It was on this missionary journey that Paul and Silas were beaten and arrested and imprisoned in Philippi.

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It was on this particular missionary journey that they were attacked by a mob in Thessalonica.

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And then when they went to Berea and they found these earnest, eager people in the

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Bereans who would go and check the scriptures. That same mob from Thessalonica chased them out.

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They were separated. Paul ended up stranded in Athens for a period of time. And after that ministry in Athens, when some came to faith and others mocked him in the

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Areopagus, he proceeded to Corinth. And so we're gonna look there together in Acts chapter 18 at this first contact with the

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Corinthian church. Acts chapter 18 and verse one.

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So it picks up right where Paul leaves Athens. It says, After this, Paul left Athens and went to Corinth.

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And he found a Jew named Aquila, a native of Pontus, recently come from Italy with his wife

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Priscilla because Claudius had commanded all the Jews to leave Rome. And he went to see them.

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And because he was one of the same trade, he stayed with them and worked for they were tent makers by trade.

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And he reasoned in the synagogue. This is what Paul did when he would go to a new city. He reasoned the synagogue every

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Sabbath and tried to persuade the Jews and Greeks. When Silas and Timothy arrived from Macedonia, Paul was occupied with the word testifying to the

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Jews that the Christ was Jesus. And when they opposed and reviled him, he shook out his garments and said to them, your blood be on your own heads.

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I am innocent from now on, I will go to the Gentiles. And he left there and went to the house of a man named

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Titius Justice, a worshiper of God. His house was next door to the synagogue.

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That's the synagogue in Corinth. And Crispus, the ruler of the synagogue, believed in the

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Lord together with his entire household. So what an amazing experience. They go into this place of Corinth.

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They encounter resistance at the same time. The leader of the synagogue is converted to Christ.

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I find that encouraging. It says, and many of the Corinthians, halfway through verse eight, hearing

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Paul believed and were baptized. And the Lord said to Paul one night in a vision, do not be afraid, but go on speaking and do not be silent for I am with you and no one will attack you to harm you for I have many in this city who are my people, many who will be called.

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And he stayed a year and six months. So that's how long he was after that in Corinth, a year and six months, teaching the word of God.

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I find it so interesting. So Paul goes to Corinth. He has what I would consider good success in Corinth.

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Crispus, the ruler of the synagogue, believes in the Lord. And then if we see Galileo there, the proconsul of Achaia, and then in verse 17, we see

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Sosthenes. So they replaced Crispus with Sosthenes.

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Then they all seized Sosthenes, the ruler of the synagogue, the new ruler, and beat him in front of the tribunal.

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And now in the first chapter of Corinth, we find him acting as the amanuensis for Paul.

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So neat backstory. I wish we could go into more, but here we find the church of God that is in Corinth.

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Paul is now writing this letter. So this is about three years or four years after Paul's initial ministry in Corinth.

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Corinth was the capital of the Roman province of Achaia. That's in modern day

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Greece. We'll talk a little bit about where that is. And it was strategically located on an isthmus.

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That's a narrow land bridge that joined mainland

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Greece with the Peloponnese. That is the southern tip, the peninsula.

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That is the southern tip of Greece. And so when Paul writes this letter to the

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Corinthians, if you want to know where that is, according to the timeline in Acts, Paul visits

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Corinth in chapter 18. He returns to Antioch, beginning in verse 18.

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And then while Paul is in Ephesus, you see there in Acts chapter 19, about three years, four years later, while Paul is in Ephesus, we see that later in 1

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Corinthians 16, this is when Paul is writing that letter to the Corinthian church. So in Acts chapter 19.

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Now I really want to share, I find this really interesting, so I hope you do too.

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But I want to share about the city that was Corinth.

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So like I said, it was located on a narrow land bridge on the sea. And because of that, it became an important port city.

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It was, in fact, for hundreds of years, if you can picture Greece, there's mainland

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Greece, an isthmus, a little narrow land bridge, and then the Peloponnese, which is a larger peninsula.

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And for hundreds of years, this isthmus that was about four miles wide, ships would come from the

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Saronic Gulf. They would sail from the Saronic Gulf to Corinth. My kids, we learned about this in geography this year.

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They would load the ships onto rollers or skids, and then they would push these giant boats, the four miles across the isthmus, and then dunk them back in the

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Gulf of Corinth, and they would continue sailing. It was said about the waters in the Mediterranean Sea around the

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Peloponnese that a sailor should always write their will before sailing around the

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Peloponnese. And so it was much more convenient, much easier, much less costly to take your boat, put it on the skids, take it across the isthmus at Corinth, and then back in the water.

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So the city of Corinth became a very prosperous, a very wealthy port town.

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I've got to find myself here. And actually, if you go there today, you'll find still a canal that runs through that isthmus.

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But it became a prosperous trade city. It was home to wealthy aristocrats, to Greek philosophers, to sailors, of course, and then slaves.

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And it drew large crowds as both an economic and a cultural hub.

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And it was even home to the Isthmian Games. Paul's going to talk later about training like an athlete.

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And he's likely referencing this to the Corinthians because here in Corinth were the Isthmian Games. There were two popular sporting events in that time.

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One was the Isthmian Games. The other was the Olympic Games. And so big events that drew big crowds.

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And like most ancient cities in Greece, it had an acropolis. An acropolis literally means a high city.

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And so that was a city that was placed 2 ,000 feet above Corinth in the mountains.

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And it was used for military defense. On a clear day, they could stand on the acropolis and see

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Athens 70 kilometers away. And also on this acropolis, it was used for worship.

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And if you visit the acropolis today, if you noticed actually that image that I shared last night and that I've shared on social media, there are pillars in the background.

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Those pillars belonged to the temple of Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love.

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And so on that acropolis was this temple to Aphrodite. And every evening, they've said over 1 ,000 priestesses, which really were temple prostitutes, would come down from the acropolis into the city of Corinth and offer their religious goods and services in the city.

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That's a nice way of putting it, both to the citizens and the sailors. And so the land of Corinth, the city of Corinth, became synonymous with debauchery.

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Even by pagan standards, it was a morally corrupt place. In fact,

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Corinth inspired a new verb in the Greek language. And that was the word

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Corinthiazo. It meant to Corinthianize. And to Corinthianize someone was to convert them to gross sexual immorality and debauchery.

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So they got their own verb. They could Corinthianize people who had been there long enough.

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And so not only did the people get into Corinth when they came to visit as sailors or citizens, but if they were long enough,

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Corinth got into them. It was a mutual exchange. And we're going to see this again and again as Paul addresses the

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Corinthian in the Corinthians. I read in one commentary that Corinth was to the

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Greco -Roman world what Las Vegas or Los Angeles or New York is to the

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North American context. Corinth was the sin city of Paul's day. And this is where we find the church of God that is in Corinth.

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So when Paul writes to these new believers, I don't know about you, but if you had a new believer, would you recommend that they move to Corinth?

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But this is where Paul is writing to these new believers in the city that is

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Corinth. So we've looked at God's messenger in verse 1, God's church in Corinth in verse 2, and now we're going to spend the rest of our time looking at God's saints.

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If I can word it this way, the true identity of every Christian. That is what we're going to see in this third section, the true identity of every

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Christian. So Paul has already identified himself. He's already identified the recipients of the letter, and now he's going to describe, and he's going to give thanks for the saints that are at Corinth.

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And I really want us to take note of this. Have you ever read the book of 1 Corinthians? And in chapter 3, looked and thought to yourself, hmm, that's interesting.

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God calls them saints. I really want us to take note of this.

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These Corinthians, Paul is going to argue, have been made holy.

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They have been made holy. Let's stop here for a second. If you know anything about this book, you know that we immediately run into problems that the

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Corinthians are called saints, that they are called holy.

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As we look through the book, we're going to find that every attribute that Paul ascribes to the

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Corinthian church in this passage, every attribute that he ascribes is almost the exact opposite of how they are behaving.

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The exact opposite. As we get to know the Corinthian church better in the weeks to come, we're going to find that the church in Corinth is still

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Corinthianized. They are not living like saints. They're not living like those who have been made holy in Christ.

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In fact, there are factions and infighting among them. The opposite of, as Paul uses here, the word called together.

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They've made a big deal of speech. We're going to hear about this, about wisdom and about knowledge.

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Paul says that they've been enriched in every way, and yet they're completely bankrupt and their ideas are completely backwards as it pertains to this knowledge and the speech and these gifts.

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And they hardly look, if we look at verses 8 and 9, who will sustain you to the end guiltless in the day of our

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Lord Jesus Christ. They hardly look like guiltless people that are going to persevere as they await the coming resurrection.

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That issue that Paul's going to address in 1 Corinthians 15. But what I want us to see here in this passage, so we've looked at Paul, we've looked at the church, and now what

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I want us to see is that Paul is laying out in this particular section the themes of the letter.

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He is laying out a table of contents, if it were, of what he is going to discuss, and he's reminding the

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Corinthians not only that he is an apostle, but he's reminding them of who they are, who they are as Christians.

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Paul thanks God for all that he has given them, for all that he has made them, despite the fact that their behavior is falling pitifully short of their identity.

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Paul says to the Corinthian church, you have been made holy. He says, you are saints.

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God has graciously given you everything that you need for life and godliness.

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That is what Paul is doing here. In the coming chapters, we can see it even in verse 10, what

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Steve's going to preach on next week. What does he start with? He says, I appeal to you. So in light of all that you are, he's exclaiming, now live like it.

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Live like it. Be who you are. As we see, the realities that Paul ascribes to the

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Corinthians are not only true of them. What Paul writes in these first verses of Corinthians is not only true of them, but brothers and sisters, it's true of us.

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And so for the last few minutes that we're here together, I want us to consider this.

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What does 1 Corinthians 1 -9 say about you as a

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Christian? We've heard about Paul. We've heard about the Corinthians. Now let's hear about you.

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What does God say about you? So in verse 2,

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Paul says to the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints.

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Paul tells the Corinthians and he tells us that we have been sanctified.

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Jason, you have been sanctified in Christ Jesus. Past tense.

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Now what does that mean? What is Paul getting at when he says that?

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Paul uses the Greek term when he says that you have been sanctified.

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He uses the Greek word hegiadzo. That word hegiadzo comes from the

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Greek word hegios, which means holy. And so to be hegiadzo, to be sanctified, is to be separate.

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It is to be purified. It is to be cleansed. And what

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Paul is talking about here is not transformed behavior, obviously. The Corinthians, there is no evidence of a significant transformed behavior in their record, in their life, at least what we can read from this book.

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But rather, what he is talking about, he's making an objective and a theological assertion.

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He's saying that everyone who God has effectually called, like the

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Apostle Paul himself, everyone who has been called, he has also consecrated to his service.

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He has set you apart to be holy. We find this same word, hegiadzo.

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You'll hear us from time to time talk about the Septuagint. The Septuagint is the

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Greek translation of the Old Testament. And the hegiadzo, this word hegiadzo is used in the book of Leviticus, and it's used to describe the process by which the utensils, think about the trays and the pans and the furnishings, the tables and the altars, and the tabernacle itself, they were hegiadzoed, they were consecrated, they were sanctified for service unto

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God. Now does that mean, like the Corinthians, that those tools were never misused?

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I think we were just talking about some of that Old Testament history a little bit earlier.

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We know without a doubt, as soon as this tabernacle was consecrated, what did

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Aaron's sons do? They burnt strange fire on the altar, right? So it doesn't mean that these things were never misused or used for an unholy purpose, because we know they were, but these items were set aside from the beginning for God's good purposes.

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They were not to be used for any purpose outside of God's design for them. And so the

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Corinthian church, even though they were used at times for unholy purposes, outside of the design of God, as we're going to read in the weeks to come, and for all of us, brothers and sisters, what

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Christ has done for us, what has been done for us in Christ, is that when we place our faith in Jesus, and when we are justified, when he justifies us, not only does he make us a new creature in him, but he sets us apart, he makes us holy, he consecrates us for service unto

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God Most High. And Paul says it all here in one expression.

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He says that the Corinthians have been called to be saints. This does not mean that they have been called to be some super -Christian.

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The world has a lot of funny ideas about what it means to be a saint. It doesn't mean that they have been recognized by church councils and are to be venerated and prayed to.

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What it means is that God has given the Corinthians, and if you're in Christ, beloved,

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God has given you a new identity in him.

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You are no longer Corinthians, but you are Haggai. You are not Corinthians anymore, but you have been made holy.

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God has delivered us, it says in Colossians, he delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved

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Son. Our identity is now aligned with God and his identity and his values.

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And so the apostle Peter writes about this in 1 Peter 1. He says in verse 14, as obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance.

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What you used to be, what you used to do. Said, but in verse 15, but there's a but again, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct and your behavior.

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Since it is written, you shall be holy for I am holy. So Paul's words to the

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Corinthian church and his words to this church, Grace Fellowship Church in Edmonton, his words are these.

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This is who you are. You've been set apart. You've been made holy. You've been consecrated unto

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God for service to him. In a word, you are a saint, a holy one.

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And so live like it. Work this reality out in your own life. And as we work this reality out in our own life, as we seek to be who we are as saints in Christ, we will be blessed.

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The church will be strengthened and God will be glorified. So that is who we are in Christ.

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We are saints. Now, I always love a good illustration from church history. And it's funny where you find some of these characters.

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You can read something and in this case, I found Robert Mary McShane in the most unexpected place.

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He's always popping up. But in 1840, a man by the name of Dan Edwards, he was a man who was commissioned to be a missionary to the

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Jews in Germany. This is 1840, about 100 years before World War II.

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He's going to reach the Jews in Germany. And after his ordination, he received a letter of exhortation from the

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Scottish pastor, Robert Murray McShane. And what did he write? I think

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McShane's words to Mr. Edwards are fitting for us. He said, I trust you will have a pleasant and profitable time in Germany.

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I know you will apply hard to German. That's referring to the German language. And he says, but do not forget the culture of the inner man.

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I mean the heart. And listen to this word picture. He says, how diligently the cavalry officer keeps his saber clean and sharp.

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Every stain he rubs off with the greatest care. And we hear this language of consecration.

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He says, remember, you are God's sword. You are his instrument.

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I trust a chosen vessel unto him to bear his name in great measure according to the purity and perfections of the instrument will be the success.

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So according to the purity and the perfections of us as instruments, will be the success.

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He says, it is not great talents that God blesses so much as great likeness to Jesus, a holy minister.

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And I'm going to broaden that. A holy man or a holy woman is an awful weapon in the hand of God.

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Are you an awful weapon in the hand of God? Does that describe you brother and sister?

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Are you holy? Are you being who you are in Christ, what

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Christ died to make you be? Let us seek to serve our

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God in holiness to be consecrated unto him.

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Paul says in the second part of that second verse, he says, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our

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Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours. So we see that we have been made saints and as part of that, we have been made saints together.

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And what this means is that every Christian is to be, is called to be united together with God's holy people.

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He says, called to be saints, plural, together.

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I'm not going to steal Steve's thunder because he's preaching on this next week. But suffice to say, in this

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Corinthian church, there were factions. He's reminding them of what they should be.

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The Corinthian culture had tainted the believers' thinking and they began to divide themselves and align themselves with various teachers like schools of people would follow great

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Greek philosophers, orators, those that are engaging in Greek philosophical rhetoric.

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They were aligning themselves here and so they say, I'm of Paul and I'm of Apollos and I'm of Peter and I'm of Christ.

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And what does Paul say here? You have been called to belong to one church. Like we see at the beginning of verse 2, to the church, singular, of God that is in Corinth.

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They are called to be the one church of God who with all those who in every place call upon the name of our

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Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord, he's their Lord too, and ours. Their Lord and ours.

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We're called to live together in unity as a new church.

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We need to work towards that. Not going to say anything else otherwise you're going to step on Steve's toes.

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And then in verse 3, he says, Grace to you and peace from God our

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Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Can you read this, this sentence with your jaw off the floor?

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Grace to you and peace from God our

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Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I think we overlook verses like this all of the time and we fail to realize what is actually being said here.

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So this is, Paul is using an ordinary greeting that the Greeks would have been very familiar with.

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The Greeks would have greeted each other in letters with the word Cairo, simply meaning greeting.

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But Paul does a little change he Christianizes this greeting instead of saying Cairo he says

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Kairos. Kairos means grace. So instead of just saying greetings he says grace to you.

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And then he, acknowledging the Greeks, then he acknowledges the Jews. Do you know how the

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Jews would greet each other in that time? They'd say a word Shalom, peace. And he uses the word

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Irenae. So he says, grace and peace. Greeting two groups now one in Christ.

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And he says this as a Christianized expression to remind the

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Corinthians and to remind us that we are recipients of the grace and the peace of God.

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If I think about what should be read there I believe that verse three should read something like this.

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You should say Paul called by the will to be an apostle to the church of God that is in Corinth and then in verse three it should read something like this.

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Wrath to you and torment from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

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But it doesn't. It doesn't read that. It reads grace and peace. And why is that? It's because the men and women in Corinth who have placed their faith in Christ they're

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Christians now they've placed their faith in Christ I've got to find myself there we go and they've been justified.

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They've been counted righteous. They have peace with God as it says in Romans 5 peace with God through the

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Lord Jesus Christ. Let me ask you I said can we read this without our jaws being on the floor?

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Do you believe it? Can you believe that this is really true? That if you are in this room right now or if you're behind that camera right now and you are a

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Christian at this very moment and for all of eternity

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God has nothing for you but grace and peace.

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I sometimes question how we can discuss this how we can read this with dry eyes that despite your weakness despite your guilty conscience and mine despite your failures despite every sinful act or omission in all of your life despite all that you are not there is no condemnation for you and you and you and you there's no condemnation for you in Christ Jesus our

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Lord only grace and peace. There's a song that goes like this grace and peace oh how can it be how can it be for law breakers and thieves for the worthless for the least but this is how the

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Lord God sees the Christian and this reality should blow our minds should blow our minds as Christians I heard one brother say it should be like a he was preaching in rural

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Missouri he said it should be like an overpowered farm tractor

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I don't quite know what that means except that I think it blows up but this should blow our minds and should make every person that isn't a

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Christian if there's anyone in this room that isn't a Christian if there's anyone behind that camera that isn't a

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Christian it should make you want to run with all of your might to Jesus Christ to come to him for grace and for peace to exchange all that you aren't for all that he is all of your sin for all of his righteousness like the

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Christians there's still too much of the world in us we know that there's too much of the world in us and there's still too much of the old man hanging around our sanctification is not yet complete we're reminded of our own sinfulness every single day and yet the author of Hebrews probably not

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Paul because it doesn't start with the word Paul but the author of Hebrews says in Hebrews 10 14 he says by a single offering by a single think about this by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified he has perfected you in Christ you are forgiven in Christ he took all of that wrath and all of that torment and there is nothing left for you but his grace and his peace and his love and his reconciliation and Paul says here in verse 9 the fellowship of his son

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Jesus Christ our Lord that's all that's left for you this afternoon we sang it is well with my soul you'll remember we sang that I said pay attention to it have you guys ever heard the story behind that hymn the story behind that hymn the hymn writer

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Horatio Spafford he was a successful lawyer he was a businessman in Chicago he was blessed with a lovely family a wife named

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Anna and he had five children four girls and a little boy the family was no stranger to tragedy their young son died of pneumonia in 1871 and then in that same year the great

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Chicago fire burnt down their business a couple years later

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Noah if you can imagine this in November 1873 so about two years later

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Horatio Spafford loaded his wife and his four children on a ship an ocean liner that was to cross from the

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US to Europe he was going to come a few days after them and four days into the journey the boat collided with another ship and so Anna grabbed her four children her four remaining daughters and they got on the deck of the ship and they prayed and they prayed that either

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God would spare them if that was his will or that he would make them willing and able to endure whatever awaited them and within twelve minutes the ship was gone it was just water and only

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Anna only Horatio Spafford's wife survived and so when Horatio Spafford heard about this he immediately he got on the next ship this devastating news he got on the next available ship and about four days into the trip the captain actually called

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Spafford and said right here about right here is the place where your children drowned and he was on that boat on this voyage across the

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Atlantic that Horatio Spafford wrote it is well with my soul in an instance like this what is the only thing what is the only reality that can bring us joy and hope and even happiness it is the grace and peace that we have in God through Christ Jesus that was paid in full by the blood of God's own dear son and probably one of the darkest times of Horatio Spafford's life he wrote these words

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I highlighted them as we were singing them my sin I feel like I would probably be writing a funeral dirge but he writes this he says my sin oh the bliss the joy the happiness the bliss of this glorious thought my sin not in part but the whole is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more praise the

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Lord praise the Lord oh my soul that is what we have in Christ grace and peace from God in verses 4 through 7

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Paul says I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus that in every way you were enriched in him in all speech we're going to hear a lot about that in all knowledge again we're going to hear about that and as the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you so that you are not lacking in any gift as you wait for the revealing of our

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Lord Jesus Christ Paul is going to talk about spiritual gifts in this book he's bringing this up at the forefront and Paul is reminding the

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Corinthians despite all that they aren't at this point that they have everything they need they've been given everything that they need for life and godliness

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Paul wrote to the Ephesians that they've been blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places and Paul says here that they have been enriched in him in all speech and in all knowledge they're not lacking any gift we're going to talk about this of course as we continue through the book so I'm not going to dwell on it but I found a good quote from John MacArthur on this particular topic he says you have everything you need there is no lack you are complete in him the

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Corinthians were complete in him you brothers and sisters are complete in him when a

01:00:15

Christian sins when a Christian falls into laziness when a Christian falls into ineffective service and when a

01:00:21

Christian falls into impurity it is not because he has a lack of anything it is because he is not appropriating what he already has they had all they needed but they weren't appropriating it he says you do not need anything

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God has stocked your shelf if there is a failure in your life it is not a divine problem but a human problem and then last of all verses 8 and 9 the revealing of our

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Lord Jesus Christ in verse 8 who will sustain you to the end guiltless in the day of our

01:01:01

Lord Jesus Christ God is faithful by whom you were called into the fellowship of his

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Son Jesus Christ our Lord so judging by these

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Christians you wouldn't think that any of them would persevere if you could look at the life of the

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Corinthians at least as we read it in this book of 1 Corinthians you would think that there is no hope the Corinthiazo the influence of Corinth is too strong and they are too weak and the same could be said for us we are no match for the world's influence the radio and the

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TV and the internet and the social media and the billboards and everybody else and everything else that we are confronted with in this life but notice here what

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Paul says he says the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ at the end of verse 7 and then in verse 8 who will sustain you to the end

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God is faithful he is going to if you are a Christian not only do you have grace and peace not only do you have justification peace with God, reconciliation but you also have preservation he is going to sustain you to the end and that word guiltless other translations use the word blameless he is going to keep you blameless to the end he was sustaining the

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Corinthians, he did sustain them, he will sustain us God is faithful, he will preserve us his gifts and his calling are irrevocable scriptures say once heard

01:02:50

John Piper say that if God did not preserve you moment by moment you would wake up tomorrow an unbeliever you would wake up tomorrow an apostate but praise

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God he is keeping us he is keeping us once heard a story about a dear

01:03:08

Christian woman who was a woman of steadfast faith and one day she became ill and her family called the doctor and as time went on her condition worsened and one day the doctors came to tend to her and with reluctance they said to her

01:03:26

I'm sorry ma 'am but it's very likely that you are going to die today how do you think she responded did she grieve, did she cry doctors were probably surprised she said to them that's the best news

01:03:43

I have heard all day how could she respond that way on her death bed it's because this woman understood the meaning of this verse it's because this woman understood the meaning of so many other verses in scripture like in 1

01:03:59

Peter 1 where it says blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ according to his great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to what, we've been born again to an inheritance that is imperishable undefiled, unfading kept in heaven for you who by, whose power by God's power who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time

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Jesus Christ if you are in him he will sustain you praise the

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Lord there is nothing that can separate you now from the love of God in Christ Jesus our

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Lord and all of this is from Christ it's all from Jesus through Jesus and to Jesus we won't look at every instance but you know that the name

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Jesus Christ in some form appears nine times in these nine verses so this letter is going to be about Paul and his apostleship it's going to be about the

01:05:16

Corinthians it's going to be about unity and division and holiness and gifts and knowledge and wisdom but most of all this book and what our lives should be about is

01:05:32

Jesus Christ he is our Lord he is our Savior he is the treasure in the field he is the pearl of great price he is our friend in every true

01:05:44

Christian when we finish this course by his power by his sustaining power we will get to spend all of eternity with him if that doesn't make you rejoice, what will?

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what will? and so this is our true identity in Christ, we've been consecrated to God as holy we are beloved of God the recipients of grace and peace he has equipped us to serve he is sustaining us to the end and so my words to you brothers and sisters, this is an introduction to the book but let us remember that you are called to be saints we together are called to be saints together and my challenge and I believe the