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Speaker 1Amen. We're gonna sing another one, I think. Renzi? You got it. Very good.
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Something beautiful. We'll probably sing through this one twice, and it has lots of rests.
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Speaker 2Something beautiful. Something good. You get it on the second time. All my confusion, he understood. All I had to offer him was brokenness and strife, but he made something beautiful of my life.
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Let's sing
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Speaker 1it again and rest this time.
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Speaker 2Something beautiful, something good. All my confusion, he understood all I had to offer him was brokenness and strife and he made something beautiful of my life.
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Speaker 1Amen. Y'all can be seated. I've got a few announcements this morning and I took the cheap way out of making the announcements. I borrowed these from last week. Oop, not that one.
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Annabelle Sage Davis was born. Actually, not this past Wednesday but the Wednesday before. So, Jeff and Katie, Katie's doing well. Jeff is doing well and Annabelle Sage is also. Now, she was born at just above three pounds but she is doing absolutely fantastic this week.
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She came in to visit but she hasn't been to church yet. They'll probably be in next week. Beautiful, beautiful little baby and beautiful little family and Jeff is just beaming. They always say the pregnant wife is glowing but boy, never seen anything like a father's pride in his face after this. He's he is really really happy about it.
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So, Monday nights at first B, 06:15PM. Neil Music and Message, that'll be here down the hall in the fellowship hall. That's great. Carl is the pastor for that service and Carl does a great job. He's preaching through Matthew.
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What's this week, Carl? The four types of soil. That ought to be good. He's been studying on this one and talking about it for we've been going back and forth talking about it for a couple of weeks. Last week, Mike Demetrius actually brought the message and we have a generation that's coming along that's getting their feet wet in the word and presenting it.
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So, that's really good on Monday nights. It's great. Meal, music, and message every 06:15 Monday night at 06:15 and soon, that will be coupled with Awana. If you have kids or if you have kids that have kids and want to come on Awana and Monday nights are good dovetail. This week, on Thursday and Saturday, August fourteenth and sixteenth, we have the first b team build for Habitat for Humanity.
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If you have experience in construction, great. If you don't have experience in construction, that's fine too. It's they know that people are volunteers, volunteering of your time and your efforts. So first b has a team build. It's on off of Nelson.
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It's called the Daisy Bush Project. It's actually near Renzi's house. It's next door, so we put him in charge. If you have any questions about it, you can either ask Renzi and he will direct you to your bulletin or you can just look at your bulletin. Skip the middleman.
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We have lots of information in the bulletin like this. Wednesday, this week, August 13, there's a men's barbecue at Mike Yockel Park. It says simply, bring something to grill. So there will be men standing around fire cooking meat at Mike Yockel Park on Wednesday. There will be horseshoes and probably other games I would imagine too.
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Definitely horseshoes and there is a trophy. So that's if you wanna talk to Matt, his name is in the bulletin, 699-0321. We also, I mentioned the Habitat team build. That gives another number. If you have specific questions, Veronica Mulhall is the person to talk to at Habitat and her number is in your bulletin.
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Bridges Ministry, which is Nancy Cummins and Brad Cummins have have taken on the Bridges Ministry and their goal is to bridge resources and needs and one of the things in their estimation of what's going on around here, they decided that young couples with kids need a night off and so they have volunteered and have asked volunteers to do a date night out for parents where they come bring the kids to the church here from six to nine on September 5. It's still a ways off but I want to let you know about it. That's contact Nancy and Brad if you need more information and I was going to welcome em into this service but this today, they made it to the first service. Richard and Mary Winn and Turner and Angela Winn have expressed an interest to be members of the church and so I'm letting you know that's what that's what's going on but they will be in a covenant ceremony probably later on this month But they're from Bondurant. So a lot of y'all are not gonna see them around the grocery store.
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You're not gonna see them every day. But would you I wish I had a picture to let you see. But they come to this service in the wintertime because they're coming up from Bondurant. They come to the first service in the summertime when they can. They you they go back and forth.
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Today, I'll be talking about unity in the body and I see this as one church. We have three separate services, but this is one church and they're kind of bridging all three of them. They've been to all three of them. So also, I'll mention this. There is a discovery class that meets the third Sunday of each month, and that's at 10:00 in my office in there.
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So if you want to be a member and you've just been wondering how that needs to go, that's a good place to discover that. It's a discovery class. Third Sunday of the month in my office at 10AM. That's between services. I don't know how many of y'all know Fernando Escobedo?
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Alright. He's been a long time resident here and he they're having an Elks Lodge is having a fundraiser for him, August 16. Doors open at 05:30, and there are more posters and things about that out in the foyer. And service opportunities. First b provides meals for the Good Samaritan mission.
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On the third Thursday of each month, that's first b's time. And Russ and Yvonne Woods have been doing it for years, but they have recently felt like it's time to move on. And we had a volunteer this morning, a family that would like to help out. But if you'd like to help out, please let us know. Thursday, the third Thursday of the month, first bees night, if you want to kind of oversee that.
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And you can do that by just overseeing it and getting people to help or you can do it yourself. And the other one is nursery workers for with a heart for children. It does not matter which service you belong to, but the nursery, typically, the the greatest need is in the first service. So if you wanted to come to this service, you could volunteer for nursery. All that's in your bulletin and that was the cheap way of getting around.
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I didn't have to make all the slides myself, but that was it. So if you would, stand with me and then greet one another and we'll come back together with a song. Judy and I'll bring you back together with another song with more rest.
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Speaker 2He's my savior he's my savior he's my savior he's my savior he is worthy he is worthy he is worthy he he is worthy he is worthy he is worthy he is worthy I will praise him I will praise I will praise him I will praise him I will will praise him him I will praise him I will praise him I will praise
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Speaker 1him Amen. You can be seated. I'm going to ask the frontline team if they come forward. Come before you now, lord, praying for your kingdom's advance. I got Emails this morning from buddies in Africa and in Central Asia about the persecuting the persecution that the church is undergoing there lord but it's extending beyond religious leaders to everyday Christians.
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Lord, would you just bless them with your peace and with your comfort? Would you give them the boldness to stand up and say, the truth to stand on a firm foundation of truth, lord, and be unafraid. I thank you for using this church lord to not just encourage but to support missionaries and churches and schools and institutions overseas lord through the obedience of your sheep. God, would you please lay on our heart exactly what you would have us give? It's a small portion of what you've given us, lord.
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Would you use it for your kingdom's advance even in these difficult times, lord, I should say, especially in these difficult times. Would you allow us to be a light to this community and to the other end of the world. In Jesus name, amen. Amen. We have had one week away from the Corinthian study that we were doing.
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Last week, we did just basically a praise service and it was fun and the first and in the second, just singing hymns and and taking note that God is the one who deserves the praise and the glory and just enjoying that and I really enjoyed the week off but as I went into this week, looking at this again, I had planned to do it the week before. The more I looked at, the more I thought, this passage is about the quashing of individual factions and keeping down factions and division in the church. That's what it's about. It's keeping down division. And the more I read and the more people I listened to, the more I saw that they were taking these verses and and claiming them for their side of an argument, which caused division and factions in the church.
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It it is who we are as mere men. It is who we are as ordinary people to have politics sneak in and feel like one is more important than the other or one view is better than the other. And we need to side ourselves with and swear allegiance to in some cases, a certain theory. Y'all see what I'm talking about just in a minute, but I wanna say from the outset, this whole passage and the reason I chose the whole chapter three is because I think it needs to be taken together. If we take any one of the individual parts, it'll be a topical sermon sermon about something else and probably I would be proof texting to prove my point.
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Okay? So we're going to take it just like it's written. The first 23 or the only 23 verses of chapter three. I really think three and four go together but it just gets cumbersome to try to preach for that long to get through all of it. So, we're going go through five different sections.
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Before I do that though, I have one announcement. Renzi and Diane have reminded me that next week, we are not having a combined service. It was in the bulletin for a couple of weeks. It did not have the time in there. We are not doing it.
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We changed the time to be September 7. So, if you're looking forward to a combined service, it is not next week. It's going to be September 7 and we will have dinner on the grounds, potluck, and all that but next week, time services are going to be 09:00 and 11:00 and Monday nights at 06:15 just like always. So, would y'all, you can turn in your Bibles or you can trust me on this one. So, you could turn your Bibles if you want to.
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See your version of it. If I know of a version that says something different, I'll try to bring that out but first Corinthians three one through 23 is the passage and we're going to start I'll just start and tell you, this is my road map. It's basically an outline of this chapter and it has five real things that Paul is dealing with and almost everybody cuts them up into the outline like this but like I said, in a topical sermon, if I go grab the first four verses, I'm trying to prove my point. If I go grab the the second four, I'm trying to prove my point about something else. I don't want it to be like that.
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I want you to get it in context. So, mere men, three one through four, God's servants is five through nine, builders for God, God's temple, and then a warning and conclusion. And we're going to move along at a rather good clip, I hope. First of all, mere men is what we start off with. But I, brethren, could not address you as spiritual men, but as men of the flesh, as babes in Christ.
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So Paul is talking about in chapter two and in chapter one, he had talked about the wisdom that is of this world really sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and that the wisdom of this world is mere foolishness, and the foolishness of the cross, and the foolishness of preaching the cross is what draws men to the message of the cross. And the message of the cross is this, if you are believing that Jesus did what he says he did, died for your sins, then you are being saved. You are one of the ones that is being saved. If you do not believe, do not put any trust, any faith in that, then you are one of those who is perishing. So, it's a active on your part.
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You are perishing or God is saving you depending on what you do with the message of the cross. Now, so far in all of first Corinthians chapter one and two, he has laid that out. Very clear. There are non Christians and there are Christians. Now, for this chapter, he is speaking to Christians and I can tell you a couple of different ways I can see that.
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But I, brothers and sisters he does not do that when he's talking to non believers. He does that when he's talking to believers. But I, brothers and sisters, brethren, I could not address you. Now this is a past tense thing. I could not address you as spiritual men but as men of the flesh, as babes in Christ.
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Now, Paul, when he went to Corinth, he was speaking to them from their paganism. He's speaking to them at a place where they did not know Jesus but he's saying, brothers now, when I came to you, I could not address you as spiritual men, but as men of the flesh, as babes in Christ, because I couldn't tell the difference. Does that make sense? Does it make sense or no? If it doesn't, I'll keep going.
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No. I fed you with milk and not solid food for you are not ready for it and even yet, you're not ready. What did he give him? He gave him the gospel. Does that sound milky?
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That's the statement of the ages. That's the thing that separates the sheep from the goats. That is the thing that separates. He gave them the straight up gospel of Jesus Christ. That's what he presented.
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He says, I fed you with milk and not solid food for you are not ready for it and even yet you're not ready for the solid food for you're still of the flesh. You're still acting out of fleshly concerns. Carnal is one of the ways that we would look at this. Carne, chili con carne, know what that is, chili with meat. Carnal, meat, flesh.
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You are still acting of the flesh. You're still acting from that same thing. And then he goes on to say why he says that, for indeed while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh? Are you not acting in a carnal way? Are you not acting, behaving like ordinary men?
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What is a constant throughout history? Politics. It's everywhere. Everywhere there are two people, there's politics. Are you not acting like ordinary men when there's jealousy and strife among you?
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James says that there's jealousy and strife among you because you have what you you want what you can't have. Power. While there's jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh carnal behaving like ordinary men? For when one says, belong to Paul or another, I belong to Apollos, campaigning, politicizing things. Are you not merely men?
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To behaving like ordinary men and merely men. He's saying, you're acting like you don't even know but he calls them brothers and he in is encouraging them to grow through this. Now, these four verses come up often whenever you come upon the lordship salvation debate. Have you all ever heard of that? The lordship salvation debate is this, basically, the lordship folks would say, it's cheap grace.
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Anything else is cheap grace. Jesus cannot be your savior unless he is your lord And the folks that that the lordship folks would call cheap grace people would say, oh, no. It's not cheap. It's absolutely free. It's not about how you live.
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It's about who you are and where you put your faith. That is a balance where one of those is way off on one extreme and one of those is way off on the other. Carnal Christian is a category. Paul gives us the category right here. He says, you are a Christian and you're acting carnal.
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You're acting out of your flesh, you're acting out of self, and you're acting just like ordinary men, not saved people, bound for glory, looking for an incorruptible hope. You're looking out for your own interest. That's it for that one. God's servants three five through nine. And I will go back and say, I'm not gonna solve this debate, the lordship salvation thing.
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Carnal Christian is a category that does exist, but according to Paul right here, it's not something that should be a stagnant, static category. He's calling them not to be in that category. He's calling them out of that into greater discipleship and understanding. He's not saying, yeah, you can be carnal. You can trust him for fire insurance but then just go on living the life.
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He's saying, come on, guys. You're better than that because Christ has made you better than that. He's given you access. You can do better. I belong to Paul.
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Another says, I belong to Apollos. Note the order right there. Are you not merely men? So, five through nine is about God's servants. He just introduced Apollos and Paul right there.
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Then he says, so what then is Apollos and what is Paul? He doesn't say who is Paul? He doesn't say who is Apollos. He says, what? What are we?
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What is Apollos? What is Paul? And then he answers it saying, servants. Servants through whom you believed as the Lord assigned to each. We cannot take any credit for this.
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We're not trying to take any credit for this. We're just servants of God and he put some of you in my path and put some of you in Apollos' path. We're not going to try to take credit for that. We're servants. Workers for God was the heading for this one.
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You see, the order was reversed. A minute ago, he said, who is Paul's who's Paul and then Apollos? He reverses them. He mentions this series four times. One time, it's four people.
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Paul, Apollos, Cephas, or Peter, and Christ, and then he leaves those two out and just representative, then he swaps them around. He doesn't even want to show favor by putting himself first each time. It's funny how many commentators noticed that and saw that. He's he is mixing it up intentionally or appears to be. I planted, that's a past tense.
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One time in the past, I planted, Apollos watered, that's a one time in the past. Apollos watered but God, the the sense of the term there is the imperfect past tense as God was the one who was continually giving the increase. Does that make sense? I plan and I did what he had for me to do. In the time that I was there, I did what he had before me.
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Apollos did what he had before him in the time that he was there, but God is the one who was giving the increase. Have you all ever seen the movie Shenandoah? You all remember the movie Shenandoah? It's 1965. Jimmy Stewart's in it.
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He's playing a guy who didn't want to get involved in the civil war. So as he did not want to get involved in civil war, said, that ain't my war, you know, this this kind of thing and he was a farmer and worker. You can tell from this clip but I want you to see this and see, I think it has correlation here. Lindsey.
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Speaker 3Lord, we cleared this land. We plowed it, sowed it, and harvested. We cooked the harvest. It wouldn't be here. We wouldn't be eating it if we hadn't done it all ourselves.
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We work dog bone hard for every crumb and morsel, but we thank you just same anyway, lord, for this food we're about to eat. Amen.
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Speaker 1Isn't that isn't that the way we do? It's like, that is very human. That's an ordinary man. Actually, that's my father in law's favorite prayer, he says. Tells you a lot about my father-in-law.
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He said, he thought that that was the most sincere and honest thing because he said that, you know when you're working that you're putting the work into it but God is the one who gives the increase. Without it, nothing happens. Nothing happens. So, what then is Apollos? What is Paul's servants?
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Servants through whom you believed as the Lord assigned to each. I planted Apollos water but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, anything, but only God who gives the growth. I emphasize God because in Greek, it's it's obvious. It's screaming off the page that this is about God.
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God is the one who gives spiritual growth. He is the one who draws people. He is the one who makes those divine appointments. He is the one that works through the words of scripture and the words that come out of the presenter's mouth. But it's God who gives that growth.
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He's the one that allows it. You cannot force it. Paul knows that he can't force it. He who plants and he who waters are equal. So now Paul is saying, Apollos and I or Peter, we're all equal.
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He who plants and he who waters are equal, and each one shall receive his wages according to his labor. Now, this is one of those places where if you're hearing an topical sermon and somebody's presenting the different gradations of reward in heaven, oftentimes, they'll pull this up and say, each one's going to be paid back just like his labor says. But what that says is, he who plants and he who waters are equal. They're equal. They're they're working for the same cause.
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I think it might draw up more from Jesus' parable about the workers in the field where the master hires them on at the beginning of the day, tells them what he'll pay them, and they're working their way along. They knew what they were gonna receive at the end of the day, and then he hires along some guys to finish up at the end of the day, and they get paid the same amount. The master can do what the master wants to do. The guys who heard and believed at the beginning of the day grow up. It says that they're equal.
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So I don't think you can use this for rewards theology. Certainly not a strong gradation of awards because what Paul is doing is people who have elevated him or elevated Apollos, he brings them down to say, we are servants. And towards the end of it, he'll say, we're your servants, below you, not above you, and should not be thought of as being above you. So, for we are God's fellow workers, bold, bigger font, it screams out. We are God's fellow workers and actually, that translation is pretty good but you could misunderstand that to think we're working alongside God.
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It's me and Apollos and God and we're working along as his equals and that's not true. They're saying, God is the prime mover but we are his fellow workers. We are fellow to one another under his leadership. We are fellow workers belonging to God And y'all I did add the plural there because I think it makes a difference. Y'all are God's field.
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Y'all are God's building. He says that, and he's saying that as the collective body. It's not the individual, So not everything that he's talking about is an individual thing. It is a collective thing for the people of Corinth and for you right here, right now. Y'all are God's field.
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Y'all are God's building. So he introduces two I wanna throw this in. Hey. No artwork today. This is it.
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Jean Francois Jean Francois, Millet. This is the Gleaners. And during the time that this was painted, the aristocracy did not want anything to be heard from the the lessors, from the plebes, from the underclass. And typically, painters of this time were painting nude figures for one thing, the beautiful nude, and it was very elevated, and they did paint a lot of people of high social standing. But Malay recognized the nobility of the worker, and without the workers, very little happens.
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You got to have people with a strong work ethic. These people, this, the hay that's back here has already been gathered up. This field has been been harvested and gathered once already. There's a guy standing back here. You can tell he's a wealthy guy and he's counting what he's got back there but these people are basically servants and they're making the second pass and making sure everything is picked up.
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The gleaners and they have on clothes. That was a rare thing for the paintings of this time but and they also have a strong work ethic and it glorified the underclass or the working class. So, I thought I'd throw that in there. God's field and God's building are two analogies that he makes from here. He's already been talking about the field.
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So he equates himself with the one who planted because he had something to plant. Does that make sense? He's the one who planted Apollos water because it had already been planted. I got another one. I hardly ever just slip in a joke, but this is a just a straight out.
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It's a joke. I'll admit it right now. So God is sitting in heaven, and a scientist comes to him, which could be the punch line right there. But a scientist comes to him and says, we finally figured out a way of sparking and creating life. We have all of the things that we need and we have found them in the elements and we can put them all together in exactly the right concentration and looking that way with a certain amount of electric shock and all of this, we can make this happen and we can create life.
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Oh, can you now? God says. Tell me. He says, well, we'll take this, take the elements from the dirt of the ground, and we will form them into we could even do humans. It's just a matter of time.
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We can form them into the likeness of you, ourselves, and then we'll breathe life into them through mechanical process, thus creating man. And God said, well, that's interesting. Show me. So the scientist bends over and he starts to pick up a handful of dirt and he said, oh, get your own dirt. God is the only one that can create something out of nothing.
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He's the only one that can make something ex nihilo from nothing. Now Paul will argue in this next section that he is a builder for God, but he's not starting from nothing. He has a foundation. That's So where we'll go next. According to the grace of God given me and this is again, Paul is not saying, I am a mighty teacher, wonderful, and great, and Apollos is my equal.
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No. He's saying, according to the grace that God has given me, by extension, he's saying, and according to the grace that God gave Apollos, like a skilled master builder, I laid a foundation and another man is building on it. So, he's equating himself to being the one who laid the foundation and Apollos to be the one who is building on the foundation that has been laid. Let each man take care how he builds upon it. That's not saying anything bad about Apollos or anyone to come after him even up to the point of me standing here right on the stage because we have the same message.
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We have the same foundation. For no other foundation can one lay, can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Amen. Now, today, we think of foundations as being laid. You gotta dig a hole.
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You dig a hole with square bottoms. In Georgia, it's 10 inches deep. That's what we had to do in Mexico. It was like three feet deep. Don't here you gotta dig a little bit more profound than that.
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You gotta dig them straight down with square bottoms, make sure everything's tied tight, and then we pour concrete into it. We make a mix of things, a conglomerate. We put it all together and we mix it and then it sets up. Well, that's not the way they did foundations back then. Either you had a rock that was where it was and you could build on that rock like Jesus speaks of the man who built his house on the rock or you had to go get a rock and put it where you wanted that building to be.
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The temple has foundation stones that are literally back to that second second divider right there. They're this big. That's the size of one of those stones about this tall. So, when the Bible speaks of having a foundation stone or the chief cornerstone, the chief cornerstone is the temple is even bigger than that. That's what he's talking about.
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Paul did not start with nothing. Paul started with that foundation stone and when he got to Corinth, he made sure that it was embedded properly but it was the foundation. He didn't mix anything up. He didn't do it by hocus pocus or by a chemical, anything. He had something to start with and that was the gospel of Jesus Christ which he has already discussed, the message of the cross.
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No other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid which is Jesus Christ. Get your own dirt. According he does say skilled master builder, and I'd I I can see where people would say, well, that's the opposite of humility to say that you're a skilled master builder, but that word is architecton. Architecton is arche and then tecton, two words put together. And what does it look like?
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It looks like architect. That's what we would think of as somebody who drew the blueprints, who came up with the idea, but that's not really true in Greek. It is the first archaeology, study of the beginning or study study of the first things, archae. And then Tekton is builder. So he is the first builder.
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That's what he's claiming to be, not super skilled master. He's saying, I'm the first builder. I'm the one that's laying this stone. Jesus' firm foundation. My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness.
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I dare not trust the sweetest frame but wholly lean on Jesus' name. Cornerstone. First builder. Now, if anyone builds on this foundation or the foundation, that is the foundation of Jesus Christ. If anyone builds on the foundation with gold and silver and precious stones, wood, hay, or straw, each man's work will become manifest for the day will disclose it.
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I'll stop right there and say, he is saying that if anybody builds on the foundation of Jesus Christ, have you ever seen anybody that was trying to build on the foundation of Jesus Christ that was not doing a good job? In the last five minutes, have you seen that? So, if anyone builds on the foundation, he's going to do so with either precious things or common things and he says, each man's work will become manifest. We will be able to see how it stands the test of time at the day, capital D day, the judgment day. When all will be revealed because it will be revealed with fire and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done.
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If the work which any man has built on the foundation survives, so if on the foundation of Jesus Christ, his work survives, he will receive a reward. If any man's work is burned up, he will suffer loss. Can you imagine standing up and knowing that you had done whatever your Christian duty is, whatever your mission is, and to see on the day that all the effort you put into programs, all the effort that you put into doing things a certain way, your way, that all that was burned up and then you see that there were several souls. You would suffer lost. All the energy you had spent putting yourself into certain programs or ways of doing things.
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But it says, though he himself will be saved but only as through fire. The way that you tell if someone's work passes through that is if it is eternal work. The only thing that we have that's eternal that we're going to deal with is souls, people. Investing in each other's journey is great. Discipleship, that's great.
35:08
Getting people to the point of crossing over into a right relationship with God, the message of the cross, that's what he's talking about here. He's saying the things that matter, the things that are eternal are the things that get through that veil. The day will disclose it. This is another one that people will go to for the receiving a reward, but this is both talking about Christians who are doing the work of God. They're equals.
35:35
Both of them are doing work for God. One of them, it's of greater value than the other because one of them is just wasted effort, basically. If it does not convert into people's lives and their very souls, then it's gonna burn up. So builders for God and God's temple. Do you not know that you, and I'll put y'all in there because it's plural, y'all are God's temple and that God's spirit dwells in y'all.
36:04
If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him. For God's temple is holy and that temple, y'all are. God's temple. He's using this analogy and he's going on forward and saying that the foundation has been laid, and as you're building yourselves up, y'all into the body of Christ, the church collectively, he's saying anybody that tears down the church, tears down the believing body of Christ, God will destroy them. They are on the other side of the equation.
36:38
They are perishing and you are not. Does that make sense? Are we getting that? Do you not know that y'all are God's temple? Not you individually, and it does say elsewhere that we individually are the place where the Holy Spirit dwells, and that's the way we should treat ourselves.
36:56
But this, the collective body of Christ, like I said at the beginning, he's trying to remove factions and division. He's pulling people away from their political alliances back towards the center and building them on the foundation. Make sense? Alright. Now, there's a warning and then the conclusion, and the warning is this, let no one deceive himself.
37:18
If anyone among you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise. This is a callback to the earlier wisdom of man is foolishness with God and the the whole idea that I mentioned from the beginning that the sophists and the great rhetoric speakers of rhetoric and the people who had figured out the eloquent speech to be able to persuade people into their side. All of those people he's saying, no, put that down and just stick to the simple truth of the gospel and then build from there. Don't try to get too big for your britches. When you start to allegorize things and and and mention what wood, hay, and stubble exactly what they mean or precious stones and gold and silver.
38:04
When you start to get wise in your own opinion, you are very likely to quickly be humble. So, if anyone of you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may then become wise in the wisdom of God. For the wisdom of the world is foolishness or folly with God. For it is written, he catches the wise in their craftiness and again, the Lord knows that the thoughts of the wise are futile. I mentioned this these two quotes.
38:33
I mean, Paul mentions them. Job five thirteen which is actually from Eliphaz, one of Job's neighbors and his friends and he doesn't always give good advice but apparently, Paul thought this one was true enough to stick it in the New Testament. He catches the wives in in in their craftiness and again, in Psalm, the Lord knows that the thoughts of the wise are futile. The word craftiness, I got a a couple of things. I have I grew up Southern Baptist and I don't I'm glad that I did.
39:04
I'm absolutely wonderfully glad that I did, but there's a certain format that we would follow and we would get to the end of the sermon. We'd have the time of invitation and we're going to sing. There's room at the cross for you when we get through with this. Trust me. We are gonna still kinda follow this but a lot of times in my sermons, I just end them with and that's it.
39:24
Phil Baxter when he was leaving this morning said that when he was about eight years old, seven or eight years old, his mom dropped him off at church. Just decided you need to go to church. Now, she didn't go. Dad didn't go and the other brothers and sisters didn't need to go but she dropped him off and and had two hours. They came back to pick him up and they did it for six weeks and every week, when they got to the end of the sermon time, the pastor would give the invitation and he would sing several, many, sometimes verses and then he'd stop the piano player and stop the congregation.
39:52
He'd say, we're going to do this until the last sinner comes forward. And that was his craft. It was his way of doing things. And Phil said he was sitting in the back row and he got up and he came straight on down and we would all be glad about that and be happy about that but Phil didn't know anymore about what that meant and it's it's his first Sunday in there. He didn't have any idea what was going on but that was the craft and it was designed to bring people down and it did and so the preacher talked to him next week.
40:20
She dropped him off outside and he did the same thing. He got to the same place in the zone and stopped him and said the same thing and Phil comes right there, seven years old. He did it for six weeks in a row. In the sixth week, the pastor came to the house and said, well, you know, this this young boy has been here for six weeks and every week he comes forward and he's wanting to give his life to Jesus. Well, that was his interpretation because that's the time to do that.
40:46
But Phil didn't know anymore about it, had not really been moved in any way except for he had received an instruction well. Now, he is a strong believer now now, but he says in the seventh week rather than her dropping him off at church, they went back to the lake. They just quit going. The preacher wanted for him to step over into a right relationship with God and that's what he was trying to get to have happen but it was not, it didn't yet make sense. It was not a personal connection for him.
41:10
He had not made that personal connection. Had another instance of youth camp. Youth camp, traditionally, we go for four, five, six, seven days in a row and we get whipped into a frenzy and and not sleeping and everything else and then nine verses of a song, the same song, why do you wait, dear brother? Now, who wants to come down and be saved? There's a certain craft in that that I think is disingenuous and so, I'm always here and I'm always ready to have that conversation.
41:41
I'll have it right now during this invitation actually or any other time but that's the reason why I end sometimes with just, that's it. Another episode of craftiness. I had a buddy that I worked with some when I was in seminary. He had been selling cars and he when he when he was trying to sell cars, he was not doing very well. He only had about a third as many as the other guys around him.
42:06
So, the boss called him in and said, you're going to have to do a little better at this. What what do you, to what do you owe this? And he said, I don't know how those other guys are getting to me. He said, I tell him, I tell em the truth. I tell em exactly what's going on and I I don't know what's going on.
42:21
He says, well, you're going have to work on being more crafty. Bless Chip's heart, crafty. He went home. He looked it up in the dictionary because he said, crafty and it looked like trickery, deceit, underhanded in a way but also craft, just the way that you do things and then, he looked it up in the Bible and he said, there are five instances and it's never good. It's always about tricking someone into doing something or trying to get them to do something that you want for them to do.
42:53
I do want for you to be a Christian. I do want for you to build the house on the only foundation. But I I don't wanna make you do anything. I want for doing to flow out of being. So the conclusion, the very end of this is these two these three verses.
43:14
So let no one boast of men, of any man, of any man, anywhere, not Paul, not Apollos, not Peter, not anybody. Do not let anyone boast of men. In fact, that can be taken another way and say, so I, Paul, should not boast of how many men have come to the Lord under my teaching And Apollo shouldn't be boasting of men or numbers of men. So let no one boast of men for all things are y'alls. Whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas, he's saying we, Paul, Apollos, and Cephas belong to y'all.
43:46
We are your servants. This is where I said, he removes himself off the pedestal and then he goes down below and says, I actually am your servant. Whether Paul, Apollos, or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future, all of those are y'alls. All of those things are y'alls. The world is yours.
44:06
Jesus has given them as the great commission. Go ye therefore into all the world, teaching them this stuff, them how to keep everything that I've commanded you, baptizing them, teaching them. Life, death, the present, the future, all of those things are y'alls and y'all are Christ and Christ is God. Amen. So, that's the conclusion and it wraps up this section.
44:31
I think it does extend a little bit more into chapter four, but after he's talked about factions and division and unity and how important it is and tried to prove it in so many different ways with analogies. In the fifth chapter, we have one more chapter before we get there, he is gonna start blasting them specifically about specific sin. Now factions is one of those amorphous sins you don't even know you're doing it while you're doing it. He's called our attention to it. He'll do it for one more chapter, and then he's gonna start blasting us for very specific sins.
45:00
And that's it. So Judy, would you come on up, and we're gonna sing, there is room at the cross for you, and there is. Though millions have come, there's still room for one and don't let that scare you because I told the story about Phil. I just got that between services. I just don't want to ever be guilty of trying to manipulate you into doing something.
45:18
I want it to happen because this is true. In Jesus name, would you all stand up with me?
45:32
Speaker 2Cross upon which Jesus died is a shelter in which we can hide. And its grace so free is sufficient for me. And deep is its fountain as wide as the sea there's room at the cross for you There's room at the cross for you. Though millions have come, there's still room for one. Yes there's room at the cross for you
46:29
Speaker 1That's it. Amen. That's good. Now, may the Lord bless and keep you and make his face to shine upon you and give you peace and I'll say this, I just caught it again in my head about the great commission. It does not say, go you therefore and teach them.
46:47
It says, teach them to obey all I've commanded you. You do that by the way you live your life. In Jesus name, amen.
