1 Corinthians 1:1-3
You can be seated. Turn in your
copy of the scriptures to First Corinthians. Today, our passage
will be verses one to three. Several years back, we made it
through Luke’s account of the work, the life and ministry of
Jesus, our Savior. And then we followed after that
with Luke’s account of the early church, the Acts of the Apostles,
and Luke’s account in Acts, both written to Theophilus. that he
may have an orderly account of all that Jesus said, did, all
that the apostles said and did. Since that time, we’ve been making
our way through the epistles that Paul wrote in their order.
So at least the order we see fit. So we went through Galatians,
1st, 2nd Thessalonians, and now we land at 1st Corinthians. And today, chapter one, verses
one to three. And before we read, let’s look
to God in prayer. Pray with me. Lord, we pray that your word
will do its work, comfort and build up your saints in the most
holy faith, but also convince and convert sinners from death
to life, from everlasting destruction to everlasting joy. We pray in
the name of Jesus, our great savior. Amen. Hear now God’s
word. This is first Corinthians chapter
one, verses one to three. Paul called by the will of God
to be an apostle of Christ Jesus, and our brother Sosthenes, to
the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified
in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those
who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,
both their Lord and ours. Grace to you and peace from God
our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. One of the best
pictures that I think we can have of the local church, as
in the local church in our place, Burlington or Corinth or wherever,
is this. The local church ought to be
an outpost of heaven. When people walk in the doors,
they should feel that there is something different between what
is outside in the present evil age and what is inside in the
church of the living God, the household of faith, the pillar
and the buttress of truth. We know, don’t have to say much
about it, that everything around us is pretty awful. This present
evil age is full of all kinds of perversions of what is good,
right, and true. And so when we come into the
doors of the church, we ought to expect it to be very different. We ought to have a feeling of
sanctuary, of sacred space. of a place where all that is
outside sort of sheds at the door as we leave our burdens,
as we wipe our feet, as it were, we come into a place, a haven
where things are very different. But what do we do? What is to
be done when the church looks like the world? That’s the question
of the Corinthian church. Or in one case in the Corinthian
ministry, Paul has to say that things taking place in the life
of that local church, that outpost of heaven, even the Gentiles
do not do them. The church at Corinth was full
of immorality and lawsuits and perversion, theft, divorce. drunkenness,
gluttony, classism. He had to teach them about paying
preachers and how to have proper worship. He taught them about
the Lord’s Supper, and he gave lessons on the gift of tongues,
benevolence to fellow believers, and most importantly, we have
his work his teaching on the resurrection of the Lord Jesus
Christ. So what’s a guy like Paul to
do who’s all the way across the little ocean there, the little
sea there? What’s a guy like Paul to do
when he can’t get there and things are falling apart? What’s he
to do? What’s he to say? These are his
babies in the faith. These are the people he spent
a year and a half with in a previous missionary journey. Is he to
throw them away? Is he to throw the baby out with
the bathwater? Well, no, he’s to send them letters. He’s going to send them Timothy.
He’s going to send them Titus. He’s going to pray for them.
And of course, he will visit them. But what do they need most?
They need the authoritative voice of Jesus Christ. They need the
same word and spirit that convinced and converted them to comfort
and build them up. And that same word and spirit
that will teach them and reprove them and correct them and train
them in righteousness so that they the Corinthian congregation
can be equipped for every good work. In this introductory passage,
there’s a lot of meat. There’s a lot of good things.
And so we’ll take a peek at the apostle. We’ll understand a little
bit about Sosthenes, also Corinth. And then we’ll look at a couple
important salvation words, calling, sanctification, and then the
name of the Lord Jesus. Let’s just zip through these.
First, in verse 1, we have the apostle. Our passage says, Paul
called by the will of God to be an apostle of Jesus Christ. By the will of God, we think
of long ago in eternity past where God the Father, God the
Son, God the Holy Spirit, worked out their plan of history, their
plan of salvation, their plan of seeking and saving the lost
through the Son, the Savior, the Lord Jesus. And the decrees
of God that are wise and holy and they are gracious, put together
what we know in history as the threefold way we look at human
history, creation, fall and redemption. God made the world and everything
in it. He made it all very good, very wonderful. Satan came, tempted
Adam and Eve. They ate the forbidden fruit.
They fell. Paradise was lost. And so in
redemption, To steal the idea from the poet John Milton, we
see history as regaining paradise through the life and ministry
of Jesus Christ. And so through Abraham, and through
David, and through prophets like Isaiah, through Jesus, and now
through the apostles in the early church era of 1 Corinthians,
we see God’s work of redemption unfold now through local churches,
through outposts of heaven, through preachers, through the ministry
of the word and sacraments. We see the word of God spread
and increase and change people’s hearts, their minds and their
lives. But Paul was called in that divine
plan of God to be an apostle. He was a young man who during
the early church, Hebrew of Hebrews, well, well-educated, very zealous. He persecuted the way, persecuted
the Christians. We know that he held the cloaks
of those who were stoning Stephen. We know him to be on the road
to Damascus, bright light, loud voice, Saul, why are you persecuting
me? It was the voice of Jesus. And
he called him to be his chosen instrument. He called him to
be his voice, his emissary, his apostle, his sent one who would
take his name into the Gentile world, who would carry his name
before kings and even carry his name among the children of Israel.
This sent one, as we have studied over the last several years,
has made a couple of missionary journeys. We’re on the second
one now. He’ll take a couple more. But he is competing there
in Corinth with fake apostles, with super apostles, with apostles
who’ve taken up the name of the ministry, but not the name of
Jesus. And so they perform signs and
wonders. They speak eloquently and Paul is having to compete
with them. They’ve gone in and wrecked this little church. And
so when he says Paul, called by the will of God, it’s sort
of a slam, you might say. It’s a compare and contrast.
They’re the fake apostles. Here I am the real apostle and
so listen up as I speak into your mess. Listen up as I speak
into your outpost of heaven that really seems to be more like
an outpost of hell. And so the apostle, the sent
one, called by God, sent by Jesus as an emissary, as an ambassador,
speaks the word of the living God to the people at Corinth
and to us today as we have this letter received into our copies
of the scripture. So there’s a little something
about the apostle. What about Sosthenes? This fellow whose
name pops up, Paul, called by the will of God in verse one.
He’s called to be an apostle of Jesus, and he’s got our brother
Sosthenes. They know who he is. Well, think
of this in the history of the people of God. They were often
scattered around the world, the diaspora, the scattering of the
Jewish population. And as they went around from
city to city, settling and making a life, when they had 10 men,
they had a quorum. They had enough to form a synagogue. where they would read the scriptures
and the scriptures would be explained. And we know well that Paul’s
missionary journeys, most everywhere he went, when he went, he found
the synagogue and he went in on the Sabbaths and he reasoned
with them. He persuaded them, if possible,
and the spirit was at work, to see that Jesus was the Christ,
that Christ Jesus was indeed the Messiah of God sent to seek
and save the lost. And so when Paul comes to Corinth,
He goes to the synagogue and he their reasons and persuades
and some of these folks get converted now There was a little problem
in Corinth. It was a good problem Crispus their synagogue leader
gets saved. Well, what do they have to do?
They have to get out their bylaws there at the synagogue and they
have to figure out how do we elect a new synagogue leader and so
they elect Sosthenes And you can imagine all the consternation.
What are these good, upstanding Jewish men doing going to follow
that sectarian way of a Galilean and a bunch of fishermen? Not
the way to go, they thought. But before conversion, Sosthenes
was the leader of the synagogue. And there’s an instance, you
read about it in Acts chapter 18, where the apostle Paul was
teaching the Israelites to worship in a way that was contrary to
the scriptures. That’s what the Jews accused
them of. And so they go before Galileo, the proconsul, and he
shrugs his shoulders and says, who cares? You are arguing to
me about a law that is in your own books, laws of worship. And
so I don’t care. And so Paul gets the biggest
free pass of his life. But Sosthenes, the ruler, of
the synagogue, we’re told in Acts 18, is beaten, beaten severely
by the Jewish population. But later, continuing to hear
Paul, continuing to hear Jesus, he comes to faith in him. And
so it’s likely he’s Paul’s secretary. He’s the one who hand writes
this letter for the apostle Paul. But his name, his name is named
in the scripture. We know Sosthenes. And our passage tells us, Acts
chapter 18 tells us that many others, Jews and Greeks heard
Paul. Now they heard Jesus and they
came to faith in him. Many at Corinth came to faith
in the Lord Jesus. They heard, they believed, and
they were baptized. Well, there’s the apostle, there’s
Sosthenes. How about Corinth? How about
the city? Verse two says to the church
of God in Corinth, to the outpost of heaven, at Corinth. This is Paul’s second missionary
journey. Remember he left Antioch, went through Galatia and that
area, came back to Antioch, went out again, separated from Barnabas. They went off, picked up Timothy
along the way. They skipped over Asia because
the Holy Spirit said don’t go there. Macedonian call, so they
go to Philippi, they go to Thessalonica, they go to Berea, they go to
Athens, and now to Corinth. And so Paul, on this second missionary
journey, after he runs and runs and runs, escaping the angry
Jewish population that does not like his preaching of Jesus,
he comes around the bend into the great city of Corinth. He
had previously been troubled with all the ideas and false
thoughts and philosophies that have been taught at Athens. And
now he walks into the city and there he’s faced with the great
temple to Aphrodite, the great temple to Apollo. one of female
prostitutes and other of male prostitutes. This little land
bridge, about a four mile wide land bridge or isthmus, if you
remember your elementary or middle school, it’s a hard word to say,
but you remember your geographical terms, a little sliver of land
connecting two big bodies of land. This was a very important
slither of land. Lots of trade there, lots of meeting of the world at that
place. It was like a bazaar. You could buy anything you wanted.
It was an interesting place. Maybe you’ve heard of the Isthmian
games from ancient times. They would have been on the Isthmus.
But nevertheless, Paul comes around the bend into this great
city with all this paganism, in fact, to Corinthianize was
a verb that meant to live a debauched, evil, a wicked life. To be a
Corinthian lass was not a term of endearment, as you can figure.
And so when Paul comes into Corinth, what does he do? He goes and
finds the Motel 6. No, he goes and finds a place
of hospitality. Well, he’s a tent maker by trade and he bumps into
Priscilla and Aquila. Remember he’s an apostle, a sent
one by the will of God. And we understand God’s providence
for sure guided every step of his way. And he bumps into Priscilla
and Aquila and says, Oh, you’re, you know, you’re tent makers
too. That’s what, that’s what I do. And we’re also believers
in Jesus Christ. What a happy providence for the
apostle Paul. Well, he made tents with them. He stayed 18 months in Corinth,
reasoning and persuading and preaching that Jesus was the
Christ. When he wasn’t tent making and
you know, that’s what we call a bivocational minister or missionary. They make tents and preach on
the side. Some gifts came from the church at Thessalonica and
other places and Paul was able to labor in the word only for
a time, but he was testifying that Jesus was the Christ. He
was reviled. The Jewish population not happy
again. And so they ran him out. They
opposed him. They reviled him. And so he shook
the dust off of his robe, shook the dust off the folds, said,
let the blood of your own blood be on your own heads. I’ve given
you the gospel. And what does he do? He sets
up shop right next door, sets up shop right next door in the
house of Titius Justice. And he kept on preaching, kept
on proclaiming. Paul and Sosthenes, Priscilla
and Aquila, Timothy and Titus would minister and others along
the way. But there’s the apostle, there’s
Sosthenes and there’s Corinth. Now, what should we think of
next in this passage? But the important word of calling,
calling in verse two to those sanctified in Christ. sanctified
in Christ Jesus and called to be saints. This word calling
is an important one. You can think of it very broadly
in that the gospel call goes out. repent of your sins, come
to Jesus and be saved. That is the gospel call. That
is what we, in our history and tradition, call the free offer
of the gospel. We preach and we proclaim. We
tell all who will hear of Jesus. We do not restrict the message.
We do not restrict the recipients. We do not see into the hearts
of men and women and boys and girls. And so we preach. and
we proclaim salvation by faith in Jesus Christ. There’s that
general calling, not only to a life by faith in Jesus, but
to a life of holiness. No longer living for idols, but
turning to serve the living and the true God. Now we think sometimes
a little more broadly about calling. We think of a call to ministry,
a call to missions, a call to have a family. And then because
of our Reformation heritage, along the vein of Martin Luther,
we think of the doctrine of vocation, where we look at what we do in
life, usually our job, as a calling. And so there’s the general idea
of the call, gospel to everyone. And then what do I do with my
life? But what about the effectual call of God? What about the effective
call of God? The one that takes root? Remember
Jesus’ parable of the seed? The farmer went out to sow. He
cast his seed far and wide. Some fell on the path. Some fell
among the rocks. Some fell among the thorns. Some
fell along the good soil. And remember, Satan snatches
some of the seed, the cares of the world come and root out the
quick profession of faith. Then there’s the cares of the
world and all the rest. But then the good seed falls
on good soil. And that’s what we might think of as a seed that
landed, a seed that germinated, a seed that was fertilized. In
fact, Paul’s going to say in a couple verses or chapters,
you know, about the classism in the church. You know, some
of you say you’re an Apollos disciple. Some of you are a Paul
disciple. Some of you are this, whatever.
And he goes, it’s all of God. Some sow, some plant, some water. But God gives the growth. And
that growth is what we call by the Holy Spirit, an effectual
or effective call. Gospel goes out to all people,
but God, by his word and spirit, savingly Opens up our minds to
see our sin and misery. Opens up our senses to smell
the stench of sin in our lives. opens up the terrors of our heart
to see the judge of the earth on the throne of heaven, and
knowing that he has appointed a day to come and to mete out
justice for sin. And so our hearts are renewed,
our minds are renewed, and we have our wills renewed that we’re
dead in sin and trespasses, and we are persuaded and enabled
to receive Jesus and rest in him alone as he is offered in
the gospel. And then we continue a life of
trembling at God’s threatenings, embracing his promises and yielding
to his commands. We call that new life in Jesus
Christ, new life wrought by the Holy Spirit. And perhaps you
look back at your own life. You think of yourself in exactly
the way that God has said it through the words of his apostle
Paul. You are sanctified in Christ and you are called to be a saint. You look back and see your deadness
to the things of the Lord. You look back and remember when
the lights came on, when the heart was softened, the heart
of stone was chipped at and the heart of flesh was worked in
you and the spirit blew his wind and his breath and took the chaos
and brought order. And so there’s the calling that
we have, not just the outward general call of the gospel, but
the inward work of the spirit where we knew without a shadow
of a doubt that we were a child of the living God. Well, what
about the word sanctification? Another important salvation word
that pops up to those sanctified in Christ, Christ Jesus, and
called to be saints. There’s the Latin phrase we say
around here from time to time, simul justus et peccator. We
are at the same time saints and sinners. We are at the same time
justified right before God, and we are also at the same time
sinners. You ride down Church Street,
and I think you can get a tattoo at Saints and Sinners, right?
I think you ride down Church Street, and you can probably
get a coffee at a Saints and Sinners shop. It’s a pretty popular
term, but it’s a big one in the life of the believer, because
we say in our heads, do we not? How can I be a child of God,
saved from sin, and yet still have these rotten things in my
heart? Robert Marie Machein, the Scottish minister, I believe
from the 1800s, very, very godly man, very diligent minister,
died at a very young age, maybe below age 30. Everybody thought
he was perfect and great. You read his biography and he
realized he knew his own flesh. And he writes in one place, in
my heart is the seed of every sin. And so what about this business
of sanctification? Well, we have to understand something
about justification also. And justification is that fancy
legal word where God pardons all our sin and accepts us as
righteous in his sight. It’s a legal declaration. It’s
a forensic declaration. It deals with our guilt. It deals
with an angry God, a just God seeing us as we are, and that
is as a sinner. And it’s a judicial act. The hammer, the gavel is pounded
on the desk of God’s throne of justice when we come to faith
in him. And so in our justification,
our sin is pardoned. But in our sanctification, our
sin is subdued. And sanctification has to do
with our pollution, our filthiness, our dirtiness. Justification
with our guilt, justification more legal, sanctification more
our pollution. And to confuse matters, or maybe
to clarify matters, we think of sanctification in two ways.
We think of sanctification as definite and then also progressive. So our passage says, to those
sanctified in Christ. That sounds kind of past tense,
doesn’t it? When you came to faith in Jesus, you were no longer
unholy. You are no longer considered
pagan or secular. You were set apart by God to
be holy as he is holy. And so our position, it may not
be the reality. It’s definitely not the reality
if you look down into the depths of your heart. But the reality
is our position is in Christ. Our position is to be holy. You are holy, the Bible declares.
But what about the progressive side of sanctification? You are
becoming holy. The scriptures tell us to lean
into our sanctification, work out our salvation with fear and
trembling. And so, you know, Sanctification
to be the work of God’s grace. It’s progressive. It’s lifelong.
It’s the work of God’s free grace whereby we are enabled more and
more to hate what is evil and to put it to death. That is the
rub. That is the daily call of every
Christian. It’s when those sinful impulses
rise up. It’s when those sinful impulses
come at us. Or it’s when the whisper of Satan
comes in our ear, we have to be like Jesus and say, man shall
not live by bread alone. You shall not put the Lord your
God to the test. We have to call on God for help. We have to remember
scripture. We have to say, deliver me from
the evil one. lead me not into temptation.
It’s something that only God can do for us. We call on him
to help us. We lean into our growth in grace.
We read the word. We come to church. We experience
the means of grace. We live out of our baptism. We
live out of the realities. On and on we can go. But these
at Corinth are called to be saints, called to be holy, sanctified
in Christ. But here’s the problem at Corinth. They’re living out of their old
nature. And I listed the issues a little bit ago and they’re
pretty bad, pretty rotten. As we go through the letters
to the Corinthians, you’re going to say, boy, what a church, wouldn’t
join that one. But they are living out of their
old nature and all of their issues are heart problems, world problems,
devil problems, flesh problems. And the gospel that saved them
is the gospel that will clean them up. And it’s the gospel
that saves you and will clean you up and bring you safely home.
Now, there’s a very important phrase in our passage that we
want to land on at the end here. And it’s those who call on the
name of the Lord Jesus Christ, those who call on them there
at Corinth, but also around the world together. with all those
who in every place. And I’ve mentioned before, uh,
when we come to church, we have to have the Hebrews view of church.
Yes, we’re here with all you guys. We’re also worshiping in
the spirit with those who around the world today call on the name
of Jesus. We sang a little song earlier. Who are these like stars
appearing at the saints in heaven? Perhaps you have loved ones who’ve
gone on the glory before you. We worship together when we call
on the name of the Lord here, there and up there, we are worshiping
together in the one united body of the Lord Jesus, the church
of God. And so together with those who
at Corinth or in every other place where Paul has preached,
others have preached in planted churches. Think of this. Maybe different use of the word
calling. And think of it in the life of Abraham, who was living
in Ur of the Chaldeans. He was not calling on the name
of the Lord, but he was worshiping idols. And God comes to Abraham
and says to him, up, leave your country, leave your kindred and
go to a land I will show you. Well, Abraham did so. And he
went to the promised land. He went to Canaan. All the ites
were there. All the pagans were there. And
it says he pitched his tent and he built an altar. And there
he called on the name of the Lord. Every place he went in
the promised land, as he moved, as he sojourned, he pitched his
tent, he built an altar, and he called on the name of the
Lord because he heard the voice of God calling to him. Now, I want you to think very
hard about this as we approach the Lord’s table. Have you heard
the voice of the Lord? Has our God been calling you
by his word, by his grace, by his spirit? Perhaps he’s already
convinced you of your sin and misery and converted you to salvation
through faith in Jesus. Maybe that faith is new, it’s
young, it’s shaky, but it is sure and firm in the heavens.
And you need to be comforted and built up in your most holy
faith. The word is what will do that. Maybe you feel like
a Corinthian. You’ve got the evil seed in your heart. You’ve
got the world and the whispers of Satan and you’re wrestling,
you’re battling with this. Maybe you’ve not yet come to
faith and the stirrings are there. You’ve been hearing, but not
hearing. You’ve been trying to reconcile these things, but it’s
not yet figured out. You’ve got the itch. You’ve got
the feeling there’s something different, bigger, better, but
you don’t know yet how to put your finger on it or to express
it. Let me encourage you. Let me
press upon you today. If you hear the voice of the
Lord Jesus Christ, you call on his name. may be simple, it may
be not terribly sophisticated. Your mind may not have worked
it out, but your heart knows that you’re a sinner in need
of grace. And so you call on the name of the Lord and the
scripture says very clearly that you will be saved. And verse
three tells us, God will give you his grace and he will give
you his peace. What a great gift. Let’s do pray
together. Lord, we thank you for the story of the gospel and
how our Savior, our sinless Savior, went to the cross and bled and
died and suffered in our place. And how after 40 days at his
ascension, he lifted up his hands and he blessed the people and
said to go into all the world and tell people that I am Messiah,
I am Savior. And we thank you that down the
line of history, here we are. We’ve heard your voice, we’ve
answered your call, and we thank you for that great and gracious
gift. Let us never stop hearing your voice. Help us to tune in
to the right station and to tune out the ones that do us no good. Help us to hear the voice of
Jesus so clearly. And we pray now that as we come
to your table that you would bless us with your presence,
and with the gifts of the emblems of your satisfaction that you
made for sin so that our souls are encouraged and filled full
of your grace and your goodness. Hear us and help us as we make
our prayer in the name of Jesus, amen. Let’s prepare to come to
the table. We have a hymn, we have not known
thee as we ought. so so We have not known Thee as we
ought, Nor learned Thy wisdom, grace, and power. The things of earth have filled
our thoughts, And trifles of the passing hour. Lord, give us light, thy truth
to see, and make us wise in knowing thee. We have not feared thee as we
ought, Nor bowed beneath thy lawsome eye, Nor guarded deep,
and word, and thought, Remembering that God was nigh. Lord, give us faith to know Thee
near, And grant the grace of holy fear. We have not love thee as we ought,
Nor care that we are loved by thee. Thy presence we have coldly
sought, And feebly long thy face to see. Lord, give a pure and
loving heart To fill and own the love Thou art We have not
served Thee as we ought Alas, the duty The work with little fervor wrought,
The battles lost or scarcely won. Lord, give the zeal and
give the might, for thee to toil, for thee to fight. And shall we know