Jesus – our Source and our Goal: Part Two

Psalm 24                           2 Chronicles 7:13-14                         1 Corinthians 10:1–11:1                 

Jesus – our Source and our Goal: Part Two

Having journeyed through the first few chapters of 1 Corinthians, I think we can safely summarise the major concern that Paul addresses in this letter as the misguided, misdirected, misapplied, self-centred overconfidence of the Corinthian believers. In last week’s sermon, we saw how Paul reminded the Corinthians of Israel's tragedy…that although they had shared great spiritual privileges…having been divinely delivered by God despite their unbelief and their doubt…having been included in the freed status of the covenant people of God despite their lack of faith and despite their fear and anger…having been fed with miraculously provided spiritual food and drink despite their constant grumblings and arguments…all but three of the original adults that came out of Egypt died in the wilderness without inheriting the Promised Land. 

Paul’s conclusion as to what happened to the Israelites is that this is because obedience to the will of God is expected from those who are delivered by God and adopted by God into his covenant family. In fact, salvation demands obedience as obedience is the natural consequence of salvation. And this obedience is achieved through perseverance in faith…a perseverance made possible by God's unfailing faithfulness in providing a means of escape and endurance in times when we are tempted to deviate from the commandments and statutes he has given us. 

And this is extremely encouraging for us as we know that we do not always walk in step with the Spirit as we do not always obey what is written in his Word. But as John reminds us in his first epistle, while we may fail time and again, if we confess our sins, God is faithful, not only to forgive us our sins, but also to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 

Now, in the light of this gracious provision, Paul now speaks about how obedience works in practice. "Therefore,” in other words, because of the grace given to us in our deliverance, adoption, and constant nourishment, and because of the warning provided for us illustrated through the tragedy of Israel, and because of God’s unfailing faithful provision of a means of escape and endurance, “Therefore, my beloved,” Paul says, “flee from idolatry." 

Just as an aside, I do want you to notice the tone of Paul’s address. In stark contrast to his letter to the Galatians where he calls them deserters (1:6) and foolish, bewitched people, there is a tenderness in his words to the Corinthians. He calls them his “beloved..." Indeed, even his strongest warnings throughout this letter appear to be wrapped in pastoral affection. Clearly, there was a change of temperament from the time he wrote his first letter to the time when he wrote his fourth. What caused this change we can only speculate…but while his explosive language is moderated in this letter, it is not compromising because Paul loves his fellow believers too much to allow them to continue down a dangerous road.

And what road is that? Well, it is the road of divided allegiance, because that, ultimately, is what idolatry is. It is not merely bowing before a carved image. It is allowing anything else to claim the devotion that belongs to God alone.

Now it seems that some of the Corinthian believers imagined that they could safely eat meat sacrificed to idols or even participate in pagan temple meals while remaining devoted to Jesus. Their argument was that because idols were nothing, what was offered to them hardly mattered.

And Paul agrees with half of their argument. Yes, idols are nothing. There is only one true God, so anything else called a god is not a god.

But what lies behind the idol is very real. Demonic forces have always used material things and the ideologies behind them to steal people away from the truth. The danger is never the thing or the thought itself. The danger is the divided heart.

Idols are rarely inherently bad things. They are almost always good things that we turn into ultimate things. When a good thing becomes an absolute requirement for your happiness, your heart divides its allegiance to protect it. And this divided heart often maintains the outward appearance of devotion (doing good things, saying the right things) while its functional trust rests entirely somewhere else (a bank account, a relationship, or personal control).

So ultimately, idolatry is counterfeit worship. It is the state of trying to serve two masters, leaving the heart fractured, anxious, and perpetually at war with itself.

God has always desired the undivided love of his people because an undivided love of the truth is always the best for us. That was true in the wilderness, it remained true in Corinth, and it remains true today. So we are not to even flirt with idolatry…rather, we are to flee from it.

To illustrate his point, Paul then addresses the realities behind spiritual rituals or symbols. "The cup of blessing that we bless,” he asks rhetorically, “is it not a sharing in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a sharing in the body of Christ?"

Now, for many of us these words have become so familiar that we scarcely pause to hear their wonder. Paul is not merely speaking about an ethereal remembrance. He is speaking about a very real participation that lies behind the symbols and the symbolic action. The Greek word he uses here is koinonia which means a sharing, fellowship, participation. In other words, when we gather around the Lord's Table, we proclaim that our lives are bound up, not only with the crucified, risen, and reigning Jesus, but also with all who are in him. 

This is reason why Paul immediately adds, "Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread."

That sentence lies at the very heart of chapters eight through ten. Why should the free restrain their freedom? Why should the knowledgeable limit their rights? Why should love govern liberty?

Why? Because we are not isolated entities. We are one body. One loaf. One people.

Think back once more to the Exodus. All Israel was delivered by God from slavery in Egypt together. All passed through the sea together. All were baptised into Moses together. All ate the same spiritual food together. All drank from the Rock together. Their covenant identity was never merely individual.

But Paul moves on to address that which was at the heart of the Old Testament Cultus...the sacrificial system. What the sacrificial system was to Israel, the sacraments are to the Church. Just as the sacrificial system represented the relationship that united Israel as God's covenant people under Moses, so the New Testament sacraments represent that which unites us as God's covenant people under our Lord Jesus Christ. In other words, our reconciliation to and with God in and through Jesus.

In both cases the rituals represent a participation in the very real relationship that we have with God. So to partake, however innocently, in any type of ritual that represents the dark forces of the demonic is to provoke God to a justifiable jealousy and to invite his discipline. 

Every action has a consequence and in this case the consequence is a dismantling of the unity that is ours in Jesus. Unity is received before it is achieved. We are already one because faith in Jesus makes us one. The question is whether we will choose to live like the one body we already are.

That is precisely why knowledge without love is so destructive. Knowledge separates people into categories. The informed and the uninformed. The mature and the immature. The strong and the weak. But love looks at the same body and sees something entirely different. Love sees brothers. Sisters. Members of one body. People for whom Christ died.

So, how can I insist upon my rights if doing so wounds someone whose life is joined to mine through the body of Christ? How can I say, "I am free," if the application of that freedom tears the very fabric of the family to which I belong?

So, our conduct should always be governed by the question: will what I am about to say or do glorify Jesus by serving those for whom he gave himself? 

This is why Paul repeats an apparent motto of the Corinthian church that has echoed throughout these chapters.

"All things are lawful." Yes, Paul agrees, that’s true, but not all things are beneficial. While all things may be lawful, not all things build up the body.

Note that Paul does not deny that Christians possess extraordinary freedom, but he requires that the practice of this freedom be governed by love. 

We should not strain to see how far liberty may be stretched. No, rather we should seek to limit liberty when love requires it. That is not weakness. That is Christlikeness.

Jesus certainly possessed every right and yet he emptied himself and while he deserved every honour, he voluntarily became a servant, laying down his life even for those who mocked him.

Christian maturity always looks like Jesus. That is why Paul's closing words here are so remarkable.

"So, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God."

What a wonderfully ordinary sentence spelling out the simplest activities of daily life. Eating and drinking. In a sense, Paul has brought theology down from the heights of abstraction into the routines of every day because the Christian life is not lived only in moments of great spiritual significance. It is lived at the dinner table. In conversations. In decisions no one else may notice. In quiet acts of kindness. In choosing not to insist upon what we want for ourselves. In seeking another's good before our own. That is where the glory of God is most often displayed.

Then comes the sentence toward which Paul has been moving ever since chapter eight. "I try to please everyone in everything I do, not seeking my own advantage, but that of many, that they may be saved."

Now we need to understand Paul correctly. He is not saying he becomes a people pleaser or a doormat. He has already shown us that he is perfectly willing to offend when the truth of the gospel is at stake. No, rather Paul means that he willingly lays aside his preferences, his comforts, and even his rights whenever doing so might bring another person nearer to God.

Why? Well, because that is exactly what Jesus did for him. Jesus gave up all his rights by taking on the form of a human being, so that through his sinless death and victorious resurrection, he might save us.

And then Paul wraps it all up neatly in his final statement. "Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ." Or in other words, imitate the pattern of my life because the pattern of my life is shaped by Jesus.

Now, I wonder if y’all can remember me talking about what happened in a little barn on the Isle of Lewis…a simple action that sparked off the Hebridean revival?

For weeks those elders had prayed. But nothing happened. Week after week. Nothing. Month after month. Nothing. Until one man stopped looking beyond the walls of the barn and allowed God to search his own heart.

"Brethren," he said, "it is just so much humbug to be waiting thus, night after night, month after month, if we ourselves are not right with God."

Then he asked the question. "Is my heart pure? Are my hands clean?" He had stopped asking what was wrong with everyone else on the islands as he invited the Holy Spirit to expose what was wrong with him.

Pete Greig writes that the man lifted his head, cried aloud to God, fell to his knees, and collapsed to the floor. In that moment, the barn was overwhelmed by the presence of God. Those who later reflected on the Hebridean Revival would describe that night as the catalyst that released a movement which shook the islands.

Why, do you think, did God choose that moment? It certainly wasn’t because they prayed longer or because they prayed harder or because they finally found the right strategy.

I think it is because they had allowed the searchlight of the Holy Spirit to finally turn inward.

And I cannot help wondering if this is not exactly where Paul has been leading us. To answer the one all important question. Will I imitate Jesus? Will everything I aim for in life be governed by my desire to become more and more like him?

Dearest beloved brethren, it is remarkably easy to identify what is wrong with the Church. It is remarkably easy to point out theological errors. It is remarkably easy to criticise another Christian's conscience, another denomination's practice, another preacher's shortcomings, another generation's failures.

The Corinthians were very good at that. And unfortunately, so are we. But revival has never begun with people who were experts at diagnosing the faults of others. Revival has always begun with men and women who allowed the Holy Spirit to expose the hidden corners of their own hearts.

So perhaps before we pray, "Lord, revive your Church," we should first dare to pray, "Lord, search me. Lord, search my heart. See if there is any wickedness in me. And lead me in the way everlasting."

Before asking, "Why don't they change?" perhaps we should be asking, "What in me still needs to become more like Christ?"

Because the prize toward which Paul has been urging us to run is not really revival. It is not spiritual influence. It is not theological reputation. It is Jesus.

To know him. To love him. To imitate him. To become like him. Jesus is our source and Jesus is our goal.

And when a church filled with ordinary people begins to pursue that prize together…laying aside pride, surrendering rights, bearing with one another in love, and gathering around the one Bread as one Body…then, whether the world notices or not, something infinitely precious is taking place. We begin to resemble our Lord.

And there is no greater revival than that.

Shall we pray?

Johannes W H van der Bijl 2026