This week we continue our series called Chronos. A term which means time. We have decided to study the scriptures this year in the order they were published. It gives us a very unique insight into the early church and the struggles of a growing movement. This review of history is important because The Center’s leadership believes we are on the cuspid of a great awakening in America. An awakening that will challenge the status quo of the current Christian industrial complex. An institution more concerned with Attendance, Buildings and Cash than the Gospel, Grace and Growth of the kingdom.
This week we continue in the book of first Corinthians. It’s another book written by Paul around 25 years after Jesus' earthly ministry. Corinth is the original sin city. It was a transitional city and as such there was a lot of anonymity. As a Coastal town people were always coming and going. Some for vacation, most for business. The community was know for their worship of the goddess of sex. They had one of the largest temples devoted to her and the idea of fertility. The temple operated with over 1000 prostitutes where every man was supposed to go once a year and participate in “worship” to ensure all aspects of creation would be favorable for him and his family. You can see why when you called somebody a corinthian back then, you were saying they were living without morality. After his 1 ½ years planting the church, Paul left behind Apollos who was an amazing preacher/teacher and yet, we can see from this book the people still had questions. The immorality of the culture was so rampant that Paul had to address everything from why church potlucks should not turn into drunken frat parties and worship to the one true God like kids first birthday party at chuck e cheese restaurant. The book of Corinthians is a great resource for the early church and the struggles a new body of faith must wrestle with and why it's so important to have good leaders willing to engage in and walk beside people who are dealing with life on life’s terms.
Last Sunday, we dove head first into the book. We learned there was a little disunity in the church leadership and maybe a little power struggle happening in this church plant. Paul was having none of it. He was trying to bring everyone back to the mission, stop the infighting and get back on task. He continues this letter to the church gone wild in the second chapter verse 6
6 We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. 7 No, we declare God’s wisdom, a mystery that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. 8 None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
Paul uses the word wisdom three times and connects it to the mature. He is not talking about people who are older in life. He is referring to the experienced followers of Christ. There are differences between new believers and those who have experienced “living as” christians for a while. There are different experiences and learnings as well as habits of those who have walked with Jesus for a time.
Paul refers to this learned and lived understanding as a revealed mystery. Please don’t think this is some special knowledge meant to build you up as a special agent for Christ. It’s not. It’s the applied scripture, experience, reason and even tradition (the transmission of customs or beliefs from generation to generation- Dictionary.com) that runs contrary to every human and supernatural evil.
The mystery is the truth of God's love for us in that He came as Christ to die, to rise and to come again. Before the world began, God will has been for us to join Him in heaven.
Until then, Paul is clear - God’s still present in and among those who call Him Lord. We have His Power in us to do His will on earth! Now, as if that first part of the letter wasn’t enough, Paul goes on…
9 However, as it is written:
“What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived”—
the things God has prepared for those who love him— 10 these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit.
Again, we don’t know what the report Paul was responding to or what was happening in the church he planted. But someone may be trying to undermine Paul’s position as a special leader or an apostle. While Paul may have never personally walked with Jesus, he was friends with some of the original knuckleheads. They knew he had more education than they did. They may even have been a little wary of his intentions. Yet, they ordained him as a significant force in the movement and validated His call story as just as profound as any one the originals. Paul knew what he was talking about when the idea of Holy Spirit revelation came up.
Take a listen to this next section and remember, Paul was knocked on his keister by God and spent three days in silence as God revealed and forgave him for the error of his zealousness towards the messanic Jews (those who were jewish but believed Christ was the prophesied messiah). Paul wrote:
The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. 11 For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. 12 What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us. 13 This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words.14 The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. 15 The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, 16 for, “Who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.
By receiving the Spirit within us when we came into relationship with Him, we are free to work with Him so no one is lost. We are free from the bondage of this world, free to love unconditionally, free to discern good from evil, free to learn more about God, free to forgive and be forgiven, free to be inspired to do more in His name, free from condemnation of who were. We are truly free to be who He created us to be.
We possess the mind of Christ. The mind of Christ means to look at life from our Savior’s perspective, having His values and desires as our leading thought.
So what have you done with this new mind? How has your life changed since you first received it?
Examples of people who have changed from what they were to Christian warriors??
study from Warren Wiersbe Commentary 572-576
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