This is the first of a series of seven teachings on the book of 1st Corinthians, delivered by the Reverend John W. Howe, Rector of Truro Episcopal Church in Fairfax, Virginia. The first teaching is entitled Division and Healing, and the scripture references Chapter 1 of 1st Corinthians.

Return to the Word of God and begin a study of 1st Corinthians tonight. We're going to be doing this rather rapidly. 1 Corinthians is a book that has become extremely timely once again, and certain parts of it in particular, extremely controversial.

And we could easily spend several weeks just going on one or two chapters that are of greatest interest to the 20th century. We're not going to be doing that. We're going to be moving very, very quickly, and again trying to get an overview, because sometimes the broad themes inform the individual passages in a remarkable way.

Let me give you just a little bit of introduction, and then we're going to try to quickly take a look at chapter 1 tonight. The city of Corinth was a great bustling metropolis in the first century. It was a center of commerce and industry for the whole of the Roman Empire, one of the largest cities of the ancient world.

particularly noted for its banking and its finance. And if you just stop and think for a minute in the United States of America what city is most associated with banking and commerce probably you would say New York City. We immediately think of Wall Street.

And you stop and reflect on that for a moment more and right around the corner from Wall Street the other thing for which New York is particularly notorious is Times Square. the center if you will of immorality and of the kind of parading of all manner of sins of the flesh that was exactly the case in Corinth it was a center of business and finance and it was equally well known perhaps even more so as a city of great immorality of great sexual looseness and as a matter of fact a word was coined if we put it into English, it would be to Corinthianize. To Corinthianize was to make something immoral or to make it or to become immoral in your action.

To Corinthianize. That's how widespread that reputation was. We've studied in several different sessions in the past the propensity, the danger, the temptation for a given church, a given congregation of Christ's people to take on the ethos, the lifestyle, the mores, the value system of whatever their surrounding culture might be.

To begin to reflect the kind of life of the city or the state in which that church found itself. If you want a vivid portrayal of that kind of a pattern, read chapters 2 and 3 of the book of Revelation. and as Jesus addresses himself prophetically to the seven churches of Asia Minor a kind of an in-depth study will show you that each one of them has a message that is somehow geared to the particular history and lifestyle of that city in which the church finds itself I would suggest to you that that same propensity carries on right down to the present time it has always been the case it is the case for the church here in Fairfax, Virginia in Washington, D.C., that the great temptation to the Church of Jesus Christ is that rather than being an agent for change, a leaven or salt or a light to the world, it will in fact take on the characteristics of the world around it.

Subtly. It won't even know it. Whatever is current, whatever is popular, we will find a way of calling that Christian and swallowing it into the life of the Church.

That's a huge generalization. I think it could be defended historically and certainly biblically. Paul's word to the Romans in chapter 12 was, Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds.

Confirmation or transformation, that has always been the issue. Will you be conformed to the world around you, Or will you be an agent of transformation within that world? I think it was Moffat who translated that phrase, don't let the world squeeze you into its mold.

That has always been the issue for the church of Jesus Christ. It was particularly so for the church in the city of Corinth. Particularly so for the church in the city of Corinth.

The Corinthian church had received enormous spiritual blessing, enormous spiritual empowerment. It was a church that enjoyed the gifts of the Spirit, perhaps more so than any other church. Certainly they're more talked about in this letter than in any other letter in the New Testament.

They knew what it was to operate in the power of God's Spirit. They were a church that had experienced miracles. They knew what it was to deal with a supernatural God.

but at the same time that that was true they were a terribly carnal church and they had taken into themselves much of the lifestyle and the ethos, the value system the world outlook of the city in which they lived a terribly carnal, sensual city and it was a terribly carnal and sensual church they thought, in fact I think you could say and we'll see this by the time we conclude our study I think you could say that they even were seeking spiritual experiences on a kind of a fleshly motivation I don't know if that means anything to you I hope it will by the time we're done how many of you would understand what I mean that you could seek an experience of God for a totally wrong sensual fleshly prideful kind of motive that it's not so much that I want to be a servant but I want people to see how great I am that whatever the gift is whether it be preaching or healing or speaking in tongues or prophecy or working miracles or whatever the ministry of the gift might be that it's not so much that I desire to be a servant and therefore equipped to serve but that I'm taking great glory in the specialness of who I am it's possible to seek spiritual experiences for fleshly motives and I think that's the indictment that we'd have to make of the church in Corinth there are in this letter 1 Corinthians three of the most famous passages in the whole New Testament in fact in the whole Bible in recent days chapters 12 and 14 which discuss the gifts of the spirit and operating with the empowerment of God's spirit have again become terribly terribly important as God has begun in a new way in the 20th century to pour out his spirit once again. Both those promoting the gifts and those in some sense opposing their exercise have turned again and again to 1 Corinthians 12 and 14. It's interesting, you could read chapters 12 and 14 leave 13 out altogether and they would be a connected whole.

It's as if 13 were a parenthesis inserted in the middle of that discussion. 12 goes directly into 14 in a discussion of the gifts of the spirit chapter 13 on the other hand has been forever probably the most well known and most loved passage in the whole scripture the great hymn or poem of love if I speak in the tongues of men and angels and have not love or as it used to be translated charity I'm a noisy gong and a clanging cymbal and so on and Paul's peon His hymn of praise for love within our hearts and within our experience. And 1 Corinthians 15 then is also the third passage of tremendous importance because it summarizes the resurrection appearances and it really states as powerfully as anywhere in the New Testament the victory over sin, death, and the grave that we have in Jesus Christ.

now the interesting thing is having mentioned those three passages is that very seldom do we pause to see how they're related to each other and I commented that chapter 13 is somewhat like a parenthesis in the middle of a discussion of the gifts and that's just how it's been treated it's been ripped out of context and put on its own and sewn into tapestries and samplers and carved into stone and made into stained glass windows and we've all stood there and applauded never looking at the function that it plays within the discussion of the gifts. It is a parenthesis but it is an absolutely critical parenthesis as if Paul can go no farther in talking about the gifts without stopping to say but look you can't even begin to understand the supernatural empowerings of God's spirit without first coming to grips with the motive in which they're to be exercised, which is the motive of love and building up the body of Christ. And then we move straight through the whole of that discussion, the whole thing being about gifts and love, service, the building up of each other, and then we come to 1 Corinthians 15 as if to say, don't glory in your ministry, don't glory in your gifts, Don't get hung up on spiritual experiences.

The rock bed foundation of the whole enterprise is not what you do, even under the power of the Spirit, but what God has done in Jesus Christ in raising him from the dead. So I just wanted to say that at the outset. We're going to come back to all of that.

But I wanted to just mention that at the very beginning, that those three very important passages are part of an overall development. And their interrelationship is absolutely critical to our understanding. Let me give you one other kind of background just to set it in context.

Paul first visited Corinth on his second missionary journey, probably in the year 49 AD. And he was initially helped in evangelizing this city by a couple by the name of Achilla and Priscilla, who were natives of Pontus, Italy. and they came with him at his request to begin the work of evangelism.

And it was they who, along with Paul, did the work of tent making. Sometimes you hear about Paul doing a tent making. In other words, he supported himself by the work of his hands, while in his spare time he went out evangelizing.

After a while, Silas and Timothy came and joined him, and you can read about all of that in Acts chapter 18. It might be worth just getting that background sometime. after Galio was appointed pro-council of the whole area Achaia which was in 51 AD Paul's enemies sought to have him silenced and thrown into jail but they were unsuccessful in that attempt he stayed on a little bit longer and then he moved on first to Centurion on the coastline then to Antioch and finally to Ephesus in all he was probably in the city of Corinth for about two years maybe a little bit longer, 49 to 51 AD.

From Ephesus then, he wrote back to his friends in Corinth. He initiated a correspondence. In his first letter, we've lost.

Some scholars think that it has become part of the book that we know as 2 Corinthians. Most would say no, that's a separate book altogether. His first letter was lost, we don't know what it says.

but he refers to it in chapter 9 of 1 Corinthians. He alludes back to the fact that he had previously written them. They in turn wrote back to him and asked him a whole bunch of questions and one of the reasons for this letter is that he wants to address their questions and he begins doing so in chapter 7.

But he also takes opportunity to address a number of other issues which they didn't raise and he doesn't take too much time to get to them. let's begin then with chapter 1 and just very quickly notice how he introduces the letter Paul called by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus and our brother Sosthenes to the church of God which is at Corinth to those sanctified in Christ Jesus called to be saints together with all those who in every place call on 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.

That's a fairly standard opening. Very typical of the way Paul begins his letters. But even so, it's worth just noticing a couple of things.

It's a rather interesting definition of the church there if you look for it. He says, To the church of God which is at Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, and as we read on, it'll become quickly apparent that there's a hidden clause empowered by the Holy Spirit. So it's the church of God in Christ empowered by the Holy Spirit.

He says to those sanctified and notice that that's put in the present. You are already sanctified in Him. It's a very important statement.

Sometimes you'll hear the distinction that justification which is the forgiveness of our sins happens the moment we come to Christ but that sanctification is a process that goes on for the rest of your life and you're not there yet maybe someday you'll get there have you heard that kind of teaching? that's not what Paul says he says you are right now sanctified in him that's already a fait accompli look at the end of the chapter skip ahead to verse 30 He says, He, God, is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, whom God has made our wisdom, our righteousness, and sanctification, our redemption. Therefore, as it is written, let him who boasts, boast of the Lord.

Look over at chapter 6. beginning with verse 9, he comments on how grievous some of the sins in which they were previously involved really were. Incredibly deep sins of the flesh.

And he says, Do not be deceived. Neither the immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor sexual perverts, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you.

And then he says, But, You were washed. You were sanctified. You were justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Spirit of God.

So he's writing to people who have already been sanctified and we need to understand that about ourselves. Yes, of course, there is a working out of all of that. And yes, of course, that is going to take the rest of our lives.

But to be sanctified simply means literally to be set apart for God's purposes. And that's something He does. He does.

And that is done when we come to Him, when we give our lives to Christ. He, in turn, sets us aside. He makes us holy for His purposes.

He goes on to say, to those called to be saints. And the word saints is simply the noun form of the verb sanctified. the saint is the one who is set aside for God's purposes it's the same word hagios notice the two callings he says to those called to be saints together with those who in every place call on the name of the Lord Jesus we call on him we call him Lord and he believe it or not calls us saints that's who you are friends if you've called him Lord he has called you a saint.

It's a great encouragement, isn't it, George? Saint George over here. Well, that's not his fault.

In a very real sense, I think you could say that the message of 1 Corinthians is precisely this. That in him, you already have the power to be what he calls you. so be it live up to who you are in him live out your calling be who you are in Christ be a saint be a sanctified one that's who you are it's not something you've got to become that's who you are so just be who you are in him live up to who you really are in him and then his greeting grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

You're probably aware of the fact that the typical way in which Jewish people greeted each other, they still do today, is shalom, peace. The Arabs say salem, peace. Same thing.

The Greeks, for the most part, greeted each other with the word grace. What Paul has done here is deliberately taken those two greetings and brought them together, implicitly saying in Jesus Christ, the wall of division between Jew and Gentile has been abolished. But also, I think he's saying that when God's grace is shed abroad in our hearts, we have peace with Him and with each other.

So there's an awful lot in those first three verses. That's the definition then of the church. The church is the sanctified ones.

The saints are simply those who call Jesus Lord. That's what the church is and now he gives thanks for it. Verse 4 and following.

I give thanks to God always for you because of the grace of God which was given you in Christ Jesus. That in every way you were enriched in him with all speech and all knowledge. Even as the testimony to Christ was confirmed among you.

so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift. As you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ who will sustain you to the end guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ our Lord.

Again, that is a rather remarkable statement. He says, In Him, grace was given to you. In Him, you were enriched.

And notice the inclusivity of it. With all speech, with all knowledge, there's nothing lacking. In Him, you've been given every spiritual gift.

Can you imagine saying that to a church? That can't be said here, can it? Have we been given every spiritual gift?

Then where are they? Ah, they're Leighton Dennis. they're there in embryo they need to be brought to birth but he's saying you've got them and as we'll find out they've already been brought to birth they've been exercised this is a church that has been dramatically empowered by God's spirit nothing is lacking no spiritual gift is lacking in this church so they're not only sanctified which has to do with their holiness but they're empowered which has to do with their service this is a church that is ready to go friends this is a church that knows something of who the Holy Spirit is and the promise is there he will sustain you it says it's not a matter of you're making it on your own efforts but he is faithful and will sustain you so he's told us who we are we are the sanctified ones and the challenge is to be who we are and now if it were in any way unclear it's now abundantly clear that we have in him the resources to do just that to live up to that high calling but instead of doing so this is a church which is running rampant with division with strife with enmity with schism with factionalism and if you were to translate it into modern jargon with denominationalism this is a church that rather than being the body of Christ enjoying this empowerment of his spirit for the building up of a living temple it's a church which is broken and bifurcated and separated one from another and so he comes immediately to the point I appeal to you brethren by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ that all of you agree and that there be no dissensions among you but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment.

For it has been reported to me by Chloe's people that there is quarreling among you, my brethren. What I mean is that each of you says, I belong to Paul, or I belong to Apollos, or I belong to Cephas, or we're the real Christians and nobody else is. I belong to Christ.

Those other guys are just a bunch of phonies. Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you or were you baptized in the name of Paul?

I am thankful that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, lest anyone should say that you were baptized in my name. I did baptize also the household of Stephanus. Beyond that, I do not know whether I baptized anyone else.

For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel and not with eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power. Now let's just note, there is a time for separation. And this will come before us before we're done with this letter.

There is a time when Christians have to separate from each other. There are two grounds for doing so. One, when a so-called Christian, or even more importantly, when a would-be leader, is espousing and teaching heresy.

Then we go to him, we go to her, and we share the teaching of the gospel, we unveil the truth of God's word, we attempt to win them to that standard, and if they will not be won, finally we have to say, well, I'm sorry, that's an alien doctrine and we can't have common cause. Or two, even more importantly, more deeply, more devastatingly, Again, when a Christian, or more especially a leader, will be unrepentant in compromise of God's standards, will be involved in sin. Blatant, flagrant sin.

And we go to them and we attempt to win them back, and we plead with them, and we cry with them, and we pray with them, and they won't be won. There is a cause for separation. Come out from among them and be ye separate, says the Lord.

He said it first through Isaiah, And Paul himself quotes that in 2 Corinthians. There does come a time when either heresy or immorality will not be let go of that we have to separate from our brothers in Christ. But bear this in mind.

That is only ever done as a last resort and it is only ever done in the hope that it will bring pressure, spiritual and social pressure upon that person to repent and to win them back. Okay? So, I needed to say that because in the light of that, the kind of separation going on in Corinth is another matter altogether.

It is not a matter of heresy. It is not a matter of immorality. It's a matter of little cliques, little groups coming together in an exclusivity motivation and picky, trivial matters being elevated to a point of such importance that they tear the body of Christ apart.

And Paul is absolutely horrified at that. Things like whether or not you genuflect, whether or not you cross yourself, whether or not you bow when the cross comes down the aisle, what kind of vestments you use, whether you prefer folk music or classical, whether you prefer right one or right two, whether you raise your hands to praise the Lord, those kinds of trivial, really petty things that today some Christians would allow to become elevated to a point of division within the body of Christ. Or even worse, personality differences.

Well, we happen to like this leader, but we just can't relate to that one. They're teaching exactly the same message. They're preaching the same gospel, but would divide on personalities.

I like Peter's group. I like Paul's group. Thank you.

Well, we're the real Christians, and we'll do it our way, and nobody else's anywhere. Have you observed within the church of Jesus Christ today the tendency of some people to associate only with those whose personalities or whose education or whose cultural background or whose training or whose financial status or whose neighborhood or whose race is similar to their own. That's the sort of thing that apparently is going on here.

Whereas Paul greets them with the words grace and peace in Jesus Christ all walls of cultural division have been abolished they on the other hand are indulging themselves in a kind of relationship that is based upon those external, petty, trivial differences. And he says it's tearing the body of Christ apart. When we make as the basis for our unity anything other than the Lord Jesus himself, we have missed the point of the gospel.

Because the point of the gospel is that we're reconciled not only with God but with all those who also come to Him. And there is no gospel that talks about me and Jesus only. To come to Jesus is of necessity to come to His body.

And in His body there's neither Jew nor Greek, male nor female, rich nor poor, black nor white, wise nor foolish, old nor young, rich nor poor. and yet we allow all of those kind of cultural differences to determine our unity and we end up having cliques the very opposite of the thing that Christ intended Paul is horrified party strife, division within this body of Christ which has known such an empowering of his spirit they have altogether missed the point now the operative element here has to be pride. It has to be a kind of a pride in what I am and what we are.

This thing that makes us different from everybody else. This thing that we have in common which is the exclusive basis for our fellowship. Notice how that ties the whole book together anticipating what we said about the gifts.

that the problem in Corinth, when it comes to the exercise of the gifts of the Spirit, is that God gave them to be a blessing to each other, and yet some of these Corinthian Christians received them as a basis for pride in themselves. Not, God give me all that I need that I may serve my sister, that I may serve my brother, but look at me. Pride in my gift.

Pride in my insight. pride in my talent, pride in my ministry, and pride in my little circle of friends. Do you see how that's all of a piece?

And may I suggest, this may be a real leap of intuition for you, but may I suggest that that same motive of pride is not very far removed from the kind of physical sensuality that was going on in the whole of the Corinthian culture. Because what is immorality, physical immorality is taking a delight in a physical experience apart from the purpose for which God intended it. Do you see that?

Indulging in sins of the flesh and in particular in sexual sins is taking a pleasure in something which is in and of itself a good thing but which God intended for a larger purpose as an expression, again, of unity between a husband and a wife. Ripping it out of that context and reveling in it for its own sake. That is sensuality.

And that's exactly the same thing that's going on here in the spiritual realm. That's why I said at the outset that you can seek a spiritual experience for a fleshly kind of a motive. It's a kind of a spiritual narcissism that's going on here.

It bends my mind to say it, but it's a kind of a spiritual sensuality that is running rampant in the city of Corinth. When we allow anything other than Christ himself to become the basis for our unity, or to put it another way, when we allow that which is peripheral to become central we rob the cross of its power the power of the cross is the power of reconciliation when the gospel is not reconciling it's been robbed of its power Paul says I determined not to preach the gospel in words of eloquence but in simplicity lest I rob the cross of its power and he launches into this final part of the chapter for the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing but to those who are being saved it's the power of God for it is written I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the cleverness of the clever I will thwart where is the wise man where is the scribe where is the debater of this age has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world For since in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom. It pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe.

For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom. But we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles. The Jew could not imagine anything more revolting than the idea that salvation would be through someone who died and worst of all died on a cross the Old Testament says that to be hanged on a tree is to be cursed of God to come and preach that redemption is to be found in a human being one who in fact died and whose death was on a cross of condemnation that's a stumbling block to the Gentile to the Greek who prided himself in his philosophical expertise that is the greatest laughing stock that he's ever heard to think that God could become a man that that man could die and still be God to think that there was such a thing as the resurrection of the body every good Greek student knows that we leave the body behind it's just gross matter and we drift off into the realm of pure ideas foolishness absurdity but that's what we preach says Paul We preach a gospel which is rooted in history with God becoming a man and that man dying and rising again.

That's foolishness as far as the unbelieving world is concerned. But that foolishness confounds the wisdom of this world. God's foolishness is wiser than all the wisdom of this world.

God's weakness is stronger than all the strength of this world. God turns everything upside down. He says, to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God, for the foolishness of God is wiser than men and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

And then he has a little barb for these Corinthians. For consider your call, my brothers. Not many of you were wise according to worldly standards.

not many were powerful not many were of noble birth but God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong God chose what is low and despised in the world even things that are not to bring to nothing things that are so that no human being might boast in the presence of God He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus whom God made our wisdom, our righteousness, and sanctification and redemption. Therefore, as it is written, let him who boasts boast of the Lord. Do you see how that is the exactly opposite mindset from the one that would take pride in human differences?

We're the guys who've gone to college. We don't want anything to do with those unwashed peons who have never graduated from sixth grade. God says, hey, your wisdom is nothing.

Nothing. If you take pride in your wisdom, look out. You just might miss the power of the cross.

Well, we're the guys who really know what you're supposed to do in an Episcopal service and we get absolutely every movement exactly right. And God says, you better not glory in that, my friend. Because when you glory in your liturgy, you just might miss the power of the cross.

When you glory in anything of your own, in anything human, in anything cultural, in anything that is coming out of your own background and associations, you will have missed the point. The only thing in which to glory is Christ Jesus and His cross. Let him who boasts, boast of the Lord.

Jeremiah chapter 9 says this. Thus says the Lord. Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom.

Let not the mighty man glory in his might. Let not the rich man glory in his riches. But let him who glories glory in this.

That he understands and knows me. Let him who glories glory in this. that he understands and knows me.

God has poured out his spirit upon this church. He has equipped it for every contingency. He has demonstrated himself in power.

He has distributed his gifts in abundance. But rather than understanding that those empowerings and that spiritual anointing is for the exaltation of Christ, the building up of his body in the service of one another. These poor, sad Corinthians were glorying in the things that they had been given.

Glorying in who they were as individuals. Glorying in their differences one from another. The very opposite of the reason that God gave the gift.

Rather than building up the body, tearing it into pieces. And God's word was, let him who glories glory in this. That he knows and he understands me.