1 Corinthians 15 is a chapter all about resurrection. In 1 Corinthians 15 there were people within the church who don’t believe in the resurrection and feel like it’s not an important belief of being a Christian.
Unfortunately, this is still a belief held by some people today. There are people in the world that teach that the death and resurrection of Christ never really happened, instead it’s just a made up story. Some people even try to water down the gospel and come up with scenarios that are more “plausible” than Jesus dying and being resurrected. This is an incredibly dangerous thought process as the validity of the resurrection gives us purpose as Christians.
In 1 Corinthians 15:3-8, Paul reminds those that don’t believe in the resurrection that there is evidence it happened. There were hundreds of eyewitnesses that saw Jesus alive after being publicly executed by the Romans. Paul then goes on to explain that without the resurrection we are all lost. In 1 Corinthians 15:17-18 Paul says
“And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins.Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost.”
Paul is essentially saying that without the resurrection our faith is pointless. We are unable to be saved and our loved ones are unable to be raised from the dead. Paul then goes on to remind us that the resurrection is real! The resurrection of Jesus reminds us of what’s really important in our lives, to glorify God during our lives on Earth.
-Brooke Cisneros
Reflection Questions
Why does it matter if you believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ or not?
Do you believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ?
How can you put into action verses 57 & 58, Paul’s concluding words on the resurrection and the difference it should make in our lives?
In this devotion I want to delve into a chapter in Psalms. What we see is David sharing a dark time in his life, one of the things that makes it difficult is people turning on him. One of the hardest things in life is having people you trust betray you. Jesus dealt with this same thing when Judas betrayed him.
Have you ever had to deal with a betrayal? What did you do in that instance? Many people unfortunately want to take revenge. Others spin into a depression, but David gives us strong advice on how to handle adversity. He tells us to allow God to protect us and keep us strong. He likens God to a strong tower that we can take refuge in. In Psalm 59 David is in his house surrounded by Saul’s soldiers who were sent to kill him.
The Psalm is both a prayer and a praise for God’s saving help. Psalms 59 is an important chapter because it reminds us of God’s unfailing love. David was hunted by people whose love had turned into jealousy which drove them to try to kill him. David had trusted friends and the king who he considered a mentor who all turned against him.
As humans, relationships are so important and necessary. We all hope and strive for dependable, long-lasting relationships but that’s not always the case. We all have dealt with broken relationships. Maybe it was the loss of a friendship, a break up, a church split, or family estrangement. At some point everyone deals with finding out that someone was not a trustworthy, dependable person like you thought. This is the hard side of human relationships. Humans are far from perfect, people will disappoint you and you will disappoint others. Regardless of the state of your relationships in this world, God’s relationship to you is unchanging and unfailing.
-Brooke Cisneros
Reflection Questions
Have you ever felt betrayed? What was your response?
When have you turned to God for strength when human relationships disappointed you? What did you find in Him?
What do you appreciate about God’s unchanging and unfailing character? How will you praise Him for this?
When we began this week on Sunday we read about Spiritual gifts in chapter 12. We saw that there is no “I” in “team” and that everyone in the church has gifts and needs to be using their gifts to help the church grow and carry out its mission.
There is one key transitional sentence at the end of chapter 12 leading into chapter 13: “And I will show you a still more excellent way.” The more excellent way is the way of love. From Monday to Friday, we have looked at love, not as an abstract idea but as a concrete set of actions. Love is made up of behaviors that are patterned after God. When we love we show people who God is and what God does.
Today, we look at how Paul closes out this “Love chapter” in verses 8-13:
Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.
So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
Here as Paul brings this section to completion he brings home the point. It’s important to be gifted, to use your gifts and talents to serve in the Church and to serve God in the world, but as important as those gifts are, they are not the ultimate or final good, they are penultimate or next to last good. To speak a prophetic word to exhort a congregation is important, to exercise the gift of speaking to the world in ways that are understood by people of different languages is valuable, and knowledge is a necessary good to a flourishing life and church, but all of these are penultimate good, not ultimate. They will give way to the eternal, but love will outlast everything. At the end of all things love for God is love.
I’m getting older and I have some serious health challenges which remind me that I am a mortal person. Unless Jesus Christ returns very soon I will one day join those who have gone to “sleep in the dust of the earth” (Daniel 12:2) awaiting the resurrection. As I get closer to my personal end, I am more aware of that which is truly most important in life. It’s not my accomplishments, it’s not how much money I’ve earned, at the end of the day what matters most is “Did I love?” Jesus summed up the entire teaching of God with 2 things: “Love God and Love others”. Paul is adding more depth and clarity to what love looks like and what we all should aspire to be. Every morning we should ask, “God, how can I love well today?” And at the end of the day ask “God, how well did I love today?”
Reflection Questions
When you hear the words “Love never ends” what comes to your mind?
Why do you think Paul says that being loving is even more important than being gifted?
When will you start to begin your days asking “God, how can I love well today?” And at the end of the day ask “God, how well did I love today?”
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Through this week of reading through 1 Corinthians 13 Paul is giving us concrete examples of what It means to love. He’s building this message into a kind of crescendo. Like a great symphony or chorale masterwork, the various themes of the story build on themselves. Here he is moving toward the peak of this love song with 4 things that love does: love bears, love believes, love hopes and love endures. That would be a lot. But he adds “all things.”
I could take time and give you a detailed exegesis of what each of these words means in the original Greek and how they are used in Corinthians and throughout Paul’s writings and the Bible as a way to arrive at their precise meanings, but I’m not going to do that. Instead, I’m going to tell you a story.
I grew up in a loving family. My father was a pastor and also a school teacher. My mom was a pastor’s wife and drove a school bus and took care of our family, keeping us fed every day precisely at 6 p.m., our clothes washed and our house neat. I felt loved and supported along with my 2 older sisters Cheryl and Debbie. I was the baby, younger than my two older siblings by 7 and 10 years. My parents were in their early 40’s, our family was settled and my oldest sister had already left the nest and gotten married. I was an active boy, a happy ‘tween who played baseball and basketball and hadn’t started noticing girls yet at eleven, but life was sweet. We went to Church every Sunday and learned about God and his love for us.
Then the world changed. My Mom found out that she was going to have another baby. Surprise! Jeff, you’re not going to be the youngest child anymore, you get to be a big brother. I couldn’t wait, after years of being the only boy, the little brother who had to listen to his older sisters who both loved me but could also be a bit bossy. Sometimes it felt like I had a Dad and 3 Moms telling me what to do. Now I would have a little brother to boss around and to show how to hit a baseball and shoot a free throw. I even had a name picked out for my little brother, Scott. I don’t know why I picked that name, but that was the name I picked for my little brother.
As it turned out, “Scott” was born a little girl, whom my parents named Christine Noelle (she was born right after Christmas so she got a very Christmasy-sounding name). Before I got to meet my little sister (I got over the fact that she was not my little brother Scott) my parents shared that she was a special child. She was born with some differences in her little body that made her look different from other babies that I had known and she would not be able to do all the things that other children did in the way that they did them. The name for my sister’s condition was called Down’s Syndrome. I didn’t fully understand what that meant, but I was glad when my parents got to bring her home and we all loved her very much.
For the next 50 years my Father and Mother, and after my father died my mother alone, provided love and care for Christine. She received cutting-edge health care. She had multiple surgeries to repair things that normally didn’t function well in children with Down’s Syndrome that would help extend her life. She started getting therapy and schooling and grew to be a happy and loving young woman.
I found out many years later, as an adult, that when she was born her doctor advised my parents to have her institutionalized. He said she would never live with a good quality of life and would be a burden to them. It would be best for them, for the family, and everyone else to let her be put away. I am so glad that my parents did not listen to the advice of their physician but to the love of God in their hearts.
My mother, who is now 90 has spent the last 50 years loving my sister Christine. Christine has spent the last 50 years loving my mom. My mom has spent 50 years bearing, believing, hoping, and enduring many trials and challenges while caring for my sister. She has been for me, a model of what Paul talks about when he describes what true love is all about.
At 90, my Mom has come to recognize her limits, she will not be around forever to care for Christine, but even now she is acting in love to help prepare my sister to live a good and flourishing life after my Mom is no longer here.
I could tell many other stories about love that I have seen and experienced in my life.
When we love in selfless ways we bear God’s image to the world.
Pastor Jeff Fletcher
Reflection Questions
Think of a person in your life who modeled a selfless love for others. What does their life teach you about God’s love?
Why does Paul connect bearing, believing, hoping and enduring all things with concrete examples of love?
What is something you can do today to show selfless love for another?
Usually, when we watch a movie we are introduced to a hero or heroic group to root for. We want the “good guy” to win and the “bad guy” to lose. We need to see Batman defeat the Joker or 007 to defeat the agents of SPECTRE.
Occasionally, though, the filmmaker sneaks one by us and we find ourselves rooting for the anti-hero. The show Breaking Bad did an outstanding job of getting us to root for Walter White who morphed from being an ordinary hard-working science teacher husband and dad to Heisenberg, the drug kingpin of the southwest who poisoned people with his methamphetamine creation.
I recently saw someone post on Reddit that he realized later in life that the movie Top Gun had us rooting for Maverick instead of Ice Man when clearly Ice Man was the far better pilot and person. “Iceman was the only pilot that: actually obeyed the rules, was a skilled flier, never killed anybody in the entire movie and correctly identified all of Maverick’s faults.” Yet we were all rooting for Maverick.
To that, I will simply add that I can’t imagine why anyone would ever root for the evil New York Yankees, Dallas Cowboys, or Alabama Crimson Tide. (I’ll stop before I make some more lifelong enemies).
The spirit of this age is constantly working to pull people away from finding joy in truth. The Bible contains an epic story about our hero, a loving God who creates a place where everything is good and populates it with people in his divine image to care for the earth, who are opposed by those he created. But God loves this creation so much that he will stop at nothing to find ways to rescue and restore that which is lost and broken and corrupt.
We are currently living amidst the ongoing battle against that which is true and right. People are daily undermining what is good and just and loving and claiming that that which is evil and corrupt is good, and that which is good and holy is evil.
For Paul, true love does not root for the villain or the anti-hero. True love does not rejoice that evil is victorious. True love finds its joy in the truth that is consistent with God and God’s love.
Jesus predicted that before the end of this age, there would be a decrease in love. In Matthew 24:12 Jesus says: “And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold.” When people reject what is true and right, when people reject the ways that God lays before us to keep a rightly ordered society, it will result in a loss of love. Lovelessness is the natural outgrowth of lawlessness.
Jesus said “I am the way, the truth and the life.” (John 14:6). If you want to have true life, you have to follow the path of Jesus, the path of truth. Paul says essentially, you can’t find love if you reject God’s truth. You can’t truly love God and love people if you don’t love God’s truth.
Today, ask yourself, “Are there things in my life that I know are the opposite of God’s truth?” If you answer “yes”, you must be willing to reorient your life to pursue God’s truth and rejoice in God’s truth to practice true love.
Pastor Jeff Fletcher
Reflection Questions
Why do you think increased lawlessness results in failure to love the truth?
Why is society becoming more enamored with anti-heroes who are opposed to truth?
Happy hump day! We’re here in the middle of the work/school week. Are you tired of hearing about love yet? Like that TV advertising guy used to say: “But wait! There’s more.”
Sometimes, the best way to learn about what something is is to consider its opposite.
In verse 5 Paul gives three more examples of what love is NOT.:[Love] does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;
For the past almost 40 years, I have lived with the most beautiful, amazing, wonderful woman. This woman has patiently served alongside me as a pastor’s wife in places far from her family and friends. She even let me drag her halfway across the world to England to start a church with a toddler in tow and she was “great with child” as in, about to pop. She has been a great wife to me and a mom to our 11 children.
I love her more than anything on the planet and her name is Karen. Sadly, the name Karen has, in recent years come to be associated with a certain kind of middle-aged woman who is, shall we say a bit entitled, difficult to please, and hard to get along with. The woman who “asks to speak to the manager” is referred to as a “Karen”. I like to tell people “My wife is named Karen but she is not a Karen.”
Why do “Karens” cause endless eye rolls? Because they are very insistent on getting their way, they tend to be easily irritated by normal human flaws and frustrating situations, and they carry resentment towards those who upset them, they are not quick to forgive and give people a second chance.
If the Apostle Paul was writing to today’s Christians he could simply say “Don’t be a Karen” and would easily get his point across. Instead, Paul might say be an Annabelle, which means “loving” or for a male be an Amadeus, which means “love of God.” (Although for many Annabelle was ruined by the horror movie franchise bearing that name. For older people like me the name Amadeus was ruined by the movie about Mozart- a talented musician and horrible person).
Instead of being a Karen who insists on having her way, be an Annabelle who, as Paul says in Philippians 2:3 learns to “value others above yourselves.” Instead of being a Karen who is irritable or easily angered be an Amadeus who is “slow to speak and slow to anger.” (James 1:19). Instead of being a Karen who is resentful, be a person who practices forgiving “70 times 7” as Jesus taught. (Matthew 18:22).
By now you might be wondering, does Paul want me to become like, a whole different person by doing all these practical, loving things? Paul wants us to allow the one perfectly loving person, Jesus, to radically take over our lives. To be so full of God’s spirit and love that “to live is Christ.”
Pastor Jeff Fletcher
Reflection Questions
Can you think of a time when you were around a “Karen”? How did that make you feel?
Can you think of a time when you acted like a “Karen”? How do you think it impacted others?
What are concrete ways that you can show love by valuing others above yourself?
Yesterday we saw that Paul is not interested in talking about love as an abstract concept. Abstract love is worthless. True love is only proven to be of value by concrete actions. In today’s reading, 1 Corinthians 13:4 Paul starts giving concrete examples.
Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude.
We could pick out any one of those examples and do a deep dive into what patience looks like versus impatience or what kindness looks like versus cruelty. But I think we could place them under one major subheading. If love is the main theme of this chapter, the subheading over these 6 things is humility. Humble people will tend to be more patient. Think about it. If I think I’m better or more important than the other person, I’m going to demand that my needs take priority and so I’m going to be impatient with the server in a restaurant, or the cashier at checkout, or the secretary at the doctor’s office. Impatient people tend to think that their time is more valuable than anyone else’s so their needs should be met now. And of course, if they are impatiently placing demands on other people they are not likely to be expressing them with kindness. Patience and kindness are concrete examples of love in the form of humility.
The other four examples Paul gives, envy, boasting, arrogance, and rudeness are all the antithesis of humility. They are all driven by pride. “Why should my coworker get the promotion, she doesn’t deserve it. I’m a far better employee than she is and I have several examples I’d like to give you about why I’m much better than she is.”
I read a story earlier this week about a famous basketball player. The NBA gives out individual accolades to players and they announced the top three finalists for defensive player of the year. The reporter asked this player how he felt about not being one of the finalists for that award. He proceeded to rant about how “The NBA just doesn’t like me. I deserve that award more than any of them, I’m the best defensive player in the league.” When I read his response I felt disgusted about his arrogance put on such vulgar display with his rude and demeaning words about literally everyone in the league. But this is how things are in the world. We’ve come to reward boastful, rude, and arrogant people.
Narcissism is no longer considered a character flaw but makes one a popular candidate seeking high political office. Have you seen how rude certain candidates are as they call others rude names like children on a playground? Humility is seen by many in the world’s eyes as weakness. But not in God’s eyes. James 4:6 says “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”
Jesus taught the importance of humility so clearly when he said “Blessed are the meek (humble) for they shall inherit the earth.” Matthew 5:5
He told a very vivid story comparing and contrasting a proud person and a humble person in Luke 18:9-14: He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
The world rewards the proud and arrogant boasters who brag about how great they are. True love is evidenced by the humble who don’t think too much of themselves but rather show patience and kindness to others. As the character Forrest Gump said: “I’m not a smart man, but I know what love is.”
Pastor Jeff Fletcher
Reflection Questions
Can you think of someone who you would describe as humble? What behaviors make you think of them as humble?
Why does our culture seem to reward arrogance in places like sports or politics?
CS Lewis said that “Humility is not thinking less of yourself but of thinking of yourself less.” How can thinking of yourself less help you to love others more?
For the rest of this week, we are going to be looking each day at small sections of one chapter in the Bible- 1 Corinthians 13. When I was a kid I was taught that 1 Corinthians 15 is the Resurrection chapter, Hebrews 11 is the Hope chapter, and 1 Corinthians 13 is the Love chapter. If you’ve ever been to a wedding ceremony there is a good chance that you’ve heard all or at least a portion of this read as part of the ceremony. Today we will look at verses 1-3:
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
This is such a timely reading for me to consider. For the past 3 years, I’ve been working toward receiving my Doctorate of Ministry from Vanderbilt Divinity School in Nashville. It’s been a lot of hard work. For my project I read hundreds of articles and books, conducted interviews, presented ideas to colleagues, tested ideas on various groups, and wrote, edited, re-wrote, and re-edited until I had a project to present to my committee. Then after my committee read it, we met and I had to defend my project thesis orally. Finally, on April 9 I passed. On May 10 I’ll graduate and receive my official title D.Min, Doctor of Ministry in Integrative Mental Health Chaplaincy. The afternoon I passed my wife Karen said “Hello, Dr. Fletcher.” I said, “That’s the only time you’re ever going to call me that, right?” She said, “Absolutely, I hope you enjoyed it.”
So, I’ve been feeling relieved, accomplished, grateful, and good about having achieved this milestone in my academic and professional career.
But God had a lot more to teach me. And Brother Paul put his finger on it. In 1 Corinthians 13:1-3 Paul is saying a lifetime of accomplishments, being a gifted speaker, full of knowledge, or being spiritually gifted with miraculous powers, in the absence of concrete acts of love, is just a bunch of noise. You can get all the degrees and accolades and knowledge, but if you don’t put love into practice, it’s a bunch of noise and worthless.
It reminds me of a story I once heard: There was a child psychologist who was famous and had written many best-selling books on parenting and how to raise children. Recently, he had spent many hours constructing a new driveway at his home. Just after he smoothed the surface of the freshly poured concrete, his neighbors’ small children chased a ball across the driveway, leaving deep footprints. The man yelled after them with a torrent of angry words. His shocked neighbor heard these words and said to him, “You’re a psychologist who’s supposed to love children.” The fuming man shouted, “I love children in the abstract, not in the concrete!”
Paul is saying in I Corinthians 13:1-3 that love in the abstract is worthless.
A few days later, God showed me what love in the concrete looks like. I shared the following story on my Facebook page recently. It resonated with a lot of people because it’s been shared hundreds of times and I’ve heard more responses to it than anything else I’ve ever posted on social media. It illustrates to me what Love in the Concrete looks like:
I met Jesus yesterday. Face to face.
He’s a cashier at a grocery store in Front Royal, Virginia.
I was on my way home from work after a busy Monday visiting sick patients at the hospital, supporting families as their loved ones face the end of life, helping people struggling with addiction and staff cope with the challenges of being full-time caregivers. I’m a chaplain and a pastor, that’s what I do all day. It’s what I’ve trained to do, studied, practiced.
But then, yesterday, out of the blue, with no warning I met Jesus working the register at a grocery store.
First, I saw him patiently help the customer ahead of me. The one who only had 3 items in her cart, was very confused trying to figure out how much she could spend because she needed to have enough left over. He was gentle and patient with her. He couldn’t be more than his late teens, maybe early 20s, but he was attentive and caring. No eye rolls or looks of frustration, just caring for this confused and frustrated woman. (I was the one who was frustrated at how long it was taking).
Then it was finally my turn to check out. He was a thin young man, wearing a cross made of horseshoe nails and wire. He smiled and asked gently, “May I pray for you?”
That was unexpected and caught me completely off guard. I said, “Yes, please.” I was so moved that this young man would take the time to notice me and ask if he could pray for me. This was more than a transactional relationship for him. He was there to do more than simply earn his paycheck and go home. He saw me as more than an object, a thing to help pay his bills, he saw me as a person, a human being made in the image of God, who has a life outside of this 5-minute transaction and has needs that can be helped by God’s intervention. I was deeply moved.
But he wasn’t finished.
“What would you like me to pray for?” What should I say? How specific should I be? Should I say, “I’m currently under treatment for 2 types of advanced cancer and trying my best to keep going?” Should I tell him about my concerns about family members that I love, my desire to help my Church grow, and all the needs of the people I visit and staff I serve in the hospital?
There wasn’t time to go into all of that, so I simply said “My health.”
He stopped and said, “So you are having health problems. I’ll pray for that.”
By then the tears were starting to well up in me and I hurriedly helped him bag my groceries so I could get out of there before I started ugly crying in the grocery store check-out line.
But he wasn’t done yet.
“What’s your name?” That about finished me off. He wasn’t just making conversation or using spiritual cliches like “I’ll pray for you” as well-intentioned people often do, but sometimes forget to actually do. I knew that he really meant it. He was and is praying for me, Jeff, who has health needs. And based on what I saw, he’s already pretty close to God. So I have a feeling God will listen attentively to his prayers.
As I sat in my car afterward waiting for the tears to subside, I had the overwhelming sense that I had just spent time with Jesus.
I met Jesus yesterday.
He works as a cashier at a grocery store in Front Royal, Virginia.
Since I shared this on Facebook I’ve had dozens of people who live locally write to me or tell me in the hospital that this same young man has left others equally in tears when he prayed for them and they, too, equally felt touched by Jesus.
This young man probably doesn’t have a doctorate in spiritual care, but you don’t need one of those to show people concrete love in the name of Jesus. Go and be Jesus wherever you are today.
Pastor Jeff Fletcher
Reflection Questions
Name a time when you were surprised by God’s love revealed to you in unexpected places.
How would you describe the difference between abstract love and concrete love?
The young man showed Jesus’ love while checking people out at the grocery store. Where can you show the love of Jesus today?
I love baseball. (If you don’t, don’t leave just yet, please). Baseball is a team sport. This was put on display for me recently. I was watching a Washington Nationals game this weekend and the commentators brought in a retired pitcher who used to play for the Nationals in their 2019 World Series winning season. During the playoffs that year, Anibal Sanchez came very close to pitching a no-hitter. It was broken up in the 8th inning by a Cardinals batter. When asked about it Sanchez said he wouldn’t have come close to having a no-hitter without his teammates making great plays. He said no pitcher should ever get sole credit for a no-hitter. It’s impossible without your teammates making plays. Sanchez wasn’t just being humble, he was 100% right. It takes a catcher to catch the pitch, fielders to make plays and throw the ball to first, outfielders to run and catch fly balls. Without good teammates, you can’t pitch a no-hitter. When a no-hitter does happen, or even rarer a perfect game, the pitcher gets the accolades and they stick a microphone in his face after the game, but it was a team effort.
The same is true for the Church. That’s what Paul was trying to get at in 1 Corinthians 12. There are a few people that are “up front” during a worship service. The worship leader, the soloist, the scripture reader, and the pastor all have visible roles and they are important. But they aren’t the only important people. Many important people are working behind the scenes in nearly invisible ways. The person running the sound system is important. The pianist, guitar player, and other musicians are important. The person who makes the coffee before Sunday School is important. The people who set up tables for Church dinners are important. The people who teach children’s church are important. The people who clean the bathrooms, take out the trash, and vacuum the floors are important. The people who buy toilet paper are important, very important. If those people don’t do their jobs what have you got? A mess. Also important are the people who type the bulletin and change the slides with the worship song lyrics, and the people who make sure that the heat is turned on or the a/c is turned on. All of these people are important. So are the people who faithfully place their financial contributions in the offering, and the people who count and collect those offerings, and the people who write checks so that the pastor can feed their family and the lights stay on. Even in smaller churches, it takes a lot of people to share their gifts and talents.
Apparently, in the Church at Corinth, there was a lot of jealousy and rivalry going on between Christians. It was causing division in the Church. The Apostle Paul wrote this letter to correct some of those problems. He wanted them to understand that Churches need to maintain unity to be healthy and carry out the mission that God has given us to do. Everyone in the church is not gifted in the same way. Some people love to be up front serving in visible ways. Some people are not gifted to speak or lead worship, but they have other gifts. I have a special needs sister, Christine, who wants to help and has claimed her gifts by handing out the church bulletins. She grabs a stack and goes to each person in Sunday School and gives them a bulletin. She wants to help by sharing her gifts. She also loves to sing very loudly in worship and her exuberance is infectious. (And she likes to say “amen” when her brother the preacher says that he’s winding up the sermon).
Read through all of the Apostle Paul’s letters in the New Testament and see how much Paul depended on others to help him carry out his ministry. Often when he wrote letters to encourage and teach Churches he was in jail for preaching the Gospel of Jesus, which was a threat to both the religious leaders and the Roman Empire. Paul depended on people to take the letters he wrote from prison and deliver them to the Churches. He also depended on people to bring him food, an extra blanket, his books and letters, and medicine. He had poor eyesight so he depended on a secretary to write down his words. He also longed for fellowship with other followers of Jesus. Paul was the face of much of the teaching and spread of the Church in the first century, but it took a team to support him.
What are some ways that you are serving in your Church? You can’t start too early. Our church has a 7-year-old help take up the offering some Sundays. As you read through 1 Corinthians 12, try not to get too bogged down thinking about the theological issues that continue to divide Christians today (are the spiritual gifts Paul mentions for now or did they stop after the first century?) It’s amazing how this chapter that Paul wrote to help a church not be divided has caused many Christians to disagree and divide. If God decides to give you the gift of miracles or healing, who am I to tell you that God did away with those gifts 1900 years ago? (if you do have the gifts of miracle or healing, please come visit me, I could use it.)
Remember, there is no “ I” in “Team”. And there is no I in Church. It’s all about how we use the gifts God has given each of us to serve.
Pastor Jeff Fletcher
Reflection Questions
What similarities do you see between sports teams or work teams and the team work needed to carry out the work of Jesus and the Church?
Are you currently using any of your gifts to help carry out the mission of the Church?
Are you willing to test your gifts and potentially experience some failures and disappointments as you seek to carry out the mission of Jesus Christ and the Church? What will you try and risk next?
Today’s Old Testament reading of Joshua 23 and 24 provides such good closure and an excellent way to wrap up the week. A farewell address from a man who had helped lead the Israelites into the promised land, and reminiscent of some of the things Moses said at the end of his life to the same people.
As I read Joshua 23 a phrase jumped out at me that was used several times. “Be careful!” As a mother, an occasional babysitter, a friend, neighbor, wife, and occupational therapist, this phrase is……one I try to avoid. Well, unless used more like Joshua. We’ve all said it, and chances are if we’ve survived this far, we’ve all had it said to us. It pops out before we even have the chance to think sometimes. What else would you say when seeing someone……dangling from the top of the climbing rainbow at Camp Mack, driving back to college, hiking with middle-aged directionally-challenged individuals in the Upper Peninsula, climbing up the bookcase while drinking from a bottle, using a walker to get around while trying to carry a cat, or pretty much any of the very exciting choices made by my “sensory seekers” at work.
The thing is, the phrase “be careful” is super abstract and subjective, and it just has very little meaning in most cases if left hanging in the air as it often is before…..kaboom/crash/oops. Given it is often said to children with little to no abstract reasoning capabilities, or in the case of many of my friends of all ages who come to see me at work, those who may not be emotionally or cognitively able to process that abstract language at the time…..it is far more useful with something concrete attached. You won’t hear it much where I work, though I assure you we witness many choices which are the opposite of careful. Instead, you will hear things like….“keep both hands on the monkey bars”, “push up from the chair first, then place your hand on the walker”, or a fun conversation I got to have recently, “Do you think that was too rough, too light, or just right?”…… “I agree. Bikes are for riding. The balls are for throwing.”
It seems as Joshua was saying farewell, he wanted the Israelites alerted to potential concerns, but he left them with excellent concrete directions. In verse 6 they are told to be careful, but at the same time instructed to know and obey the Book of the Law of Moses, to not associate with pagan nations, and to “hold fast” to the LORD. In verse 11 they are cautioned again to “be careful”, and instructed to love the LORD, to avoid intermarrying with pagan nations, throw away pagan gods, and serve the LORD alone. One would think the Israelites must have known a bit themselves by now that they kind of struggled with these things historically, and they were certainly still in reach of potential corruption and distraction. Joshua’s farewell address to them is a beautiful balance of cautious reminders and powerful directives laying out the choice they were given. Joshua chose for himself as stated in verse 15, and the people answered with their choice that day in verse 18….again in 21….and again in 24. We have the same choice, and we are blessed to have such tremendous access to the Bible for the concrete foundation on which to establish our worldview. We also have so many resources, commentaries, and Christians surrounding us with the freedom to seek clarity for the things we don’t understand or might need help getting tightened up from abstract to concrete.
So many rights could be wronged, if we all did what the Israelites said they would do….
“And the people said to Joshua, “We will serve the Lord our God and obey him.”
(Joshua 23: 24)
-Jennifer Hall
Questions:
If you tend toward being a “nervous Nellie” sort, or perhaps are just struggling with worry and being careful today, how could you redirect some of your attention to what you should be doing and who you should be trusting and serving?
If you might benefit from a few more cautious reminders in life or perhaps have some contamination from the world to throw away today, what can you extract from Joshua to apply to your life and mind?
What can you do right now to serve and obey the LORD?
Seek Grow Love 