1 Corinthians (Program #38) – Dealing with Eating of Sacrifices to Idols (3)

1 Corinthians chapter 9 shows us two very significant factors in the ministry of the apostle Paul. First we see how pure he was. Pure in a sense that he had only one motive to be wholly in Christ and for Christ. He sought nothing for his personal gain. Second Paul was also faithful. Faithful because he saw his commission from the Lord in the gospel is a kind of stewardship with which he had been entrusted. Listen to these verses in 1 Corinthians

9:16-17 “For if I preach the gospel, I have no boast, for necessity is laid upon me; for woe to me if I do not preach the gospel. If I do this of my own will, I have a reward; but if not of my own will, I am entrusted with a stewardship.”

To read words such as these can’t help but convict us because we all become keenly aware of the impurity of our motives when we receive light from God’s word. But rather be discouraged we should take heart. For in other of Paul’s writing he opens the door to help all of God’s children to as such pure living and in such a faithful serving.

In Galatians
2:20 “I am crucified with Christ;”

and in this book 1 Corinthians chapter

6:17 “But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit.”

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1 Corinthians (Program #37) – Dealing with Eating of Sacrifices to Idols (2)

Paul’s way of writing in 1 Corinthians chapter 9 indicates that the church in Corinth had doubts and questions about him and about his apostleship. Why else would he opened the chapter in such a bold way?

“Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you not my work in the Lord?  If to others I am not an apostle, yet surely I am to you; for you in the Lord are the seal of my apostleship. My defense to those who examine me is this.”

Here is a striking account of the apostle commission with the majority of the New Testament revelation forced to make a bold defense of his own apostleship. But in so doing much was reveal about the Corinthians that were doubting him and much is revealed about us as well.

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1 Corinthians (Program #36) – Dealing with Eating of Sacrifices to Idols (1)

After opening the book of 1 Corinthians in a very spiritual way, the apostle Paul then turned his attention to several practical matters in the middle chapters.

Chapter 7 for instance deals with marriage. Chapter eight with eating, our diet. These are some of the most basic and practical of all human items. Yet as he begins this fellowship on eating in chapter 8 he inserts a very wonderful and very spiritual phrase. Listen to the first verse of chapter

8:1 “Now concerning things sacrificed to idols, we know that we all have knowledge. knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.”

Building up, a theme that runs through out this book. And a very important theme for all of us God’s people to understand.

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1 Corinthians (Program #22) – Feeding, Drinking, Eating, Planting, Watering, Growing

The believers in the church of Corinth that Paul was writing to in 1 Corinthians had a number of problems. But not just problems that could be remedy by giving them advice or spiritual counsel. The apostle spoke to them in a very strong way in chapter three telling them that they are infants, fleshy and even fleshly. These are symptoms of a very poor spiritual condition.

But after such a sober word he proceeds to show them the way out of such spiritual poverty not by teaching them but by giving them many marvelous expressions all pointing them to their real lack which was to eat and drink of Christ and to become planters, feeders and waterers in the Body of Christ.

1 Corinthians 3:2 & 6, “I gave you milk to drink, not solid food, for you were not yet able to receive it. ….. I planted, Apollos watered, but God caused the growth. ”

We can’t have too much eating, drinking, enjoying of our dear Lord Jesus.

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Exodus (Program #44) – Drinking the Water of Life (2)

Not all divine secrets in the Bible are revealed in a clear and evident way.  Sometimes God reveals His secrets in a hidden way.  The Bible contains many such hidden secrets that require the Lord’s shining to see clearly.  For example, the Bible commands man to believe in order to be saved, but where does it tell us how to believe?  The Bible also tells us to eat and drink of Christ, but how do we eat and how do we drink?  Don’t miss this classic presentation on this life study.

Yesterday, we saw very strikingly that eating and drinking in the Bible are not simply metaphors for us to contemplate.  They are genuine, crucial matters revealed in Scripture.  The Lord clearly said in John that if we don’t know how to eat and drink, we will not have the eternal life in us in a practical way.  It seems that all of us as Christians need to pay our full attention to these matters.

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Exodus (Program #43) – Drinking the Water of Life (1)

Sometimes the most obvious things in life are the easiest to overlook.  This is often also the case with the Bible.  Have you ever noticed it begins with man’s food and water and it ends the same way in Revelation.  Revelation 22, the last chapter of the Bible shows us a river of water of life and on this side and on that side of the river is the tree of life.  If we miss the matter of eating and drinking in the Bible, we miss a major portion of what God desires to reveal to man.

In a sense the Bible ends the way it began; a flowing river and the tree of life.  In fact what man takes in has a lot of implications.

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Exodus (Program #37) -The Heavenly Diet—Manna (3)

The food that man eats is the focus of the Bible from the first pages of Genesis to the final pages of Revelation.  Man’s eating represents what he takes into his being.  Manna, the heavenly bread given by the Lord for His people in Exodus is one of the Bible’s meaningful types of our Lord Jesus.  A careful consideration of the details and characteristics of manna can open up a great insight and appreciation of Christ.

The last couple of days we’ve been looking at the characteristics or details that are given in Scripture related to manna.  Yesterday in particularly we saw 3 items that first it came from heaven, second it came with the dew of the morning and third it came every morning.

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Colossians (Program #21) – Christ the Body of All Shadows and Christ versus Mysticism

Paul the Apostle is marvelous in his writing in the book of Colossians. He begins with a universal presentation of Christ, and not just Christ, but Christ in us the hope of glory. But then he turns and becomes very practical in leading us into the genuine experience of such a Christ. Listen to verses 16 and 17 in Chapter 2, “Let no one therefore judge you in eating and in drinking or in respect of a feast or of a new moon or of the Sabbath, which are a shadow of the things to come, but the body is of Christ”. Here, he begins to remove things like the law and angels and anything else that represents God to us in an indirect way. For God’s desire is that nothing stands between us and Him no matter how good or how religious it may seem.

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