Introduction
Let me begin with a discipleship question: how will you follow Jesus in prayer and dependence on God this week?
Main Points
In this lesson shaped by Calvary Boise's teaching on DISTRACTED: The Focus of Our Lives, Christ invites us to receive truth with humility, practice repentance, and walk in faithful obedience.
Sin and Salvation
how's it going my name is pastor Tucker mail and I'm gonna be taking us through a very exciting first week of a new. study for our church in the New Testament book of 1st Corinthians so if you could turn there now we are gonna start for. this week and it will be for the next couple of months we'll be studying this very timely encouraging and challenging letter to the. church one of the themes in this book is the theme of distracted Nassim of losing the proper focus it happens in all areas. of life it's some of some of you right now aren't listening to what I'm saying I'm sure because you just got an email. alert in your phone and you couldn't help but look at it and that is the world we live in real life and there's. no more real life than the way that happens to our spirituality and our pursuit of God and we're gonna look at this letter. to give answers as to what the focus of our life should be and how to keep it the focus the main thing is. to keep the main thing the main thing and so let's look at that we're gonna start in Chapter 1 of 1st Corinthians and. we're I'm gonna jump into the middle of the chapter starting in verse 10 so that we can really get right out of the. gate the point of the letter we're gonna retro actively look at the verses that lead up to this in our sermon but I. want to start in verse 10 because in verse 10 the Apostle Paul who is writing to this church in Corinth is gonna tell. them why he's writing and this is what he says first chapter 1 verse 10 now I plead with you brethren by the name. of our Lord Jesus Christ that you all speak the same thing and that there be no divisions among you but that you be. perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment this is the bar that Paul is setting for the church the. way the church functions the way the church gathers the way the church lives in community the way the church does outreach to the. non-believing world that they would be unified in the same mind of Christ they do that and we're gonna spend months looking at that. because anyone who has lived in a community or gone.
Grace and Justification
to a church taking part in a household of roommates or a family members you know that to live with one mind to speak. the same thing believer or not is one of those difficult things you can do and it takes a lot of discernment and a. lot of grace and a lot of power to achieve it and we're gonna look at some of the specifics of that now Paul. is writing this retroactive Lee and I want to give a little bit of context to this letter and to where we're at as. a church Paul is writing not to a church that he doesn't know the context of this and you can find the complete story. of this in Acts chapter 17 Paul was the church planter of this church before Paul came to Corinth there was not a church. believing community there was a Jewish community he came from Athens into Corinth he was a missionary of the first church and he was. always looking for that next place where he could come deliver the gospel and allow a community to form around it and when that. happened in Corinth a community did form he started with his method of going into the synagogue and preaching to the Jewish believers or. to the Jewish people and then afterwards he would go into the Gentile community and through that after about a year and a half. of him preaching and working with believers in the community also doing some by vocational work on the side of the tent maker after. about a year and a half a community of believers had been established there's a really thriving young community in a very culturally rich. City and as was the case for Paul's life it was time for him to move on and he went to his next missionary. calling in a new place and he left the church into the hands of new leadership one of the leaders that would follow Paul. in leading this church in Corinth was a man named Apollo's and we're gonna read about him and look at some of the things. that come up through his leadership as well but here's the context of this church in Corinth and I think it's good for us. as a church to be mindful of this the context is this is a CH Church that had a pioneering a visionary planter come. and established the community that leader has moved on.
Grace and Justification
and now there's new leadership in place and it's a church living in the midst of a culture that is not easy to minister. Christ in it brings challenges from the outside into the church and when I think about that context I can't help but think about. where we're at as a church not long ago our pioneering visionary leader transitioned to leadership and that's the leadership that we now have. a second generational leadership and we ourselves also live within a culture of our city and country that is challenging to be a believer. it's hard to go out and do outreach it's also easy for us to be influenced more by our culture than by Christ and. so this is a very similar season and when there is change of infrastructure change of leadership when there's challenges from the outside and. with the inside what often happens is change brings challenge and that's exactly what is happening to this church in Corinth and I so. appreciate the flow of the Canon of Scripture that we have and it perfectly lines up with our New Testament studies over the past. three years it starts with the book of Acts after the Gospels Jesus passes off the church the book of Acts and if you. remember our study from three years ago the book of Acts is really about establishing that believing community it's the power of the Spirit. poured out preaching to win 3,000 new believers and then the missionary movement of the church starts and then from Acts we study Romans. and what is Romans is here's the amazing truth of the power of the gospel for all of you people who are part of. the community's expanse the book of Acts missionaries those who want to take the gospel some where it is all the gospel grace alone. by faith alone in Christ alone his righteousness apart from our own is the power to save amen and then right from Romans you. come to first Corinthians after the community has been established and the gospel has been the established as the cornerstone of that community of. Christ it is now time for the Canon of Scripture to say and now we got to figure out how to get along that's. floo of all of this gospel proclaim community established and when you get a bunch of sinners into a sanctuary that are redeemed by. the blood of the Lord what happens is what is.
Sin and Salvation
in first Corinthians and in Calvary Chapel and then all the church movements in between and now leadership has to come in and say. we've got to keep our focus to stay unified in one mind in Christ and this is what happens in the church in Corinth. starting in verse 11 it says for it has been declared to me concerning you my brethren by those of khloe's household that there. are contentions among you so essentially if you can imagine the picture Paul has moved on from this church that he planted and he's. passed off the leadership and by some occurrence maybe it was that they crossed paths or there was a letter sent to Paul but. somehow he runs into someone from a household within the Church of Corinth called the household of khloé this household represents believers that were. there in Corinth and they reach out to Paul and they talk to him and he says it's so good to see you or. it's so good to hear from you and you think back to your own relationships as you've left a community or you left your. old college or you left your old sports team or your left your old workplace and you run into someone and you say how's. the old gang how's the team doing how's the workplace do it how's Boise doing and if you're like a current resident voice you. might say well that's been changing a lots been moving and shaking since she left and that's exactly what Paul has heard as he. runs into this old comrade in Corinth and says how's everything going this person from the household of Chloe says has some difficulty Paul. if we're gonna be if we're gonna be honest there's some challenges that have come up and the book of Corinthians for those of. you who have studied it or know where this is going well will be a book dedicated to Paul giving answer to all of. the stuff that comes up as the community of Christ works through the challenging changes of their church let me give you an overview. of some of the tensions in the church that we're studying and let's see if you can relate to some of them as we. go through our own gathering of the community of Christ one of the updates that this household member gave him was that the finances. are getting a little weird Paul to be to.
Grace and Justification
be very forthright you know you gave us this model of bi-vocational ministry and you were doing the tent making and it was. good and but since you've left nobody wants to give to the cause of the church nobody's gathering together to provide the money that's. needed for us to do what God's calling us to do that's all of chapter 16 have you ever felt the tension of finances. at the church have you ever felt the tension of like what are we supposed to do should we really be preaching about giving. all the time or should we really be passing baskets or what are we doing with the money finances come up in this first. church and Paul is going to address that then there's another thing that has come up Paul that I should probably tell you about. it's not just that people don't want to give there's also some disputes about what you taught us doctrinally the theology is now in. dispute maybe it's mine or maybe it's major some people in this church in Corinth are saying that the resurrection isn't real I don't. know if that's a big deal or not but some people are saying that the life that we have now is all that we. have and to love God and serve Him but to really make it all about this life because after this life there's nothing and. that dispute will be handled by Paul brilliantly and beautifully and I'm excited for the study of this in chapter 15 yes the resurrection. is one of the things that must be brought back into focus chapters 12 through 14 will cover another one of these tensions that. maybe just maybe you can relate to in these chapters the update given to Paul must have had something to do with their worship. style they couldn't really agree they get together and some people when they get together are so excited and moved by the Lord they. can't help but just share their gifts just randomly almost they can't help but speak in tongues and to blurt out prophesy and to. say all of these things that comes their heart because they're so on fire for the Lord and the problem that they're having is. that other people find that distracting and now there's some 10 that has exists there's some division that has been caused because there's now. two camps of people that can't really agree.
Grace and Justification
on worship style and we don't really need to study that because that's not a problem for the modern church is it pause for. laughter of course it is if you if you ride around in your car and you go from station to station to station that. is a lesson on the tension of worship style because for every genre of music and for every style of radio communication there is. someone that absolutely relates to it and there's someone that cannot wait to change the dial there are some of us who love it. loud there's something like a quiet there's something like it bright there's some who like it dark there are some good meet for three. hours and then want to fellowship afterwards and there are some of you who cannot wait for me to be done right now worship. style will always be tension and it happened in the first Church happens now in our church and almost every Church you'll ever visit. there will be something about the way the gathering happens that will not align perfectly with your preference that's something that we'll look at. as we study chapters 12 through 14 another bit of tension that is happening in this church that maybe we can relate to there. was a question of how to find that balance between doing amazing outreach and being that City on top of the hill that welcomes. people into the community and lets all people feel welcomed and greets all people in and the balance also of but not compromising we. want our righteousness and our growth and our maturity in Christ to be representative not just by what we proclaim but how we live. and in this mixed community of Jewish believers and pagan believers and all coming to Christ with different styles of worship there's also questions. of dietary restrictions and there's questions of what to do with the false idols of or the meat offered to false idols some people. find it offensive to eat that and other people like they're not real idols let's just eat it so outreach an inner jerk on. flicked will come up if you ever felt that one how much should we be a tractional bringing the outsider and how much can. we how much do we have to stand on the truth without compromise there's tension in that and there has been since this church. in Corinth received this letter that's chapters 8 through.
Faith and Obedience
10 if you haven't found something that touches a nerve yet maybe this will and this has to do with the culture that we. live in as we're getting this update Paul's listening to what's happening in Corinth since he left and the list just keeps going and. going and going and this member of the household of cloy says also I should mention that there's a lot of sexual confusion there's. some very strange things happening within the church there are some people who are proclaiming to believe but they aren't changing the way that. we look at sexual purity we don't know what to do with them and then there are some topics that are just so awkward. I'm not going to mention it until I have to when we go through that section of the word that's chapters 6 & 7. I think that we should be able to relate that to that in the world that we live in one of the biggest challenges. to our faith in the Christian community across the world is how to be welcoming but also stand on the truth when it comes. to sexual purity the list goes on and there's more categorical things that Corinthians will deal with one of the things that had to. be updated is that there were some legal disputes not with non-believers suing believers but it's the division is happening so intensely within this. church that believers are taking each other to court Paul must have been blown away that the division within the church has gotten so. drastic that now Christians and believers are suing one another this is an overview of the tension that Paul is going to speak into. and if you're like me and it's something that I have to think about as I speak into the tensions that exist and will. always exist in a gathering of this size you might ask yourself where do you even start where do we start to start address. the tensions of these very valid feelings where camps can separate based off the way that you answer some of these difficulties where do. you start when the tension comes up within your friendships when the tension comes up in your own household when the tension comes up. in your church where do we start do we prioritize the list of the first Corinthian tensions we could do that it would be. a challenging list to make because all of these all of.
Conclusion
We return to the opening teaching: discipleship is not just information, it is transformation through faith and obedience to Jesus. If we receive His Word and walk it out, He will shape us into people who endure and bear fruit.
Lord Jesus, help me hear Your Word, obey it with faith, and grow as Your disciple. Amen.
Conclusion
We return to the opening teaching: discipleship is not just information, it is transformation through faith and obedience to Jesus. If we receive His Word and walk it out, He will shape us into people who endure and bear fruit.
Closing Prayer
Lord Jesus, help me hear Your Word, obey it with faith, and grow as Your disciple. Amen.