If I were to mention 1 Corinthians 13 to most of you, it would be recognized as the “Love Chapter” and that is true. The main part of the chapter is about love and we hear it preached on and read at weddings, in particular the section between 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.
And that is a great passage of Scripture, I have preached on it numerous times, referenced it countless times have read it at every wedding I have performed over the past thirty some years.
However that is not the passage we are going to look at today, instead we are looking at one verse toward the very end of the passage and that is 1 Corinthians 13:11 When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things.
So what are the childish things that Paul is talking about here? He’s not talking about his physical life, he is in the midst of a spiritual discussion and he’s talking about the natural progression of our spiritual life. Time and time again the analogy is used of a new life, a new birth a new beginning in regards to our relationship with God. But it doesn’t stop there; the New Testament teaches us that our relationship with God may start with a new Birth but it doesn’t end there. Just like our natural birth is followed by a maturing process, that is growing up, should be the same with our spiritual life.
Let’s see what the Bible says about the process, Hebrews 6:1-2 So let us stop going over the basic teachings about Christ again and again. Let us go on instead and become mature in our understanding. Surely we don’t need to start again with the fundamental importance of repenting from evil deeds and placing our faith in God. You don’t need further instruction about baptisms, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment.
Paul is telling us that there are basic teachings each one of us needs in our life. And he’s telling us that we shouldn’t get stuck at that point in our spiritual lives. I was going to say that sometimes as Christians we are like a stuck record, playing the same thing over and over again, and then I realized that analogy would be lost on most people today.
And we need to know the basics before we move on, but once we do know the basics then we are supposed to move on. So what are those basic teachings?
1) Repentance From deeds That Lead To Death So the first thing that we need to learn about new beginnings is repentance. But the question is, what is repentance? Well it literally means “a reversal”. Peter defined it best in Acts 3:19 Now repent of your sins and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped away.
Do you see it? Repent then, and turn to God. The changing of direction. You see all too often we confuse repentance with remorse, that is being sorry. And well remorse is a part of repentance it is certainly not all of repentance. Because we can be sorry that we did something but continue to do it, right. Repentance though is being so sorry that you’ve done something that we stop doing.
Friend of mine has a sister who had a son who liked to play in the toilet when he was about 18 months old. It was kind of neat, a bucket of water that was always full. And so on various occasions she would discover him elbow deep in the loo. Well you know the story she would slap his hand, tell him that he was naughty and he would say “sorry mommy”. End of story, not quite. Because he still liked playing in the toilet. So even though there was remorse, there wasn’t repentance because the next time he got a chance he was back doing it again.
It’s amazing how many toilets we as grown and supposedly mature adults can find to play in. And when we get caught we say, “I’m sorry” and we are, right up to the point that we can find another toilet to play in.
And so we need to repent. But what do we need to repent of; well the bible says we need to Repent of Acts that lead to death. Ok what are they, things like jumping off tall buildings, stepping out in front of speeding trucks, teasing pit bulls. Nope because Paul’s not talking about a physical death as much as he’s talking about a spiritual death.
Paul tells us in Romans 6:16 that sin leads to death, and James tells us in James 1:15 that sin gives birth to death, and of course we can’t forget the scripture that everybody knows and that is Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death.
And what is sin, well theologically speaking sin is a “transgression of the known law of God.” So basically sin is disobedience to God.
Well preacher I don’t have to worry about that because I’m not a sinner, oh yes you are, the bible, God’s word says in Romans 3:23 For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard.
And all means all, so all means you. So we repent, we turn away from sin, and we turn to God, and turning to God means that we seek to be obedient to those things that he wants us to do.
Well you say how do I know what God wants? Well sometimes God speaks to our heart and through the Holy Spirit convicts us of something in our life and we know that it is wrong. Those are areas that usually aren’t spoken directly to in the scriptures. But realize that there are many areas of our lives that the Holy Spirit doesn’t have to convict us personally because he’s already given us the book.
The Holy Spirit shouldn’t have to tell you that you shouldn’t kill somebody because the book says “thou shalt not kill.” You shouldn’t need personal convictions about witchcraft or astrology because the book says that those things are of the devil.
Shouldn’t need God tapping you on the shoulder about sexual sin because the book says that the beauty of the sexual act is reserved for members of the opposite sex who are married, to one another. Hatred discord, jealousy, drunkenness, idolatry, adultery, covetousness, lust. All of those things are covered in the book.
When you repent of deeds that lead to death you are saying “I am going to endeavour by the power given to me by God to no longer do those things that displease him.” So instead of doing things which are contrary to the will of God we turn and seek to do things which are of the will of God. And if we spend our time doing what God wants us to do that should keep us out of trouble.
So then we’ve repented as a beginning to our new life, so what next? Well the next thing the book says in 2) Faith in God,
It was 1978 and I was fishing with dad on the Ralli 2, a 132 foot fishing boat out of Québec city. We had put into Paspébiac Québec for a few days to do some painting and general repairs on the boat and I was put in charge of repainting the name on the stern. Well we had finished one side of the boat and we let the lines go, went out in the middle of the harbour turned around and came back alongside the wharf. We had left one of the fellows on the wharf to take the lines and make us secure when we came back and John ran from rope to rope making them secure to the bollards on the wharf.
After we had shut the engines down we all got back to our assigned tasks. I collected my small brushes and my tin of blue paint and sauntered on back to the stern. And as I had done countless other times I placed my can of paint and my brush on the rail, and then to get in a better position to perform my artistic endeavours I vaulted over the rail and landed on the rope which held the stern to the wharf, I was younger, thinner and much more agile. Do you remember I said that John went from rope to rope making sure that they were secure? Right, he missed one. It was like a road runner and coyote cartoon because I distinctly remember hearing the rope hit the water before I became aware of the fact that it was no longer under my feet. And so I dropped and caught the rail by my fingertips. There I hung, by my fingertips, the stern swept in low and so I had nothing to put my feet against to pull myself up and so there I hung.
I didn’t want to yell because I was afraid that if I yelled I would panic, and I knew that if I yelled and I panicked then I would let go. Now normally that’s not a problem, I can swim and it was only a four foot drop into the harbour, but I was wearing work boots, and coveralls, and the harbour was home to a fish processing plant which wasn’t all that environmentally sensitive. I knew that if I fell into that mess that dad would probably find it easier to let me drown then to clean me up and so there I hung. And very quietly and very calmly I said “help” and so there I hung.
It was then that I heard the conversation between my father and his twin brother “Where’d Denny go?” Clint asked, “Oh he’s squatting down on the stern line” replied my father and very quietly and very calmly I said “help” and so there I hung.
Then I heard words that restored my faith in my blood relatives because my uncle said, “I wonder how he’s making out, let’s check” and they began walking to where I was. And I said “help” very calmly and very quietly and there I hung. It was only a fifty foot walk back to where I was but Clint and dad stopped every so often to look at and comment upon various pieces of equipment, and there I hung. Finally after several eternities they arrived and I can still hear my father’s voice as he leaned over, looked at me and asked, “what are you doing down there?” and without thinking I replied, “oh, just hanging around.” And then dad & Clint reached over and took a wrist each and said very plainly “let go”. Right! But before they could help me I had to believe that they could hold me and lift me.
Before your repentance will do any good you have to believe that God truly has the power to forgive sin. Remember that scripture in the book of Acts when Peter was preaching, he said Acts 3:19 Now repent of your sins and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped away.
When you repent, God wipes out your sins but you have to be willing to believe that. You have to let go of everything else and place your faith in the forgiving grace of Jesus Christ.
Paul says it best in Hebrews 11:6 And it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that God exists and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him.
Repentance is the first beginning of our new life, but you will need to have faith in God to believe that repentance will actually work, and that your sins will be forgiven.
Ephesians 2:8 God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God.
Did you catch that? It is by grace that you have been saved, the grace of God. But it is through faith that grace is able to save you. God can only save you when you are willing to pull your fingers away from the rail.
And so we have started down the path of our new life, we have repented from our sins, we have had the faith to believe that with that repentance comes forgiveness and that is given by God’s grace. So what is the next step? What is the next component in this foundation we are laying.
Well. Paul tells us in this verse that the next step is 3) Instructions About Baptism. We really don’t put enough emphasis on baptism; I am as guilty of that as anyone. But we have to remember that when Jesus gave us his last command, we weren’t just supposed to tell people about Him. Matthew 28:19 Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. So, after we had told them about Jesus and after they became Christians then we were supposed to baptise them.
Now I know that we can get into great long discussion about how a person is baptised. The Anglican pastor and the Wesleyan pastor were discussing that very thing. The Anglican pastor asked “is knee deep enough” and the Wesleyan said “no it has to be all the way” and so the Anglican said “well is waist deep enough” “no” said the Wesleyan “all the way” “well” said the Anglican, “how about just above the eyebrows.” “No, no, no it has to be all of them, all of them do you understand” yelled his exasperated companion. “See” said the Anglican “all that really matters is that little bit on top.”
Sometimes we waste so much time arguing over how we should baptise them when they get saved that we never get around to helping people get saved.
Not only am I a Wesleyan but I come from a Baptist background so I believe in baptism by immersion. They were good and bad, they ought to get good and wet. But listen up, really when it comes right down to it, we can argue the “how to” of baptism day and night and I’m not going to change your mind and you are not going to change mine. It’s kind of like golf, gives you something to do but really isn’t world changing right?
On the other hand I am unmovable on the issue of believer’s baptism. In the New Testament when somebody got saved they got baptised. And they didn’t get baptised before they believed. Baptism by itself won’t do anything but get you wet. You go down a sinner and come up a wet sinner.
There is no saving grace in baptism; baptism is simply an outward demonstration of an inward decision. And so even though baptism won’t save you, Jesus has said that once you are saved then you need to be baptised.
So here is the question: if you are a Christ follower and you have never been baptized, why not? And there is no good answer.
And Paul goes go, after baptism he mentions 4) The Laying On Of Hands. “I don’t know pastor sounds faintly charismatic to me.” In the context of the New Testament there were various reasons for the laying on of hands. 1) for healing 2) the Apostles used it for the bestowing the Holy Spirit 3) for ordaining for ministry and 4) the giving of gifts. “Boy that all sound faintly charismatic doesn’t it.” Well actually it’s biblical. You see the bible talks a lot about gifts, and not just gifts like tongues and healing and prophecy. Paul tells us in Romans 12 that there are the gifts of serving, teaching, encouragement, giving, leadership, and mercy.
And in 1 Corinthians 12 Paul tells us about some more gifts like, healings, prophecy, and yes tongues (although me might differ on what those tongues are with some you can’t deny that they are in the bible.) The gift of helps, administration and hospitality. Do you see where we are going, every one of us is gifted in some area for the good of the body. The concept of laying on hands is simply the fact that we need to acknowledge that every one of us needs to recognise their gift and be willing to use it for the good of the kingdom.
The last two things mentioned are the 5) Resurrection of the Dead, And Eternal Judgement. In the long term we are all going to die. Every one of us is eventually going to die, and the last part of the foundation of our faith is simply an acknowledgment of why we need the first parts.
From the very beginning Christianity has been a religion of immortality. Not only is there a life to be lived on this earth but there is another life when this one is through. People say “Praise God, I have been born again I’m going to live forever.” Got news for you, you are going to live forever whether you have been born again or not. The only difference will be the address.
It is your choice whether you will spend eternity with God, or without God. And that is the last point, eternal judgement. Regardless of what you hear about reincarnation there is only one trip around and then we face God. Hebrews 9:27 And just as each person is destined to die once and after that comes judgment. die once, not twice, not three times, but once. And that judgment will be based on whether or not you have laid the foundation properly.
So where are you at this morning? Have you got the basics down? Is there anything missing? Repentance, Faith, Baptism? And are you ready to leave childish ways behind you?
Free PowerPoint may be available for this message, email me at denn@cornerstonewesleyan.ca
