Who Are We?

WHO ARE WE?

I Corinthians 2:14-3:4

Society classifies people . Economically people are rich or poor. In the social realm, people are cultured or uncultured. Academically you have the educated, the intellectual, and those who are illiterate. People are always trying to classify us.

Even the Bible classifies people.

1 Cor. 10:32

Paul breaks all of humanity down according to their spiritual response to the things of God. In Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, he refers to three types of people: the Natural Man, the Spiritual Man, and the Carnal Man. Now, every person in this church will fall into one of the categories Paul talks about. That is, you are a natural man, a carnal man, or a spiritual man. I think it is very important for us to find out for sure which one we are. I want to look into this text and ask this simple question: Who Are we? Let's examine these three categories of people and see which group we fit into.

I. NATURAL 1 Cor. 2:14

A. A person, who chooses to be influenced by the passions, desires, appetites, and senses of the flesh rather than by the promptings of the Holy Spirit.

1. Such a person can comprehend physical things but not spiritual things.

2. All people are natural, because of the fall of Adam and Eve.

3. Each person must be born again through the atonement of Jesus Christ to cease being a natural man.

B. Simply put, the natural man is a lost men!

1. He may be a church member, he may be a good, moral person, but he is lost.

C. He Does Not Appreciate The Things Of God –

1. The things of God are foolishness to the natural man.

a. The word foolishness gives us the English word "Moron."

b. To the natural man, the things of God, and spiritual things are moronic.

c. He doesn't understand or appreciate any type of spiritual expression.

2. When he is exposed to the things of God, he becomes very uncomfortable and will usually respond in one of three ways.

a. drop out,

b. move out

c. Lash out.

D. He Does Not Apprehend The Things Of God –

1. This literally means that he is not equipped to receive the things of God.

a. He is spiritually dead in his sins,

b. Eph. 2:1

i. He simply cannot grasp spiritually things.

2. A man who is physically dead cannot respond to physical stimulus.

a. Similarly, a person who is spiritually dead cannot respond to any spiritual stimulus!

E. The natural man is a sinner in a threefold sense.

1. By his connection with Adam—Rom. 5:12.

2. Because he has Adam's nature—Rom. 5:14.

3. Because he has committed sins—Rom. 3:23.

II. CARNAL 1 Cor. 3:1-4

A. Warren Wiersbe in his New Testament Commentary describes the carnal man as – “the immature Christian, the one who lives on a childhood level because he will not feed on the Word and grow.”

B. The carnal man is a believer, Romans 10:1-3

1. He has two natures just like the spiritual man, but he is dominated by the old nature.

2. He quenches the influence of the Spirit of God in his life.

a. Often, the carnal believer cannot be discerned from the lost sinner!

b. A good example of this was a man by the name of Lot.

3. When we see him in Genesis 13 and 19, we assume that he was a lost man.

a. when we read 2 Pet. 2:7, you discover that he was a righteous, but carnal man.

4. Carnality in the life of God's children is the reason the church lacks power and influence in the community!

C. Baby believers

1. Paul says that the carnal man is a baby.

a. He has started out the right way; he has been born again, but he has progressed no farther.

2. It is fitting and normal to start out as a baby, but is tragic to remain one!

a. The carnal believer suffers from "arrested development".

b. They haven't grown as they should.

i. By the way, how long you have been saved has nothing to do with your level of maturity.

3. The tragedy of this is that God did not save us to stay babies.

a. He saved us to grow into the image of Jesus,

i. Rom. 8:29;

ii. Eph. 4:13.

D. Milk or Meat –

1. The carnal believer is still on milk spiritually.

a. Milk is fine for babies, 1

i. Pet. 2:2,

b. However, as we mature, we are supposed to move beyond the milk of the Word into the meatier places of the Word,

i. Heb. 5:12-14.

2. Here is the very reason some people are not growing in the Lord.