Whose Rights? Series

Whose Rights?

1st Corinthians Series

CCCAG October 12, 2025

Scripture- 1 Corinthians 9 (CSB)

Introduction –

I’m going to step into the confessional this morning to help set up the main idea in chapter 9.

Before coming to Whitehall, I had several opportunities to take pastoral positions elsewhere. One in particular stands out — around 2005 a church in Cudahy, Wisconsin called me. I looked them up-the building was enormous, I believe it was a former Catholic church that even had a school attached, and from the outside it was beautiful.

But inside, it was a church in crisis. They had just gone through huge church fight and were down to about 20% of their congregation of a few years prior.

They needed a pastor who could step in, bring healing, and possibly save the congregation from closing its doors.

Here is the kicker-It would have been a bivocational role, just like what I do now.

But back then, I was a paramedic making far less than I do today. The district advised that if I took the assignment, I’d need to move to Cudahy as commuting from Kenosha wasn’t realistic. So, I started looking into what that would mean for my family.

And that’s when reality hit. Cudahy was a wealthy suburb of MKE so housing prices were far beyond our reach. The only way to make it work would have been to sell our home and move into an apartment, barely scraping by. I remember sitting at my kitchen table, praying hard, trying to convince myself that it was a step of faith.

But if I’m honest, it wasn’t faith that stopped me — it was fear.

I wasn’t ready to give up my comfort. I wasn’t ready to let go of my sense of security, the pride of finally owning a home after clawing my way up from nothing.

Homeownership was a badge of accomplishment for me, proof that despite my childhood’s efforts to destroy me, I’d preserved and made it. And when God asked me to lay that down, I couldn’t do it.

In the end, I told the district and the church no. On paper, it was a practical decision. But looking back, it wasn’t just practicality — it was me holding on to what felt like mine.

My right to security.

My right to comfort.

My right to keep what I had worked so hard for.

Most of us have had moments like that. Maybe it’s not about selling a house or moving across the state, but sooner or later, God asks each of us:

“Will you trust Me enough to lay down what you’ve earned — for what I’ve called you to do?”

In other words, will you surrender your rights and trust God? It was a lesson I had to learn the hard way. As we mentioned last week about the nation of Israel in the desert after the Exodus- I had to take another lap.

Giving up our rights is a hard thing to do.

In fact, We live in an age obsessed with rights.

People march for them, post on social media about them, and build entire identities around them. “I have a right to speak my mind.” “I have a right to live how I want.” “I have a right to be happy.”

But what happens when those “rights” collide with the cross of Jesus Christ?

For the Christian, it should be simple. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 6:19–20, “You are not your own; you were bought at a price.”

That’s one of those bible verses that is easy to quote but hard to live out day to day.

Because if I’m bought, then I don’t own myself. My rights belong to the One who purchased me.

Chapter 9 of 1 Corinthians is Paul’s living example of that truth. After defending the right of ministers to be supported, he immediately lays that right down.

Not because he’s weak or timid — but because he’s free of worrying about tomorrow, which makes him free enough to surrender himself to Jesus Christ and the gospel mission with everything he has within him.

So one of the questions we will be answering this morning isn’t whether we have rights — but whose rights they really are.

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The bible really lays this out over a couple of chapters.

We have to keep in mind that the chapters within the bible weren’t placed there until about 1227 AD by Stephen Langton, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the verses not until 1551.

I’m saying this because chapters 8 and 9 flow together like two halves of the same heartbeat.

In chapter 8, Paul deals with eating meat offered to idols. He says, “Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.” Mature believers might know that idols are nothing, yet love might lead them to lay down their freedom to eat meat offered to an idol so a weaker believer isn’t harmed.