One of the most crucial aspects of discipleship is learning the importance of the church. It’s hard to overstate how much God cares for and treasures his church. We are told in Ephesians 5:25 that Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. Further, we see in Ephesians 3:21 that God’s design is to be glorified “in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations.” If the church is not one of our richest and deepest passions, then we are simply out of step with our Lord.
Yet, even though we may acknowledge the delight the church is to our God and how crucial it is in discipleship that we come to understand the importance of the church, I think we can acknowledge that love for the church, passion for the church, and the priority of the church doesn’t always come easily or naturally to us. Even our own discipleship may have worked against the importance of the church – of a community of believers in our lives with whom we are in covenant to love them as ourselves.
The discipleship I received in my upbringing was often focused solely on me. The importance of my personal devotion to the Lord, my personal holiness, my consideration of how the Lord might use me, and prayer concerning what the Lord might have for me in life were all laid out for me as if these things made up the epitome of Christian living. Even worship, I was taught (or perhaps intuited) was at its height when I could be alone with God, away from other people. In this sense, corporate worship was a distraction to this great pinnacle of worship, so that the temptation was there to try to block everyone else out of your mind. I guess I saw corporate worship as no more than a bunch of people having their own personal quiet time in the same room together, trying not to be too distracted by one another.
The idea that holiness must necessarily be a corporate concern was truly shocking to me. The idea that when I think about living a holy life that I must concern myself with how my brothers and sisters, with whom I am in covenant, are walking was quite a change in perspective in perspective for me. If I were to think about who the godliest people I knew were, I didn’t factor in how committed they were to edifying their brothers and sisters in Christ, loving them well, nurturing them in the faith, and pouring out gospel grace on them. I merely thought about how they nurtured their own individual holiness – that is if “individual” and “holiness” were two words that made sense together.
And as much as I can look back and say that this was maybe a simple time of immaturity in my Christian walk as I learn and grew, I also want to realize that seeds of destruction could have been sown then. You see, one of Satan’s greatest strategies is to get us to focus on ourselves and not on the church. And that’s because he knows that if he can get you and me to think about ourselves and not the church as a whole, then he has laid the groundwork for destroying a local church. If you and I will begin thinking on how the church is not ministering to me, how they’re failing me, and how they’re not prizing me as they should instead of how I might serve others, how I might love others, how I might work for unity, and how I might build up others then division and eventual destruction of the local church will follow.
But we’re not the first who have been tempted in this way or who have fallen prey to thinking this way, as we’ve seen over these first few sermons through the book of 1 Corinthians. As we’ve seen in these first couple of chapters, the Corinthians were on a path to destruction as a local church. They were not characterized by loving one another, edifying one another, and laboring for gospel unity. Rather, they were focused on exalting themselves above others. They were dividing themselves from others, trying to identify themselves with Paul or Apollos in order to exalt themselves over each other. They were chasing after the wisdom of the world, trying to be characterized in ways that the world said were wise and valuable. In short, they were working against the building up of their brothers and sisters, working against the building up of the church.
So, Paul confronts them, telling them in 3:1-4 that they were immature infants in Christ. They were behaving like mere men, not like those who understood the wisdom of the cross, who had the Spirit, and who were freed from jealousy and strife that consumed those in the world who are about self-promotion and self-exaltation. But then, starting in 3:5, we see Paul shift a bit as he begins to teach them. In 3:5-17 he teaches them how they need to think of leaders in the church like himself and Apollos (as opposed to how they had been thinking of them – as individuals whom they could try to identify with to exalt themselves), why they need to be careful as they think about building the church, and why it is a dangerous think to behave in such destructive ways toward the church. And in each step, we get to see how important the building of the church is for the believer.
Therefore, this morning, I want us to think through these things that Paul lays out because 1) that’s what our text is about, 2) it can aid us perhaps as a preventative from going down a divisional path of self-destruction as a church, and 3) my prayer is that we would continue to grow in the gospel unity that the Lord has given us. So, with that said, what is it that we need to keep in mind and consider as we labor for the glory and building up of God’s church avoiding the kind of self-focused, self-promoting division we see in the church at Corinth? First:
Paul attempts to overturn the Corinthians’ attempts to exalt themselves through identifying with leaders by helping the Corinthians put leaders in the right place. In short, he doesn’t want them to exalt leaders to the place that is due only God alone. Thus, he writes in verse 5, “What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each.”
Now, each part of this is crucial. First, they’re merely servants of the Lord. Second, they’re servants through whom these Corinthians believed. That is, the Corinthians weren’t trusting in Paul or Apollos for their salvation but simply through their preaching had come to trust in Christ. Third, they are servants who are merely doing the tasks they had been assigned to do by the Lord. So, do you see how silly it would be to identify with some Christian leader in an attempt to boost your own ego, especially if you’re identifying with them because of their particular gifts or tasks? After all, the only reason they have those gifts is because God gave them to them, and the only reason they are doing their tasks is because the Lord assigned them that task to do.
Then Paul lays out the specific tasks he and Apollos did, writing, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.” So, it may well have been that after Paul came to Corinth initially preaching the gospel that Apollos followed sometime later and saw a big harvest. However, to boast in Paul because he preached the gospel there first or boast in Apollos because he was eloquent or perhaps saw a great harvest of people come to faith is foolish because God is the one who gives growth. God is the one who gives people new hearts. Therefore, since God is responsible for their growth, in the sense of being due the Corinthians’ praise and allegiance, Paul and Apollos are nothing, as Paul says in verse 7, but only God. Only God deserves their allegiance and praise.
Furthermore, if they’re trying to divide behind Paul or Apollos, then they need to realize that Paul and Apollos are united in their goal and purpose. Thus, Paul writes in verse 8, “He who plans and he who waters are one [in goal and purpose], and each will receive his wages according to his labor.”
And finally, just in case the Corinthians had missed the metaphor, Paul lays it out in verse 9, saying, “For we are God’s fellow workers [that is, fellow workers, who both belong to God]. You are God’s field, God’s building.” So, our first key in building up the church and being involved in this precious task of pouring into the bride of Christ is seeing your leaders correctly.
Now, I don’t necessarily feel the same need to say to you what Paul said to the Corinthians. As a church, we have four elders (or pastors), and I don’t sense any kind of division in the church as if we’re dividing off to say, “I’m of Lee” or “I’m of Aaron,” or “I’m of Tom,” or “I’m of Nathan.” But there’s wisdom in giving a warning here both because the Bible does and because we don’t want to wait until something goes off the tracks before we address it.
Therefore, let me say that we as your pastors understand that we’re nothing special at all but frail servants of Christ. In fact, if each of the four of us wanted to stand up here and share with you our weaknesses, we’d be here all day and if you were honest, you’d probably be thinking, “Well, they did fail to mention a few of the more obvious ones.” And let me speak for the three other guys for a second in noting that these men are incredibly gifted. The pastors at this moment in our history are as diversely gifted as I’ve ever known. I’ve watched these men counsel, preach, comfort, rebuke, etc. in ways that I can only explain in terms of the power of the Holy Spirit. And I can also say that they love you. Many times in our elders’ meetings I hear these men’s hearts driven by their desire to be biblically faithful and to love the church well. We are blessed to have these men as our pastors.
And yet, we’re simply servants of God. Any gifts or abilities we have are given by God. The unique tasks we do are simply those tasks assigned to us by God. So, in terms of any kind of allegiance or praise, we are nothing. What has been worked in the lives and in the growth of this congregation is the result of God’s grace to us. Therefore, God forbid that we ever dishonor the Lord’s gifts by trying to align ourselves behind one leader instead of another or identify ourselves with one leader to pit ourselves against others in the church. And though it is quite difficult for me to imagine that happening here, many of us can probably point to situations where this very kind of division has happened (in addition to it happening at Corinth). I can say with absolute certainty that as your pastors we’d rather see Cornerstone simply cease to exist as a church that ever get to a point where we’re dividing behind the leaders of the church to exalt ourselves over one another.
So, again, we must view our leaders appropriately, as mere servants of Christ, doing what Christ has gifted them to do, carrying out the assignments given to them by Christ. Mere servants who aid us in loving and honoring Christ more.
But that’s not the only exhortation that is implicitly given in our text. We also see that:
At the end of verse 9, you see that Paul begins to shift his metaphor. He’d been working with the metaphor of seeing the church as a field, but he shifts to seeing it as a building. That’s why verse 9 ends with Paul saying, “You are God’s field, God’s building.” He’s shifting his metaphor. And he wants to make the point here that it’s not enough to acknowledge that leaders have been assigned their specific tasks in building up the church by Jesus Christ, but we need to make sure that our leaders (or we, as leaders) are building up the church by means of saturating everything we do and are about in the gospel and in exalting Christ. Let me show this to you in verses 10-15.
Paul begins in verse 10 giving us what he has done in building the church and giving us his main exhortation. He writes, “According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master building I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it.”
Now, this metaphor could be lost on us a bit because our buildings go up so quickly. You don’t drive around town and see a sign that says that the foundation of this bank was laid by so and so construction company, for example, but the walls were done by another, and the roof added by still another. All can be done by one worker in a relatively quick amount of time. But in Paul’s day, building a large building could take decades of work. So, one worker may well lay the foundation of the building and then go on or even die, leaving the next phrase of the project to be done by another.
And that’s what Paul is envisioning here. He pictures the church at Corinth as a building in which he came along and laid a foundation. And the foundation he laid for the church was Jesus Christ, crucified and raised. We see that if verse 11, “For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.”
And the reason he’s mentioning that the foundation is Jesus Christ (crucified and raised, of course) is not because he’s sending the message that they don’t need to worry about the gospel or exalting Christ because that was the foundation, and now the rest of the building needs to be made of something else, thus, they can move on from the gospel. No. Rather, he’s saying that the foundation is Christ crucified because he’s telling them that the other builders (those who come after him in building the church) need to be building with the same materials that he used to lay the foundation – Christ crucified and raised – the gospel.
Now, let me set up a picture of where Paul goes from here. You could imagine someone laying a foundation of solid material, able to withstand fire. Maybe even someone started building the walls with that same kind of material – gold, silver, precious stones. But then someone comes along and thinks, “You know, we could save a lot of money if we finished these walls with wood, hay, and straw.” What would happen if a fire blew through? Well, obviously only the parts of the building made with quality material would withstand the fire.
Well, that’s exactly how Paul wants us to think through building the church. He writes in verses 12-15, “Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—each one's work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone's work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.”
Those who came after Paul and began building the church at Corinth better be careful how they’re building the church. If they’re building the church with any other “material,” if you will, than the gospel, then it’s shoddy craftsmanship. If they’re building the church based on personality, or motivational self-help talks, or the like, then it doesn’t matter how much the church grows, in the end, that leader’s work will be burned up and shown to be nothing. All his labors will be for naught, no matter how successful they appeared in the world. And we could even say the same thing about good things. If we build the church with the call to feed hungry children, care for widows and orphans, and rid our town of violence (all good things of course), to the exclusion of exalting the primacy of the gospel, then our work will be for nothing. On that final day when the Lord rewards us for our faithfulness to the assignment given us, we will suffer loss in that there’ll be nothing shown for our work. We ourselves will be saved, Paul tells us, if we are trusting in Christ’s life, death, and resurrection, of course, but we’ll have nothing to show for the tasks the Lord had given us in building up the church.
We cannot lose focus of building this local church, Cornerstone Community Church, with the gospel and by exalting Christ as crucified and raised. Everything we do must be saturated in the gospel and everything we’re about must have as its goal and purpose exalting the crucified and risen Lord Jesus Christ.
And therefore I want you to know our heart as your pastors. We want to be a gospel-saturated church. We want that to be our identify – Christ crucified and raised. We want the gospel to be the banner we wave and the drum we beat. When people mention Cornerstone, we want them to think of a people who are obsessed with the gospel. We want it to saturate our corporate worship services, our small groups, our prayers, our singing, everything. And we believe it is the means not only by which people come to initial saving faith but is the means by which they grow in maturity and the means by which the Spirit works powerfully in our midst.
Now, just to ground these two points, think of Paul’s words to the Galatians, “Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? . . . Does he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law or by hearing with faith?” (Gal. 3:2-5).
Now, when Paul speaks of hearing with faith and “having begun in the Spirit,” this is a reference to their faith in the gospel. Hearing with faith means hearing the gospel and believing so that they are justified by faith along. “Having begun by the Spirit” is Paul’s way of referring to them having heard the gospel and believed (by the power of the Holy Spirit – think of our text last week from 1 Cor. 2:6-3:4; it is only by the Spirit that we believe) as opposed to banking on our good works as sufficient for our justification.
So, if hearing the gospel and believing is Paul’s means of “being perfected” or maturing in the faith and the means by which the Spirit does miracles among us, then we are getting ourselves off-track if we try to depart from the centrality of the gospel and the exaltation of the crucified and risen Lord to something else. That something else simply won’t lead us to true maturity and won’t lead us to the Spirit working powerfully in our midst, according to Galatians 3:2-5. It would be like getting on I-40 and heading west in your attempt to get to Nashville. That just won’t get you there.
One of my most joyous and encouraging moments in pastoral ministry took place a few Sunday afternoons ago at Mike Oliver’s funeral. During his funeral, before I ever got up to speak, we were singing gospel-saturated songs. The songs were just gospel. We sang “Before the Throne of God Above,” “It Is Well,” and I can’t remember what else, but they were just gospel-exalting, gospel-saturated songs. And I looked around as we were singing and saw you not only singing but moved by these songs. You were worshiping. It was visible. And it wasn’t just new Christians moved by these truths, but many of you who have been Christians for years. You were comforted in the gospel, moved by the gospel, delighting in the gospel, loving God more because of the gospel, growing in love for one another because of the gospel. I saw Connie, who could barely talk or stand minutes before the funeral because of her Huntington’s disease, standing and singing, “Before the throne of God above, I have a strong and perfect plea, a great High Priest whose name is Love, who ever lives and pleads for me,” and I knew in that moment that what she was singing is what she believed, and it was what sustained her, and it was where her hope was.
So, I looked around at a congregation full of people whose lives were changed, who were sustained, who were maturing in the faith, among whom the Spirit had worked powerfully, and I thought, “This is the effect of the gospel,” and I was incredibly moved in my heart.
But it’s not only that the gospel and exalting the crucified and risen Lord alone grows you in maturity and allows the Spirit to work powerfully in our midst, but also, we as your pastors don’t want to be ashamed at the Lord’s coming. So, we will withstand any attacks, Lord-willing, that say we should be about something else because we understand that one day we’ll stand and give an account before the Lord Jesus Christ. And on that day I want to be found able to say, “We tried to saturate all we did and said in the gospel and in exalting the crucified and risen Lord.” And if that’s the case, I think we’ll not be ashamed.
But you may be saying, “But I’m not going to be a pastor or leader in the church, so how does this apply to me?” Well, I think there are a couple of different answers. One of them is that all of us are building the church. Look at how general Paul is with his words in verses 10-15. He says, “Let each one . . . for no one . . . if anyone . . . each one’s . . . anyone has built . . . if anyone’s.” All those general descriptions of who is building may well be Paul’s say of saying, “All of you are building, so be careful how you build.” It’s not just pastors who build the church, but all believers, as they are equipped, carry out the ministry of the gospel in building up the church. So, indeed, take care how you build.
But another application here is that you can’t take for granted that your leaders are committed to building the church with the gospel. I pray it would never happen, but we as your pastors could lose our focus, and if we do, we need you to hold up this text before us. Or we could die, and you’ll be responsible for making sure your next leaders are committed to building the church with the gospel. We simply must always make sure the church is being built up through the gospel and exalting Jesus Christ.
But there is one more note Paul ends on to show the seriousness of our labors and how treasured the Lord’s church is to him. He shows us that:
It’s one thing for a Christian leader to build the church with shoddy materials, perhaps exalting our good works in the community to the exclusion of the gospel, but it’s another thing to destroy the church. And to the one who would destroy the church, Paul writes, “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple” (vv. 16-17).
When Paul tells the Corinthians that they are God’s temple and God’s Spirit dwells with them, he is speaking corporately here. Yes, later he’ll reference us as individuals being the temple of the Spirit of God, but here he means the church as a whole. That is, Cornerstone Community Church as a covenant community of believers is God’s temple, and God’s Spirit is here among us and with us. That’s the kind of thing Paul wants us to see.
Therefore, when one comes along and destroys the temple – by teaching falsehood, working great division, by promoting oneself to the exclusion of others – or a number of others things, God will destroy that one. And I think this means that this one will be shown not to have eternal life.
Now, that’s a strong warning. But I think what it shows is how precious the church is to the Lord Jesus Christ. Always guard against division, gossip, the like that might in any way destroy God’s church.
Therefore, let us be careful with how we build up the church, and let us make sure that we are indeed building up the church. May it be said of us as a people that we love the church, are driven to build up the church, love the gospel, and seek to exalt Christ in all things. If that characterizes us, then I don’t think we’ll be ashamed at the Lord’s coming. And if we’re falling short in these areas, then remember that holiness is a community project and corporate task, so let us labor to help one another, pray for one another, and love one another so that we might show the glory of God through the church and in Jesus Christ throughout all generations. In this way, far from being a divisive community that differs little from the unbelieving culture around us, we can be a picture of gospel-unity, being built up and matured in the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Let us celebrate this gospel now as we come to the table. Amen.