God’s Farm: Life As God’s Field Hand
There are a lot of illustrations that God uses to describe His people. Jesus and Paul, likely because they lived in an agricultural culture, often used natural illustrations. In John 15, Jesus is the vine, we are the branches, God is the gardener who prunes and strengthens the branches, or burns the fruitless ones. In the parable of the four soils, Jesus compared our hearts to hard or soft soil that God was sprinkling the seeds of His Word on (Matthew 13). In Matthew 13 the gospel and believers are likened to yeast that works itself through a whole batch of dough – becoming an unseen force that changes the composition of the whole loaf. In Matthew 5 Jesus calls His followers salt and light – forces of good, preservers of life, enhancing the flavour of the world, spreading the truth for all to see. Jesus calls us a city on a hill, a net full of fish, a field of wheat mixed with weeds, a group of children, a flock of sheep, innocent doves and crafty serpents.
When Paul is teaching about how Christians can be very different but still work together, he tells us we are like different parts of a human body, and Jesus is the head (1 Cor 12). When talking about new believers he calls us babies who need milk. When we are more mature and able to wrestle with more difficult spiritual things, we are like adults chewing a tough piece of meat. When talking about the spiritual war going on around us, we are soldiers, strapping on the armor of God and preparing for battle (Eph 6). When the church is praying or singing, we are like priests who burn incense that rises to the heavens (Rev 5:8, 8:-4).
Each of these illustrations (and there are many more) are meant to help us understand the many different sides of what it means to follow God and live in this world.
I don’t know if you’ve ever been asked what it’s like to be a Christian or what it’s like to follow God, but it’s not an easy answer. “Well,”, you say, “sometimes I feel like a baby who has no idea what they are doing, but just trusting their father to take care of me. Other times I feel like a tool in the hands of a carpenter, being used to do amazing things I could never do on my own. Other times I feel like being a piece of clay spinning in the hands of a potter, where He’s gently but firmly moulding me into something new. Other times being a Christian feels like I’m a battle-hardened warrior, hurting, bleeding, covered in cuts and bruises, but standing once again to take on the enemy because I love my King and my Kingdom. Being a Christian also feels like being part of a huge family of people that you love but have never met – while at the same time, once God gets a hold of your heart, it’s like the whole world has flipped upside down and you now live in a foreign land full of strange customs that you waver between finding tantalizing, disgusting and incomprehensible. Sometimes I’m on the mountain shouting praise, other times I’m resting by still waters, and then there are times when I’m walking through the valley of the shadow of death.”
If you’ve been a Christian for any length of time, then I would imagine that you’ve felt at least some of that, and you can appreciate why the Bible is so full of varied illustrations describing a believer’s experience.
Open up with me to 1 Corinthians 3:1-9, and let’s read two more illustrations that Paul gives to explain how to live the Christian life. We’ll start at verse 1 again so we can get the context:
“But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready, for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way? For when one says, ‘I follow Paul,’ and another, ‘I follow Apollos,’ are you not being merely human?”
That’s where we left off last week. Let’s keep reading:
“What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building.”
The Format of Paul’s Letter
First, and as always, we need to remember the context. The Corinthian church had some maturity issues and God told Paul to write a letter to them explaining some things to them. Paul had planted the church during his second missionary journey, had been their pastor for a year and half but had gone on to plant other churches. He wrote this letter from Ephesus during his third missionary journey, after getting reports from a bunch of people that things in Corinth weren’t going very well. In fact, the whole letter is written in response to those reports, and to answer the questions that a delegation from Corinth had brought to him.
Chapters 1-4 address the first, and most pressing problem, that being the divisions that had cropped up in the church. You see that in 1:11 where Paul says, “it has been reported to me by Chloe’s people that there is quarreling among you, my brothers.” So Paul takes the first part to address that problem. Then in chapter 5 the next section starts with addressing another report Paul has received: “It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that is not tolerated even among pagans…” and Paul takes two chapters to deal with that issue.
Then, starting in chapter 7 we see a list of “now concernings” where Paul addresses the questions the delegation brought him. In 7:1 we read, “Now concerning the matters about which you wrote:” and Paul answers their questions about marriage. In 7:25, he says, “Now concerning the betrothed…” and answers questions about unmarried people. In 8:1 he says, “Now concerning food offered to idols…”, in 12:1 we read “Now concerning spiritual gifts…”, in 16:1 we read, “Now concerning the collection for the saints…” and in 16:12 we read, “Now concerning our brother Apollos…”
Paul is writing a letter to a group of Christians that shows concern for their spiritual health, condemnation of their reputation for sin, and then gives counsel about how they need to alter their understanding and their behaviour to become more in line with what God wants them to do. And this ties right into Paul’s illustrations in chapter 3.
God’s Farm
To build the foundation of the rest of the letter, Paul wants to make sure that they understand two very important things: First, they need to understand the truth of the gospel, which they had forgotten. So he reminds them in 1:30 that “wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption” isn’t found anywhere else other than in Jesus Christ. He reminds them that the human wisdom they’ve been listening to is foolish, and that all that they require to be right with God has been done through the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. They don’t need any more special knowledge, or crazy experiences, or demonstrations of power, or anything else. Their salvation is by their faith in Jesus Christ. Period. In other words, God has done all the work.
Which is why what Chloe’s people says they are doing bugs him so much. The church wasn’t full of the love of God, but instead was full of strife and jealousy, splitting into factions, and putting their favourite preacher up as their de facto leader. A servant of God doesn’t want any of that. It breaks God’s heart and a Christian’s heart to see people divided. But to hear that they are using your name as a point of division would be even more painful.
Little side-bar here. God hates it when his people are divided. Literally hates it. Listen to these words from Proverbs 6:16-19,
“There are six things that the LORD hates, seven that are an abomination to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil, a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers.”
In light of that, what do you think he felt about this discord ridden, strife-filled church, full of people who were abusing one another? He hated it. And so did Paul. God really hates it when His people can’t get along because it is then that they are most unlike Him and are actually playing into the hands of the Enemy.
Farm Hands
And so Paul, to remind them that dividing into factions over their favourite preacher was sinful and ridiculous and then says, “What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building.”
His point is that humans, even amazing ones like Paul or Apollos, are a just tiny, miniscule, little parts of accomplishing God’s will for the world. What is Paul? A servant, a worker; that’s it.
Paul’s first, brief, illustration is that the church is like a field and Paul and Apollos are just field hands. God tells them where to go, gives them the tools to dig, gives them the seed, and then causes the rain to fall, the sun to shine, and the seed to grow. It is ridiculous to try to elevate any preacher or teacher, no matter how gifted, to any kind of level, because their contribution to the church is negligible compared to the work of God. Billy Graham, Charles Spurgeon, John Calvin, Martin Luther, Paul and Apollos were all merely farm hands.
Each of these men were sinners who God chose to use for a time, not because of their ability, but despite their disabilities. More often than not, their great abilities actually became a problem for them!
- Billy Graham was born in the Southern US, a hard-core American, who was reluctant to get saved and wasn’t much for public speaking, but God called him anyway.
- Charles Spurgeon was a British man who was a gifted speaker, but was often in physical agony and suffered crippling depression, sometimes barely able to stand in the pulpit because of the weight on his heart and the pain in his body, but God used him anyway.
- John Calvin was from France, and by all accounts I’ve read, was a super-intellectual hermit who loved books way more than people (and was kind of a jerk), but opened his heart to God and God used him anyway. More than once people had to convince, cajole and even threaten Calvin just to get him to leave his books and obey God’s call to preach.
- Martin Luther was a foul mouthed, blue-collar, superstitious, German, with no understanding of the Gospel, who only decided to become a monk because he was almost hit by lightning, but one day God opened his eyes to see salvation is by grace through faith alone, and though he struggled with his many personality weaknesses for his whole life, God used him anyway.
- The Apostle Paul was a Christian killer before he met Jesus.
All these men, regardless of how different they and their contexts were, had two things in common: 1. God called them to work His fields and 2. They knew that it was God who gives the growth.
Paul is adamant (and if you read any of the biographies of these great, Christian men, so are they) that they are responsible for very little of the success of their ministries. In fact, it usually came by total surprise – and sometimes, despite their terrible failures. And because of this, they knew, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that whatever good they had done in their lives was solely attributed to the work of God.
Sure, they sowed some seed by preaching the gospel, and watered by teaching the people the Bible – they are “God’s fellow workers” in that way – but it is God who really did all the work, not them. And what’s amazing is that God is still going to give them the “wages according to their labour”. Even though they have no power over the growth, maturity or harvest, if they have done the work faithfully, they will receive their reward. That’s an amazing grace.
No Magic Formula
Here’s the thing: There is no magic formula you can use to cause someone to get saved, grow in maturity, or grow a church.
There’s no magic words you can say to a non-Christian or backslidden child, spouse, parent, or friend that will suddenly make them want to put down their sin and turn to Jesus. I know this is a struggle for some of you. You have a friend, family member, or work mate that you feel drawn to share your faith with, that you want to see in the kingdom, that you know needs God’s grace – but they won’t receive it.
And you blame yourself. You think, “If only I had the right words… more answers… knew more about the Bible… had a better testimony… shared it differently… then they’d be saved by now. If I was part of a cooler church or acted a little cooler, or knew more cool shows, then they would listen to me. If I was way more holy and less sinful, had less temptations, fasted more, prayed more, studied more, then they would turn their life over to Jesus.”
You think that the reason that they aren’t Christian is your fault – and that’s just not true. There is no magic words or perfect system that will change someone’s heart. It is God who gives the growth, not you.
In the same way, there is no magic formula, no perfect system, no mystical biblical secret to growing a church or church minstry. It’s not about how comfortable the chairs are, whether the music is great, the sound system rocks and the visuals are stimulating. A church with a gym or classrooms or coffee shop or bookstore may get some folks through the door, but it won’t guarantee that anyone becomes a follower of Jesus.
All the things we try at this church, from the welcome bags to the website to the bbq’s and coffee time and small groups are fine, but they aren’t a guarantee our church will grow or that the people within it will become more mature believers.
I can preach all day long, the deacons can build you the nicest building in the world, the coffee can be the tastiest ever, and the band could win awards – and it won’t mean anything unless God gives the growth.
Ask any farmer how much power they have over their land. They can choose the best seed, but they can’t make it rain. They can buy fancy irrigation systems, but they can’t make the weather warm. They can build greenhouses, buy a water system, and control the climate, but they can’t make a bad seed grow a good plant.
And even if they get everything right – seed, water, soil, temperature, sunlight, protection from bugs and blight – they still can’t make the plant grow. All they can do is create the environment or the conditions in which a plant should grow. God still brings the growth.
God’s Fellow Workers
So, that being said, we are still “God’s fellow workers”. Just because God does the work of saving and growing people, doesn’t mean we are abdicated from our responsibilities as a worker. Every single believer here today has been given the great commission to “go… and make disciples” (Matthew 28:18), to “proclaim the gospel to the whole creation” (Mark 16:15), to be God’s “witnesses… to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:8).
We have been told to scatter our seed far and wide. For some that means telling people with your words because you are evangelists. For others, this means living such a life that others see it in you and want to know what you have. Listen to the words of Peter to wives with unbelieving husbands, “Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives, when they see your respectful and pure conduct.” (1 Peter 3:1-2) “Won without a word…”
Sometimes sowing seed means talking, other times it means influencing people by your conduct. As a church we need to do a better job of sowing seeds in both these ways – not through fancy outreach programs or rearranging the furniture, but through personal evangelism, sharing our individual stories, and being more careful with our conduct.
God doesn’t just call us to sow seeds, but also to water them. In other words, we need to be diligent to do all we can to – as I said before – create the environment or the conditions in which a plant should grow.
This means you are careful to make sure you, your spouse and your children, have time to read the bible, pray, and serve within their giftings. It means encouraging them to connect with God the ways in which they meet God best – not just ways that work for you.
This this means you create a home environment that has the conditions to help everyone who lives there to grow in faith, love and obedience to God. This doesn’t just mean hanging cute posters on the walls and saying grace before meals, but, that every part of your home is turned over to God. Your TV, internet, movies, games, conversations, your daily schedule and weekly calendar, everything.
Look how Deuteronomy 6:4-9 tells the people of God to remind their families about following God:
“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”
Every part of their lives was to be saturated with the presence of God.
This also means allowing your spiritual authorities to guide you (parents if you are a kid or your church elders if you are an adult), submitting to their authority as it reflects scripture. When they set a boundary, work to live within it. When they challenge you, do your best to face it.
Conclusion
Let me conclude with this: We can’t make anyone grow, but we can work as God’s servants to spread seed and create the conditions by which someone can grow. God allows us to work with Him on that.So evaluate your heart.
- Are you fulfilling the mission God has given you in your daily life to spread seed and water those God has given you? If not, then ask forgiveness and ask God what ways he wants you to spread seed – with words and without words.
- Also, are you feeling unnecessary guilt because the person you are talking to about the faith isn’t saved? Let God be the one who gives the growth. Release control to God and accept that all you can do is love that person like God does.
- Also, evaluate your home. Is it an environment that builds up the faith of those who live there or a field full of spiritual landmines just waiting to be stepped on?
- Do you have hidden things you hope no one finds?
- Are your conversations godly?
- Are you working hard to build proper priorities into your home?
- Do you have a high standard of godliness?
- Or, is your home a bastion of false religion?
- Do you embrace the joy of the Lord, and all the freedoms He has given you, or are you teaching those in your home how to follow rules, but not build relationships?
How to Give a Christian Testimony (Carnivore Theology – Ep. 74)
Chad, Steve and Al are finally back together and talking about the pluses and minuses of the modern testimony movement and the best ways to share your personal faith journey — and things to avoid while doing it.
Podcast Audio
How Can You Help Carnivore Theology?
1. Pray for us!
2. Subscribe and rate us on iTunes and watch us on YouTube!! (If you don’t have iTunes use FeedBurner)
3. Record a question in your voice on our SpeakPipe page! (We love this the most!)
4. Send a question or comment through Facebook , Twitter, or E-mail!
5. Buy some cool stuff from our new Merch Store! (And check out our friend Kim’s amazing art while you’re there!)
6. Share www.CarnivoreTheology.com and our Media Kit with your friends and church. Sharing is caring!
5 Reminders for Students (Carnivore Theology – Ep. 73)
Whether you’re going into High School, College, University or Post-Grad, Pastor Al gives some important reminders to students returning to school this semester.
1. Guard your reputation.
2. Remember why you’re there.
3. Find a good church.
4. Keep your devos going.
5. Try to find balance.
Podcast Audio:
How Can You Help Carnivore Theology?
1. Pray for us!
2. Subscribe and rate us on iTunes and watch us on YouTube!! (If you don’t have iTunes use FeedBurner)
3. Record a question in your voice on our SpeakPipe page! (We love this the most!)
4. Send a question or comment through Facebook , Twitter, or E-mail!
5. Buy some cool stuff from our new Merch Store! (And check out our friend Kim’s amazing art while you’re there!)
6. Share www.CarnivoreTheology.com and our Media Kit with your friends and church. Sharing is caring!
The Wolf You Feed (The Battle Between Flesh and Spirit)
Let’s open up to 1 Corinthians 3:1-4 and read it together. We already studied verses 1-3 last week, but I want to read them again to remind us of the context:
“But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready, for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way? For when one says, ‘I follow Paul,’ and another, ‘I follow Apollos,’ are you not being merely human?”
If you remember last week, I said that the first verses of chapter 3 are a summary of what Paul has been talking about generally for the past couple chapters, and a transition into some more specific language about God has shown him are some major challenges in this church.
On the broad stroke he tells them that there are two types of people in this world – the “spiritual people” and the “natural” (or “fleshly”) people, which he calls “merely human”. His main concern is that this church, supposedly full of Christians who believe in Jesus as their Saviour and Lord, are not acting like “spiritual people” – knowing right from wrong, good from evil, holy from unholy, helpful from dangerous – but are instead, being driven by their carnal, animalistic, desires.
The majority of the rest of the letter is Paul contrasting the way of the Spirit of God with the way of the flesh – and trying to convince the church to turn away from the natural desires which are destroying their souls and allowing the Spirit of God to guide their conscience and choices so they can be liberated from of the effects of sin and embrace their freedom in Christ.
These out of control drives are seen all through the letter. Listen to the list Paul gives:
- In chapters 3, 8, and 10 we see them getting jealous of one another, fighting amongst themselves. There is no gentleness, patience, or humility, but are instead are acting like wolves fighting over a piece of meat – each one wanting what the other has, refusing to share, growling and barking at the rest, and then sitting in victory over those who are starving. This causes them to divide into packs and, without their consent, set up their pastors as de facto leaders of their factions.
- In chapter 4 we see them acting like foolish sheep or strutting peacocks, prideful to the point of believing they know more than the apostles.
- In chapter 5 and 6 we them acting like animals in heat, their sexual appetites out of control to the point where they engaging in prostitution and becoming more perverse than even the pagans around them.
- In chapter 6 we see them cockfighting for public amusement as they sue each other in public court.
- In chapter 11 we read about them strutting and preening like cats or birds, showing off for all to see. We also read of them turning into drunken monkeys, humiliating themselves and others during their sacred events.
- In chapter 14 they are screeching crows making much noise but having little of value to say.
This church was more barnyard or zoo than a collection of spiritually enlightened followers of Jesus, and it grieved God and their Pastor, the Apostle Paul. Why? Because they had been told the truth, but were now living the lie. They had been shown what life was really like, seeing behind the spiritual curtain that the world doesn’t even recognize is there, and had turned away from it. Because they had been called to so much more than merely pleasing their fleshly desires. This church, full of people who wanted to know God, who believed in Jesus, who wanted wisdom and knowledge – which were all good things – had gone feral. They were being, as verse 3 and 4 say, “merely human” – and that’s not enough.
Heart, Soul, Mind, and Strength
Humans are created as multi-faceted beings. The great commandment says we are to love God with our “Heart, Soul, Mind and Strength” (Mark 12:30), and without getting too dogmatic about it, this gives us a good place to talk about the different facets, or different sides, or aspects, of being human.
- Our strength is our physical body.
- The mind is our capacity for our conscious thought.
- Our heart is the seat of our emotions. The soul is that part of us that goes beyond the physical and allows us to connect to God.
- The soul is that part of us that goes beyond the physical and allows us to connect to God.
God says that we are to worship him with every part of our being – our bodies, thoughts, emotions, and spirit – not just part of it. We cannot merely give God our thoughts – thinking of Him, believing in Him, studying Him, memorizing things about Him, learning and teaching about Him – but keep our bodies to ourselves to use however we would like.
We cannot give God our physical side – denying our fleshly desires, beating our bodies into obedience, waking early and working hard – but not give to Him our spiritual selves by refusing to pray and denying Him worship as we work.
We cannot connect to God with our soul and mind and strength, but then keep our emotions to ourselves, allowing our feelings to drive us wherever they will.
This was the main problem with Corinth. They had given their minds over to God, believing Paul’s words and putting their faith in Jesus as their Saviour – and they had given their souls over to God, admitting that they were sinners, wanting to meet and worship the One, True, God – but they had not done it fully, and they had not turned over their Heart and Strength – their emotions and their bodies. They wanted to keep those to themselves.
Their feelings and their physical desires were still big influences in how they made decisions. They lived by their feelings, lusts, cravings, and desires.
Desires
I really want to park on this concept of being driven by our emotional and physical desires because it’s so key to understanding our world and the Christian life. We are driven by our desires – and that’s not always a bad thing.
When our physical bodies are hungry or tired, they send a signal to our brains to tell us that we need to sleep or eat. That’s a good thing. That desire is helpful. When something happens to us – whether it’s something good like meeting a friend or something bad like getting into a fight with that friend – we have been given emotions that kick in to allow us to process the situation. That’s a good thing.
God has given us internal signals that tell us to pay attention – a gut instinct that says you should do something, an internal lie detector when dealing with a shifty salesman, a feeling of foreboding when walking in the dark, or a sense of excitement before a big event – and they are good things.
We have the capacity to think through things, remember details, mull over problems, imagine solutions, invent entire worlds and conversations and possibilities, all in our minds – and that’s a good thing.
Many of the thoughts, feelings, sensations and longings we have inside of us are God-given and good. We should desire to be loved and cared for. We should want to be safe from pain and danger. We should be creative. We should be attracted to other people. We should want to get away from repulsive things.
Before the fall, when Adam and Eve were in the garden, they had natural desires in all four areas of their being – and they were good. They loved each other. They felt hunger and thirst and physical attraction. They used their minds to name creatures and make conversation. They had a desire for meaningful work. They wanted to walk and talk with God.
So, what I’m not saying is that desires are all bad. But what I am saying is that all our desires need to be evaluated for their truthfulness and turned over to the Holy Spirit. Why? Because of sin.
Sin has caused us our desires to get out of whack. All four facets of our being have been affected.
- Our bodies are now attracted to things that are dangerous.
- Our biochemistry and environment are out of whack and create some big problems with our bodies, feelings, and thoughts.
- Our souls are bent away from God and want nothing more than to usurp Him, place ourselves on the throne of the universe, and declare ourselves gods in His place.
- Our bodies are prone to give us false information, get addicted to any number of things, and cause us to crave activities and things that cause harm to us and others.
- All manner of influences, from social media to the demonic forces, are working hard to play with our emotions so we can be manipulated for their benefit.
- We are surrounded by lies, innuendo, gossip, and misinformation, and therefore have a hard time knowing what we think about certain topics – that is, if we haven’t already burnt our brains with either chemicals or dulled them through entertainment.
- Our souls are either dried out, or are in a constant state of “drying out”, which drives us to find the waters of purpose, joy, hope, love, and meaning somewhere; the desperation often causing us to take in the polluted waters the world offers, rather than seek out the pure waters of the Gospel.
The World
The world uses their desires as an excuse as to why they do what they do. Whether it’s making a case for addiction, anger problems, sexual sin, or greed, you’ve heard the arguments before:
- I was born this way, so therefore I must live this way.
- My feelings are so strong in this area that they cannot be denied.
- Anyone can do whatever they want, so long as there is consent and there is no harm done.
- I am free to say whatever I want because I have the right to express my feelings.
- No one should stop anyone else from pursuing their dreams.
- How can something be wrong if so many people agree that it’s good?
- The greatest way of living is if everyone is free to do whatever makes them happy.
In other words: if I believe it, feel it, or think it, then it must be true, and therefore must be good, and therefore must be done.
That’s simply not true. Morality does not change based on our feelings or opinion. Morality has been given to us as a gift from God. He is the One who wrote it on our consciences and in His Book, and it is for us to line up to His standards – not for us to create our own.
Not that this is a new way of thinking. This is a quintessential human problem, not only prevalent in the ancient Corinthian church, but well before it and continues to be popular today – even in churches.
The War Within
All through scripture we read about the war within us, the battle between our flesh and our spirit. And one important lesson we get from these passages is that it is a battle, and we are meant to engage in combat. God gives us hundreds of reasons not to believe our fleshly desires when they are steering us towards sin: they will destroy our bodies, harden our hearts, soften our abilities, corrupt our mission, dull our senses, and create barriers between us and God and us and the ones we love. God also gives us hundreds of ways to avoid being driven by these desires. He gives us personal help by the presence of the Holy Spirit, but also teaching about how to arrange our lives wisely and carefully and get our priorities straight. He tells us in no uncertain terms where the boundary is between right and wrong, and then gives us ways and means to evaluate everything in between.
But we must engage in that battle. We must realize that what we think and feel isn’t always good, right or best. We must admit that we are sinful creatures with sinful natures, with flesh that desires the things we shouldn’t want and makes it harder to pursue the things we should want. We must admit that our souls have been corrupted, and that we are not yet perfected in Christ, and therefore we cannot trust all our gut feelings and personal interpretations of what we think God has said. And once we have admitted that – which is essentially admitting that we need God’s help – we must commit our lives to God, ask for His help every day, and enter into the battle.
God, in 1st Corinthians, is telling us that our natural selves will lead us to danger – and then gives evidence of the consequences of what they’ve already done. But, it says, when we listen to God’s Word and God’s Spirit, as it is given to us in the Bible, in prayer, and through the church, we will have the capacity to enter into the battle and be victories.
Later, in chapter 9, Paul will say,
“Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way as to take the prize. Everyone who competes in the games trains with strict discipline. They do it for a crown that is perishable, but we do it for a crown that is imperishable. Therefore I do not run aimlessly; I do not fight like I am beating the air. No, I discipline my body and make it my slave, so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified.”
Paul has an incredibly important reason to win the battle of the flesh vs the spirit. He knows that his ministry, his connection to Jesus, and the reputation of the Gospel for most of the believing world, rests on his personal holiness and character. If he looses touch with God, gets prideful, or gets caught sinning, then all that he has worked for would be sorely damaged. So he works hard to make sure his desires are turned over to God.
The Wolf You Feed
Let me close with an old, but apt illustration. It is a Cherokee legend, but it is loaded with truth:
Once, and old man and his grandson were walking through the woods when the grandfather turned to the young man and said, “Young one, inside all of us there is a battle raging between two wolves. You have felt it even in your young years, and I have felt it all my life. One of the wolves is evil – he is anger, envy, greed, regret, arrogance, resentment, lies, hatred, and ego. The other is good – he is love, joy peace, hope, humility, kindness, empathy, generosity, compassion, truth and faith. Everyone has this battle going on inside them.”
They walked a little further in silence, until the young boy stopped and asked, “Grandfather, which wolf will win?”
The wise, old man simply replied, “The one you feed.”
Now, you and I may not have the weight of the missionary work for an entire generation on our shoulders – but nonetheless, we have some important incentives to evaluate our desires and engage in the battle against our natural selves – to feed the right wolf.
- Your spiritual life and connection with God depends on this. The more sin we have in our lives, the less connection we have to God, the less we will hear Him; the less wisdom, love, and peace we will have.
- Your family depends on it. The more we allow ourselves to be driven by our human nature, the more we mess up our marriages and children. They are watching us – and if we don’t care about what we see, hear, say, do, and think – then neither will they.
- Our church depends on it. We need maturing, passionate, faithful believers in this church. We need people who are listening to God, obeying His Word, and living out their spiritual gifts. The teachers should be teaching, the leaders leading, the encouragers encouraging, the prophets preaching, the administrators administrating, the healers healing, the wise governing, the merciful helping. But if you are being driven by your natural desires for wealth, fame, power, lust, or comfort, then you won’t have the time, energy, ability or desire to live out what God has called you to do in this church.
- Your community depends on it. They don’t need more nice, busy, shallow, disengaged, mindless consumers. They need godly people who are working hard to listen to and obey Jesus.
So my final question is this: Are you engaged in the battle? When was the last time you questioned why you do what you do, go where you go, post what you post, buy what you buy, watch what you watch, think what you think, feel what you feel, pray what you pray? Are you constantly evaluating the desires of your heart, soul, mind and strength – or are you merely human? Which wolf are you feeding?
Review of “Mansfield’s Book of Manly Men” by Stephen Mansfield
“Mansfield’s Book of Manly Men”
An Utterly Invigorating Guide to Being Your Most Masculine Self
Stephen Mansfield and William Boykin
Nelson Books – 2013
Summary
New York Times best-selling author Stephen Mansfield uses manly maxims, mini-biographies, and stirring illustrations to inspire men to evaluate their lives, raise their standards, and embrace their God-given masculine identity.
Review
This book is not only easy to read but incredibly inspirational. It’s not a rah-rah masculine grunt-fest, but a well thought out, well-researched, well written, discussion of what it means to be a godly man. The stories don’t merely centre around athletes and war veterans (as some men’s books do), but gives a much broader understanding of what it means to be male by including men of all stripes – intellectuals, peacemakers, politicians and biblical figures.
The book itself is broken into three parts:
Part 1: “The Manly Maxims”, four personal mottos that help summarize the masculine life. This is a helpful baseline for the meat of the book in part 2.
Part 2: “Show Yourself A Man”, a list of attributes (ex. Honor, Blessing, Wildness, Integrity, etc.) that combine a mish-mosh of bible studies, biographies and personal stories which are not only fascinating to read but immensely instructive and inspirational. This is the best part of the book!
Part 3: A resource section with quotable quotes, movie and book recommendations. Not my favourite part, but I can see how some guys would like this.
Conclusion
I recommend this book to anyone who wants to read some great stories and be challenged and inspired (I keep using that word) to rise above the watering down of the masculine identity. I’m sure there are some people who would be upset by the fact that this book targets men, but I think it’s great that there is a book like this that I can give to my teen boys to help them set a high standard for their personal conduct and walk with God.
*I received this book for free from BookLook Bloggers for review.
Listener Questions: Can We Know God? Should We Suffer More? How Different Should Christians Be? (Carnivore Theology Ep. 72)
We couldn’t find Chad, so we wandered down to the mailroom to look for him — and decided to stay and answer some questions: Can We Know God? Should We Suffer More? How Different Should Christians Be? If God Wore a Superhero Suit, What Would it Look Like?
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Crabapple Christians
When I was growing up, my grandparents had a crab apple tree in their front yard, and every time we went to visit them, my brother and I would see the tree and hope the apples were ready to eat. It was actually quite frustrating for us because we found the readiness of crab apple trees is notoriously difficult to predict. I’m not sure if you’ve ever had an unripe crab apple, but if you have, it’s a memorable experience.
They are uncomfortably hard to chew, and as for taste, they have an extremely intense and unappetizing mix of bitterness and sourness that makes you not only never want to take another bite, but uproot and burn the tree, scattering its ashes so as to never be spoken of again.
But! For that extremely brief period of time when they are ripe – in Alberta anyway – just before they freeze and/or turn to mush, they are actually really, really good. A unique taste right off the tree and extremely good for homemade jelly.
We visited our grandparents quite often, and, as I said, each time we were there we would ask if the crab apples were ready. It was most often “no”, but occasionally – whether because they didn’t know or because they enjoyed our suffering – they would say, “I’m not sure, why not go try one?”
Then the games would begin. I, being the older brother, would do my best to get my younger brother, James to take a bite – while he used all his wits and whining to make me do it.
Sour Corinth
The scripture we’ve been going through for the past while reminds me a lot of that crab apple tree. Before I went on holidays we were stuck at the end of chapter two, talking about the difference between mature and immature Christians. The Corinthian church, though they were Christians –saved people with the Holy Spirit dwelling within them – had not progressed in their faith, but had actually regressed and were living like spiritual infants.
Hearing about this frustrated the Apostle Paul, because he had been their pastor for a year-and-a-half and hadn’t been gone for very long. He had moved on to plant other churches, but even from far away, was hearing reports about how messed up the church in Corinth was. And so, God inspired Paul to write a letter to them, chastising them for their immaturity and instructing them on what needs to change.
Anyone who has experimented with crab apples knows how Paul must have felt. He planted that tree in Corinth expecting it to grow, mature, bear fruit, and for that fruit to be sweet – but instead, the fruit is bitter, sour, wooden, wormy and disappointing. He longs to be able to praise them for their faithfulness and maturity, for turning away from the sinful world they live in so they can bear the fruit of being disciples of Jesus – but he can’t. Instead of being believers who are light and salt in a city lost in the darkness of paganism and moral corruption, loving God, His Word, and each other – they have instead become more like the city, more immoral, have dimmed their light, lost their flavour, and were acting like immature, children.
In chapter 2 it says that that they had stopped living as spiritual people, and had started to live as “natural” people. Essentially, they had given up their connection to God’s life and truth, in favour of seeking out other sources. They had turned away from Jesus as the “wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption” (1 Cor 1:30), which we read about in chapter one, and had tried to find wisdom, righteousness, sanctification and redemption elsewhere – and in that search, had corrupted themselves to the point that they were no longer even able to tell good from bad, evil from holy, saint from sinner, godly from demonic. We see at the end of chapter 2 that they had had lost their “spiritual discernment” (2:14), their ability to “judge” things properly (2:15), and had given up the “mind of Christ” (2:16), in favour of other voices they thought would be just as good.
All of that cut Paul deeply, but I also believe it grieved God’s heart too. God loves His people and hates to see them wander away from Him, because He knows it will only hurt them. And so this letter is written to explain where they have gone wrong, and to try to call them back.
Being Saved
Let’s open up to 1 Corinthians 3:1-3 and read it together
“But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready, for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way?”
Let’s take this apart a little.
In verse 1 we see Paul summarizing the argument he’s been making for almost the whole of the letter so far: the Corinthians aren’t acting like Christians, but like unbelievers. He contrasts two different types of people: the “spiritual people” and the “people of the flesh” – in fact he uses that phrase twice – but follows it up with “as infants in Christ.”
This tells us something important – that the people he was addressing were Christians. This letter was inspired by God and written to a church full of saved people. They were corrupted, sinful, wandering, foolish, carnal, jealous, angry, people – but they were Christians. How could this be?
Because our salvation is not based on our obedience to God, nor our personal holiness, nor our ability to be good, but upon believing in the finished work of Jesus Christ as the crucified and resurrected Saviour of our souls.
Jesus was the one who obeyed all the laws, fulfilling every one. Jesus is the one who perfectly loved the Lord God with all His heart, soul, mind and strength, and perfectly loved His neighbour. Jesus did everything that God commanded of Him, and then offered Himself up in exchange for any sinner who would believe. He would be the once and for all sacrifice, the final payment for sin so that no other payment would ever need to be made. All that is necessary for salvation is to believe in Him.
When the Philippian Jailer asked Paul “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”, the answer was, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved.” (Acts 16:30-31)
Right after the most famous passage in the Bible, John 3:16, where we read about Jesus as a gift: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”, we read John 3:18, where Jesus says, “Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.” And then a little later in John 5:24, Jesus says, “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life.”
Romans 6:23 says, “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” God is not stingy with the requirements for salvation. He doesn’t demand that we jump through hoops, make grand displays, shave our heads, or sit in sackcloth and ashes, before He saves us. He doesn’t require us to get baptized, join a church, talk to a pastor, walk down an aisle, raise our hand, or anything else. What God requires of us is simply to believe Him that His Son, Jesus Christ, lived perfectly, died on a Roman cross, truly rose from the dead, and took the punishment we deserved.
That’s the Christian invitation. Will you accept that Jesus is the Son of God who came to give His life for yours, to conquer death, to settle your accounts before God, so you could be with your Father in Heaven? If you do, you’re in.
Belief is Harder
In a sense, even though this puts all the work on Jesus’s shoulders, and makes it a free gift that only needs to be accepted, having faith is in some ways harder than doing what other religions teach. Your admittance into the Kingdom of Heaven will not be judged on your actions, but on what you believe – which is actually a much deeper requirement.
Other religions, cults, and even aberrant (or heretical) forms of Christianity, simply give you a laundry list of requirements and behaviours that you must accomplish or align to, and if you achieve a certain percentage of them, then God (or Karma, or the Universe, or whatever) is happy. Follow our religious rituals and rules properly and then you’re life will be weighed out by a cosmic force, and then you’ll see where you end up.
That’s actually a lot easier than God’s requirement for “belief” or “faith”. It’s easier to follow a list of rules than it is to allow your understanding of the universe to be so radically altered that you actually change the way you think about God, yourself and everything else. Following a religion is shallow, believing in Jesus is deep. Checking boxes so you can call yourself a good person is simple, turning your heart, soul, mind and strength over to Jesus because you believe He is the Lord of your life is hard. Saving yourself by following your own personal idea of how to be a good person and get to heaven is easy because you can make excuses and change your requirements anytime you need to, but humbling yourself before God and following Jesus because you believe His way is the only way, is harder. Judging yourself and others by your personal religious beliefs makes you feel proud and superior to others, judging yourself and others by what you believe Jesus says, brings both deep humiliation and deep appreciation for God’s grace.
The Corinthians were saved people. They believed in Jesus as their Saviour. They were a mess, but they were, as Paul says in verse 1, “in Christ” – and that’s all that is necessary for salvation: belief.
Faith Changes Everything
However, we’re not just trying to get people saved, are we? No, we are saved unto something. The Apostle Paul doesn’t want mere belief, or dead faith. God didn’t plant the crab apple tree to have its growth stunted so it could bear only bitter fruit. He planted it so that it would grow bigger, stronger, and bear fruit that He and everyone else could take and eat and call good.
When Paul planted the seed of that church, he wanted to see it sprout. When Apollos preached there afterward, he wanted to help it grow. But it didn’t.
The Bible never stops at belief, or faith, in God. The demons believe God exists, but that isn’t enough for salvation, is it? The demons believe that Jesus is Lord of all and even Saviour of the World, but they are not saved. Why? Because the Christian faith isn’t just about believing the fact that God exists, or believing the fact that Jesus died and rose again, but having that belief, those facts, take over every part of our lives. That’s why the Bible, Old Testament and New, is so full of teachings that tie our faith in God to a changed life.
This is Paul’s message to the Corinthians is, “I want you to become spiritual people, but you are living as ‘people of the flesh’, carnal people who, instead of being obedient to God and controlled by the Holy Spirit, are controlled by your own natural desires. You may believe in Jesus, but your behaviour looks no different than the world. Your thought patterns are not mature, biblical and godly, but look just like the world’s. You claim to be followers of Jesus, but you think and act like pagans. When I came to you, I fed you with milk because you were spiritual babies, and that was appropriate, but you were supposed to grow up!”
In his letter to Titus (2:11-15), who was a Christian leader who he had sent out to check up on the churches he had planted, combat false teaching, and appoint elders before he moved on, he says this,
“For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works. Declare these things; exhort and rebuke with all authority.”
Do you see the ebb and flow of salvation with a changed life? The grace of God appears and brings salvation – which trains us to put down the things that are ungodly. We are waiting for the blessed hope, the coming of our God and Saviour Jesus Christ – who redeemed us from lawless and works to purify us. He bought with His blood so we could be His own, and we show we are His by being zealous for good works.
Even Now You’re Not Ready
In Titus, Paul is talking to a mature church leader who is given some deep teaching and then commanded to go and declare and exhort and rebuke others, but in Corinth, Paul is talking to spiritual babies. In verse 2 he says, “I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready, for you are still of the flesh.” How does he know that they’re still “of the flesh”, acting like spiritual babies? Verse 3 says, “For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way?”
There’s a bunch of reasons he’s going to get into in the rest of the letter – from their sexual sin to their acceptance of pagan worship practices – but he starts with how they are treating each other. Their church is full of “jealousy and strife”.
How does he know that they are not maturing in their faith? The first reason he gives is because of their attitude towards one another. Jesus said, “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:35)
Paul’s argument is that since there is “jealousy and strife” among them, then they are acting like “people of the flesh” and are “behaving only in a human way”. This is a deep, cutting accusation.
In Galatians 5:19-21 we read the opposite of the “fruit of the Spirit”, which are called “the works of the flesh” which include: “sexual immorality… idolatry, sorcery… drunkenness, [and] orgies”, which we would all agree are worldly and sinful, but also included in the list “enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, [and] envy” – all relational words. Then scripture says, “I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”
This is how sour the fruit of this church was – they were acting like those who are still on the side of the kingdom of Satan and bound for hell. Paul says, “I can’t address you as mature Christians, and your fruit is terrible, because you are still living by the desires of your flesh, living carnal lives, driven by worldly wisdom, and treating each other the way unbelievers do.”
Conclusion
The point of today’s message, and what I believe God is saying here, is twofold.
First, that we understand that we are saved by our faith in the grace of God alone, not by anything we can do – but that that belief must change our lives. If you’re a new believer or a young person, then it is to be expected that you will struggle with the things all new believers struggle with.
- How can I put down the sinful habits I’ve built up?
- How can I learn how to turn to God instead of my vices?
- How can I build healthy boundaries in my life in order to combat bad influences, but still let my light shine?
- How can I discipline myself to read the bible and pray regularly?
- What does my relationship with God mean in relation to my wife, kids, friends, family, school, past, present, future?
- How can I live a life that honours Jesus, and still enjoy the good things in this world?
- How can I get over bitterness, laziness, or prejudice?
- What does God want me to do with my life?
- What are my gifts? What am I supposed to do at church?
- What messed up things have I believed about God, His people, and the world, that I need to change in favour of discovering the truth?
All of these are really important questions, and ones that every new believer has to go through. But that’s the point – we go through them and then continue our journey into deeper things. We allow our belief in Jesus as our Lord and Saviour to open us to the influence of the Holy Spirit within us, so that we become more like Jesus every day.
That’s called maturing, and it’s something that most Christians don’t do. One of my favourite bible teachers talks about the “unnatural man” called the carnal Christian. He sees it as a bad hybrid, an unnatural joining of light and darkness, hot and cold, good and evil. He says,
“The carnal Christian is the one who hasn’t grown up spiritually, and it is evident that he lacks spiritual discernment – not because he doesn’t have the Holy Spirit within him, but because he is not growing in grace and in the knowledge of Christ…. This is a consequence of his relationship to the Word of God…. This unnatural man, this carnal Christian, is a babe in Christ. He has an ability but no desire…. Unfortunately it is on this level that most church members are living today. How can we identify the carnal Christian? It is the Christian who is using the weak arm of the flesh. He uses carnal methods to obtain spiritual goals…. Their motto is: Do what comes naturally. Let the flesh have its way.” (Thru The Bible with J Vernon McGee, Vol 5, 1 Corinthains, Pg 16-17)
He’s right. Many of the Christians I have known and have served, have the ability to grow, but no desire. They live as children of the world, but claim to be followers of Jesus. They come up with all kinds of human, worldly, carnal methods to try to obtain things that can only be given by God. They try to combat spiritual problems with worldly wisdom. They seek human answers to spiritual questions.
This is the first issue, the lack of maturity in the Christian church – and the lack of desire for maturity – which creates carnal Christians, lukewarm church, and people who live as spiritual babies for their whole life, doing more damage than good for God’s Kingdom.
The second point is connected to the first: that we must engage in actively choosing to live as spiritual people and not as natural ones. Another translation of our passage today said it this way, “You are jealous of one another and quarrel with each other. Doesn’t that prove you are controlled by your own desires?”
That’s exactly right.
“By remaining immature and allowing that immaturity to divide them, they were wreaking havoc on the church…. James wrote, ‘What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you?’” (Life Application Bible Commentary, 1 &2 Corinthians, Pg 48)
Christians aren’t to be controlled by their fleshly desires or their carnal thoughts, or it will lead to trouble in all of their relationships! We are to turn those thoughts over to God and allow the Holy Spirit to control and change our desires. Whenever we choose to be guided by our own wisdom or natural desires, we run the risk of doing things simply to gratify our sinful nature. And that is dangerous.
So, my closing question to you today is this, are you maturing as a Christian – whatever phase you’re in – or are you stuck in spiritual infancy, repeating the same old sins over and over again? When God comes to evaluate your fruit, does it taste like it has maturing in godliness where your life lines up with your beliefs? Or does it taste of hypocrisy, where you’ve claimed to be a believer, but you are still behaving in a fleshly way?
I encourage you to do something difficult: ask those closest to you about this. Ask your parents, children, spouse, and Christian friends if you are walking in step with what you say you believe. Ask them if they have seen you mature and grow over the past year, or if you seem exactly the same (or worse) as you were last year and the year before.
