Weakness
Spiritual Gifts, The Body of Christ, and The Weakest Members
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Christmas is coming and I’m very excited already. I went to the Christmas store at the Carleton Place nursery and officially got myself in the mood. There was free mulled cider, cookies, Christmas music playing in the background… I love the colours and lights and trees and everything. I’m a huge fan of Christmas and though I’m practicing some self-control by not putting up my tree yet, I’ve already busted out a shuffle of my Christmas Music Playlist and have sung along to such wonderful hymns as “Grandma Got Ran Over by a Reindeer” and “I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas”.
And while I love all the colours of Christmas I’m just like anyone else and know that a big part of the season is the exchanging of gifts. I’ve already sent out my list to some key family members, ordered some for people online, and have been talking with grandma about what the kids want.
I was thinking back as to the best Christmas gift I ever received. And while I’ve gotten a lot of cool gifts there was one that stuck out in my mind as the best one. It was 1989, I was 11 years old, and desperately wanted the hottest new item of the season – the one that none of my friends had and which would complete my life so I would never need anything again. I didn’t grow up in a family with a lot of money and this thing would cost a lot. I was cool about it though. I didn’t beg or remind my parents over and over. I just sort of left out a picture of it on the counter, circled it in the Sears catalog and kept turning to that page and leaving it open, and just, like, casually bringing it up naturally in conversation. Nothing annoying.
I absolutely didn’t think I was going to get it – at all. But on Christmas morning, on grandma’s couch, I couldn’t believe when I opened up the box that it was there… a Nintendo GameBoy complete with Super Mario Land and Tetris! The greatest thing I’d ever seen in my life. It was a huge moment and I barely contained myself.
I loved that thing for a long time, got every accessory, and played it constantly – until the Sega Game Gear came out two years later. The Sega Game Gear had something that the GameBoy didn’t – a colour screen. And I was hooked, but I knew that my parents would never get me another game system, especially since the one I had was still great. So what to do?
[This is a painful, regretful memory actually. I get a little misty just talking about it.]
The Game Gear came out in October of 1991 and was $150. The GameBoy, brand new was $100, but I had all the accessories.
So 13 year old me, by myself, without my parent’s knowledge, went down to the only pawn shop in town and sold it to the guy. It was insane. Somehow, between his talking and my idiotic mind, I ended up giving him my GameBoy, all the games, and all the accessories and walking out with something like $40 or $50. I still remember standing outside the store, with the money in my hand, wondering what happened, and wondering where I was going to get the extra $100. I never did. [Ugh, that hurts to share.]
Spiritual Gifts
I’m sure you’ve gotten some pretty memorable Christmas gifts, right? Maybe even ones that you, hopefully, still have and cherish to this day? Well, today we are going to open up to 1 Corinthians 12 and read about something that God gives all believers, which the Bible calls “Spiritual Gifts”. So please open up to 1 Corinthians 12 and we’re going to read it together.
As you open I want you to marvel at our giving, generous God. God gives us life and this amazing world to live in – and then we sin and mess it up. And then God gives us His Law to guide us and teach us how to live the best way together – and then we sin and mess ourselves up. And then God sends prophets and teachers and leaders to guide us back to Him – and we don’t listen to them, even going so far as to reject and murder them. And then, even while we were yet dead in our sins, having made ourselves His enemies, God sends His Son to show us how to live, teach us the truth, inaugurate His kingdom, and then take the death and punishment we deserve, having God the Father’s wrath poured out on Himself, exchanging Himself sinners. And then He rose again to conquer death and offers us the free gift of salvation, justification, sanctification, for all who would believe – not for all who would do amazing works, or follow the rules, or perform religious acts – but simply by faith in Jesus as the Risen Saviour.
But the gifts don’t end there. Once we accept Jesus as Lord the gifts keep on coming, and the greatest gift that Christians receive is the presence of the Holy Spirit living in us. Just as God’s presence dwelt in the Holy of Holies in the Tabernacle with Moses, or the Temple in Jerusalem, so now the Spirit of God dwells in everyone who believes(1 Cor 9:19). When His disciples wondered why Jesus would be dying and then leaving them to take His place in Heaven, He said, “I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.” (John 16:7) Jesus said that it is better to have the Holy Spirit inside us than Jesus walking beside us! And He does some amazing things for us.
In John 16 Jesus says that the Holy Spirit will be our Helper, helping us with evangelism, convicting the world of sin, showing us how to be righteous, warning us of spiritual dangers. He helps our minds to see the difference between good and evil, lies and truth, light and darkness. It says that He helps us understand the Bible. It’s not just priests and preachers and scholars that can interpret the Bible, because every believer who is dependent on the Spirit will be taught by Him. In John 14 the Holy Spirit is called the Counsellor who comes alongside us to encourage us, guide us, inspire our good works, and never leave us (Jn 14:16). He binds Christians together with God and each other, causing us to love Him and one another (1 Cor 12:13). He teaches us who Jesus is and helps us to worship and glorify Him (John 15:26, 16:14; 1 Corinthians 12:3).
It is the Holy Spirit that causes us to produce Godly fruit. When we are convicted that we do not love enough, that we are at war within ourselves, that we are too angry, or out of control, Galatians 5:22-23 says, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control…” [1]
That is a LOT of gifts from God to Christians. And yet, how often are we like me at age 13, taking these awesome gifts and disregarding them, ignoring them, or just callously throwing them away in favour of something else the world has to offer – that just ends up not working out anyway.
1 Corinthians 12
Let’s read though 1 Corinthians 12 together and see what we can learn. We’re going to do a quick study of it because there’s a lot there, and then at the end of this message I’m going to point you at a good resource where you can really dig deeper into it.
“Now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be uninformed. You know that when you were pagans you were led astray to mute idols, however you were led. Therefore I want you to understand that no one speaking in the Spirit of God ever says ‘Jesus is accursed!’ and no one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except in the Holy Spirit.”
First, I want you to notice that Paul wants to make sure that believers are not “uninformed” about Spiritual Gifts – which means it behooves us to put some time into public and private study regarding the role of the Holy Spirit in our lives and the discovery and use of our spiritual gifts.
There’s a few ways to do this. One is private study of course. Taking it upon yourself to read and study scripture and some good books on this topic. Second is to go to RightNow Media and watch something called “Your Divine Design” by Chip Ingram. I watched a couple of them and they are a great overview. And third, I’m actually going to be working with the leadership team to put together a 36-week leadership training course for the church where one of the things we cover is how to discover and use our Spiritual Gifts.
The second thing I want you to notice here is the contrast of influences we see here. Before you were saved you were “led astray” or “influenced” toward useless, pagan, idolatrous things. He talks about “mute idols”, pointing back to what we talked about during our discussion of eating meat offered to idols, right? That the actual statues of the gods were just mute, stone carvings. But even though the statues were mute, the followers were not. These cultic religions were full of wild displays and all kinds of ecstatic speech where they would claim to have special words from the gods or the afterlife.
Paul acknowledges that this happens and gives the warning again that there are only two teams: Team Jesus and Team Satan, and sometimes they look similar. Both have great influence over their followers. Satan often makes false copies, or imitations, of what God does in order to confuse and tempt people away from the true faith.
But Paul gets down to brass tacks and says, “These pagan idol worshippers are absolutely being influenced by the spiritual realm and have some kind of ‘gift’ from the demons, but they are forgeries of what God gives. How can you know the difference? Because when the Holy Spirit gives a gift to someone it always points them and everyone else to Jesus. All the other influences, the false gifts, the demonic powers, all point people away from Jesus. That’s the litmus test.”
We’ll see that later in the chapter, but that’s an important place to start. We see a lot of gifted people, some with some incredible sorts of power, even spiritual power. How do we tell if it’s from God or from Satan?
The same way we tell whether we have a good compass or not. A good compass always points North. A bad compass wobbles around and points all sorts of other directs. The Holy Spirit always points to directly to Jesus as Saviour, Lord and the focus of our worship. The other powers won’t. They will wobble around and point everywhere else except Jesus. This tells us something important about why we are given these gifts, right? We are given them to point people to Jesus! Not to lift ourselves up, not to build our popularity, not to keep to ourselves, not even to draw people to our church, but to bring glory and praise to Jesus and accomplish the works He has given us to do!
What are the Gifts?
So, the natural next question is “Ok, so what are the gifts?” That’s what Paul covers next. Start in verse 4:
“Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.”
That is a lot of different gifts, and it’s not even all of them because he lists more in verse 28, “And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healing, helping, administrating, and various kinds of tongues.” And there’s even more listed in Romans 12 and Ephesians 4.
Now, this study can go deep because each one of these gifts requires some study, right? What does it mean to have the gift of prophecy or miracles or discernment or tongues? What does it mean to have the gift of helping or administrating? And is this even the full list? For example, in the Old Testament Joseph and Daniel are given a gift from the Spirit of God to interpret dreams (Gen 41; Dan 1) and Bezalel is given a spiritual gift to help him make works of art (Exo 31). What about those?
Well, I’m not going to explain every gift because we can study privately, but let’s pull out a few things and see some important points are here.
A Variety of Gifts
First, from 4, notice that there is a “variety” of gifts. One of the problems in the Corinthian church that seems to carry forward today is that people were belittling some of the gifts and only desiring the ones that put on a good show – like tongues. They wanted their church to look like the pagan temples where people were flipping out and speaking in crazy languages, and Paul knew that this sort of thing was not of God.
They didn’t want what the gifts God had given them, but wanted what they had before. They didn’t accept the gift that the Holy Spirit gave them, but complained and wanted something more flashy, more exciting, more interesting.
The Babylon Bee is one of my favourite websites because it gives satirical articles about different things going on in the church and culture. One recent one was entitled, “Unlucky Charismatic Gets Boring Gift Of Hospitality” and part of it said,
“’A man with the ‘really cool’ gift of prophecy reportedly moved throughout the room at Wade’s church and read each member’s aura to determine which spiritual gift the Holy Spirit had granted. Wade grew more and more excited as he approached, but was devastated as he learned he just had the “super lame” gift of hospitality.
‘Ugh, hospitality, are you serious?’ Wade said as the church prophet announced he had detected the Christian virtue as Wade’s supernaturally bestowed talent. ‘I was really pulling for something cool like tongues or healing.’
‘Heck, I’d even take teaching at this point. This sucks,’ a downcast Wade added. At publishing time, Wade had consoled himself by focusing on the fact that he hadn’t gotten something even worse, like giving.”
That’s a perfect example of what was happening then and what happens now. Christians who haven’t learned about the Spiritual Gifts get a little understanding of what they are and then immediately want whatever one gives them the most strokes. They want evangelism so they can be the next Billy Graham, or Teacher or Pastor because they think then they can be a super Christian that everyone looks up to, or healings or miracles or tongues so that everyone can see the power coming out of them.
Do you see the problem there? They are really only concerned about their own glory. And what was the difference between spiritual gifts from Satan and ones from the Holy Spirit? That they point to Jesus. This was the danger that the church was falling into, and that some churches fall into today. The Satanic work of stealing God’s glory.
Look at verses 12-26. This is what they were doing to each other in the church as they disparaged their own gifts and belittled others:
“For the body does not consist of one member but of many. If the foot should say, ‘Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,’ that would not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, yet one body.
The eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I have no need of you,’ nor again the head to the feet, ‘I have no need of you.’ On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and on those parts of the body that we think less honorable we bestow the greater honor, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, which our more presentable parts do not require. But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together.”
This is where we get where we call Christians the “Body of Christ”. The Apostle Paul equates the parts of a church to be like the parts of a human body. Sure, there are some upfront parts that everyone sees – eyes, muscles, skin – but there are a lot more parts that people don’t see that are just as important – like our heart, liver, and pancreas.
No part of the body should tell another part of the body they are more or less important. That would be crazy! In the same way, no part of the church should call their own, or any other Christians gift unimportant! This brings division to the body.
We do this all the time in the church. Say someone is an “encourager” or a “helper”. That’s their gift. They love sending notes and cheering people up. Or they love to show up and help do the chores in the church. What do we do with them? “Oh, you’re friendly! You should be in charge of all the greeters! Oh, you’re a good helper, you should be a Deacon!” Hold on! Do they have the gift of leadership? Do they have the gift of administration? Nope. Which is why when they end up being “promoted” they are miserable at it, which makes them miserable, and everyone else miserable. But what happened? We took them out of their gifting and put them somewhere they weren’t meant to be! We took a hand and tried to make it into a mouth. We took a heart and tried to turn it into a pancreas. And it didn’t work.
Weaker Members
I want you to notice something really neat in verses 22-25,
“…the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and on those parts of the body that we think less honorable we bestow the greater honor, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, which our more presentable parts do not require. But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another.”
This is a huge part of being in God’s Upside Down Kingdom. Who gets all the glory in worldly kingdoms? The warriors and intellects, right? People that are strong, fast, smart, clever… and everyone else is less important, right? What does the world do with “weak”, and “less honourable” parts like the mentally challenged, sick, hurting, immature, elderly. We hide them. We avoid them. We lock them away. Worse, these days we kill them.
What does this verse say? It says that the weaker parts of the body are “indispensable”. The parts with “less honour” or need to be taken care of, are bestowed greater honour. The parts that require protection we protect.
Think of your own body. There are certain parts we take really good care of, right? We wear eye protection and athletic cups because eyes are really sensitive.
What happens when you poke someone in the belly or get something in your eye? The whole body constricts. The head drops, the elbows and arms come in, the knees come up, the muscles contract, to protect damaged area. When one part of our body gets hurt, the other parts naturally protect it. That’s a picture of what’s supposed to happen in the church.
Some people in the church are designed by God to be the arms, legs, knees, elbows, and muscles. Able to take a beating and keep moving. Other members are designed to be weaker. Not less important, but weaker so they can do a special job. A knee can’t do what an eye can do, right? But when the eye gets hurt? Everything stops, right? The rest of the body surrounds it.
What is a church supposed to do with weak and hurting people? We surround them, help them, protect them, care for them, using our own gifts to serve them. Maybe the knee and the elbow can’t come up with a good plan, but the brain can, and the knee and elbow use their strength to protect. The brain can’t cry out for help, but the mouth can. We all work together.
The whole point is that there are a variety of gifts given by God on purpose. So Paul says, “There aren’t just three gifts meant to bring attention to yourself, there are a whole variety of gifts, and none of them are accidents or unimportant.”
Whatever gift you have, it wasn’t your idea. These gifts are not earned. You didn’t ask for the gift you got. They are not chosen or appointed or voted on by people. It is God alone, the Holy Spirit, who administers the gifts among His people.[2] To reject or call one better or more important than another is a great sin. God controls the gifts, not us. It is the believer’s responsibility to seek God’s guidance, read His word, pray and listen to see which gift God has given you and how God wants you to use it for His purposes!
For the Common Good
And that’s the second point, found in verse 7.
“To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.”
Paul answers the questions, “Where do the gifts come from?” From the Spiritual Realm. “How can we tell which ones are from the Holy Spirit or a demon?” Because the good ones point to Jesus. “What are the gifts that the Holy Spirit gives?” He says there are a variety and gives examples. Then he answers the question, “What are they for?” They are given by God for the common good of the church.
Incidentally, that’s what Paul means in verse 31 when he says, “But earnestly desire the higher gifts.” We know after some study that he doesn’t mean that some gifts are better than others, right? He just told the church to stop competing with each other and belittling some people because of their gifts. So what does this mean?
The encouragement is to desire gifts that will spread more and love for the common good, not to bring attention to ourselves. It means that instead of desiring gifts that put on a good show and make us look good, to instead earnestly pursue that which would build up the church and glorify God the most. It leads directly into what Paul is going to talk about in chapter 13, that no matter what gifts we have they need to be motivated by and done with love.
Conclusion
Let me conclude with this: Ephesians 2:10 says, Christians are God’s “workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”
Part of those good works are simply the helpful life that all Christians are meant to lead, but it also has to do with the spiritual gifts you have been given. You and I were shaped to serve God and the church. And we won’t feel like we fit until we are working in the place we were designed to be. You will never feel more joy or satisfaction than when you work within your spiritual gifts. And conversely, as long as you are trying to do things you weren’t designed for, jealous of someone else’s gift, or belittling others, you will never feel the satisfaction that comes with serving God with His special gift to you.
So my encouragement to the Christians here is to take some time to further study this passage and discover your spiritual gift, then tell others what it is, and then allow us to help you live it out! Check out that Chip Ingram study called “Your Divine Design”, check out GotQuestions.org and read some more about it, and prepare yourself to do the leadership course we’re starting soon.
Finding and using your gift means you’ll have to say yes to some things and stop doing other things, but that means you’ll be coming more in line with how God created you to live, which is always better. It is God who builds our church, not us. His way is best, not ours. His glory is our highest purpose, not ours. Our task is to simply follow His plan to work together as an effective body.
[1] https://www.gotquestions.org/Spirit-today.html
[2] Life Application Bible Commentary, 1&2 Corinthians, Pg 169-170
Your Weaknesses Are Very, Very Important (Acknowledging the Necessity of Lack)
If you have your Bibles with you, please up to 1 Corinthians 1:26-31 and let’s read it together. Those of you who have been following along with the sermon series so far are going to see some really important words in there and will, hopefully, recall some of the things we’ve already learned.
When you read the word “calling”, I hope it brings to mind this section’s repeated emphasis on how it is not we who choose God, but God who calls people to Himself. When you read the words “wise” or “foolish”, I hope it reminds you of the Greek people who loved nothing more than the pursuit of wisdom and feared nothing more than being considered a fool, and then remember the contrast between worldly and godly wisdom and worldly and godly foolishness which we’ve seen over the last couple weeks.
“For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, ‘Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”
Weakness
I’ve been thinking a lot about human weakness these days – specifically my own. Most of you know that I’ve been dealing with Bell’s Palsy for the past 5 weeks or so. It’s a lot better now, but it was quite a shock when I woke up 36 days ago and half of my face was paralyzed. I still have a way to go to call myself “fully healed”, but I’ve come along way. The day before I was perfectly fine, then the next morning, I couldn’t blink, move my lips, taste on one side of my mouth, or breath properly. I went to the doctor and he gave me a mess of pills, but had no real explanation of what happened or how long it would last.
A week later I was back in the ER in a huge amount of pain. The doctor looked concerned, said “Hmm, I don’t think that’s supposed to happen”, prescribed more pills and said she’d get me a cat scan. It’s been some time since then, and I’ve done a lot of healing. Thankfully, the pain has stopped, but I still have some issues with my face and can’t blink – which is the most annoying part right now.
This sudden illness has caused me to do some soul searching that I would never have expected, and has caused me to ponder the concepts of weakness and foolishness in ways I don’t think I would have otherwise. This experience reminded me of how weak and foolish I really am – and how frail humans are in general.
I know that rankles some people because they hate the idea of being considered weak. “Sure, Pastor Al – you’re weak – but I’m not. I’m strong! I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and gosh darn it, people like me!”
I’ve even had people argue with me when I’ve said that I’m weak. Maybe this has happened to you too. I’ll be going though a tough time, physically exhausted, mentally drained, spiritually down, emotionally fragile, and someone will ask me to do something, or something will come up and I’ll say, “I just can’t do that. I’m too weak to pull that off right now. Just forget about it. If you want me to do that, it will literally require a miracle.” And they’ll say, “No! You’re strong! You’re smart! You can do it! Just believe in yourself! You don’t know how tough you are until you try! Quitters never win and winners never quit!”
Have you ever been told that? You get to the end of your rope, or you find yourself in a dark place, your life feels like you’re trudging through the slough of despond, or the valley of death, and you just want to curl up there and quit – and well-meaning people keep telling you to “keep trying”, “suck it up”, “get going”.
The implication behind that advice seems to be that if we try hard enough, everyone is strong enough to deal with whatever life has to offer. No matter what life throws at us: sickness, death, tragedy, natural disaster, war, abuse, heartbreak… we all have the inherent capacity within us to push through it, get over it, break it down, or build it up. All we have to do is try. No human being should need anyone else! You can do it if you try!
What a ridiculous notion! Not only does it go against what we read in scripture, it goes against common sense, worldly wisdom and human experience! Ask any professional counsellor in the world, any politician, anyone with military background, any doctor, or lawyer, anthropologist, historian, accountant, teacher, poet or artist and they will say the same thing: everyone needs help. Everyone needs help. No one is born with everything they need to survive, thrive and conquer this world and the troubles within it. No one. Everyone has lack. Lack of stability. Lack of strength. Lack of knowledge. Lack of skills. Lack of wisdom. Lack of resources. Everyone has weakness.
And yet, somehow, though countless voices around us – from the medical establishment to the educational system to religious leaders – are telling us that we have weakness built into us, the voices we tend to listen to are the misguided ones that tell you “you’re just not trying hard enough” or the voice in own head that tells you: “I can do it on my own, I don’t need anyone, I should do it alone, no one understands, everyone else has it all put together, I’m the only weak person, I should be ashamed of myself for having weakness. Even God is disappointed in me. He expects me to be strong, good, helpful, joyful, gracious, kind, sinless, and perfect – and every time I mess up, every time I show my own weakness, He’s angry, or disappointed, or leaves me, or punishes me.
Therefore I must be strong – or if I can’t actually be strong, I must pretend to be strong! I must tell everyone that ‘I’m fine, I’m good, in fact, I’m great!’. I must hide all of the ways that I sin, and keep them in the dark, because then everyone will think I’m perfect. I must have the best car, the nicest toys, the cleanest house, the prettiest wife, the smartest kids, the greenest lawn, so everyone will know how successful I am and then they won’t think I’m weak.
If I study hard enough then I’ll know more than anyone else and they won’t realize I think I’m a fool. If I diet and exercise enough then I’ll look good so no one will know that I’m crumbling emotionally. If I earn enough and have enough things, then I can impress everyone and they won’t know that I think I’m a total failure. If I say all the right religious words, and do enough religious things, then everyone will think I’m a saint, even though I have massive struggles with my faith and am trapped in a cycle of temptation that I can’t see a way out of.”
What a total load of garbage we feed ourselves in our private thoughts, don’t we?
God’s Way is Backwards
This same pile of lies had infected the Corinthian church too, and in the first chapter of his letter, Paul is trying to shake them up with some truth. They had already forgotten some of the most critical things about their relationship with God, and had slipped into a bunch of false thinking. I’ve covered a lot of those things over the past weeks, but another set of false beliefs that had snuck into their minds was that they needed to overcome their weaknesses so they could be acceptable to God and the world.
They had started to listen to teachers that were telling them that they didn’t just need to believe in Jesus to be saved, but also needed to do a bunch of other things – have ecstatic religious experiences, follow the whole Law of Moses, and come up with ways to make the Gospel of Jesus look cooler to their neighbours.
The true Gospel of Jesus, where we are unable to save ourselves but need to turn from our sins and accept the free gift of salvation that comes only through believing in the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ, was making them look like fools to their neighbours – and it was making them look weak.
They were used to boasting about their leaders, teachers, religion, and selves – and Christianity wasn’t very boast worthy. The leader of the church was Jesus – a rural, Jewish teacher from the middle of nowhere, spent most of His life in obscurity, and barely left a 120 mile square during His whole ministry. Their main teacher, Paul, had a pretty impressive resume of education and experience, but he refused to talk about it, instead opting to preach simple messages and point people to Jesus.
Their religion was nothing like the ones around them. Corinth was full of beautiful temples, lavish decorations, crazy religious performances, and hugely popular speakers and personalities. Christians, on the other hand, gathered at some guy’s house, sang a few songs, and then sat quietly as a few people taught and prayed. And the teachings they heard, at least at first when Paul was there, kept telling them – from the wealthiest man in town to the slave who tied his sandals – that they were all foolish sinners in need of a Saviour, starving beggars in search of bread, wicked, hellbound people that experienced undeserved grace. They were told that God wanted them to be humble, their acts of charity and prayer should be done in secret. They were told that they would never be good enough, strong enough, wise enough, or smart enough to achieve the perfection that God desires – and that the only way to be accepted by God is to throw themselves at His feet, acknowledge they were spiritually bankrupt, and ask for mercy in the name of Jesus.
But, if you’ve been told that your whole life is about amassing knowledge, wisdom, riches, pleasure, honour, and status to impress the gods and everyone else – and that it’s the god’s job to give you all these things if you perform all the right rituals – the Gospel of Jesus comes as a shock because God’s version of knowledge, wisdom, riches, pleasure, honour and status are radically different than the world’s. They’re not boast-worthy.
If you’ve been told that you need to be stronger, better, smarter, and wealthier than everyone around you in order to be worthy of God’s attention, and know you have been blessed by God, then the Gospel of Jesus will come as a surprise because it says that the first step towards getting saved is acknowledging that you are too weak, too foolish, too ignorant, too poor, and too broken, to be able to do anything of value for Him – that you are spiritually dead inside, and that you absolutely need God to resurrect you before you can begin.
If you believe that you need to suck it up, pretend everything is ok, deny you are hurt, deny your temptations, and ignore your pain, so you can look happy, successful and spiritual, then the Gospel of Jesus Christ will challenge that belief by saying that you need to come to Him on your knees, and acknowledge to those around you that you are in need. You need to realize you are broken, lost, afraid and dirty; so He can pick you up, clean you off, put you on the right path, and give you a hope and a future.
The whole Gospel of Jesus Christ is backwards to most of our worldly thinking – and that’s kind of the point.
God Doesn’t Choose Like We Do
Look back at our scripture today and see what Paul reminds them of. He says, “Consider your calling… not many of you were wise according to worldly standards.” He reminds them that God didn’t call them (or choose them, or save them) because they were so wise and intelligent that they discovered His secrets. No, in fact, they were so off the mark that God had to go and get them because they were too foolish to find Him themselves.
He tells them, “not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth”. He reminds them that God didn’t choose them because they had so much to contribute to His church and Kingdom. He isn’t like us humans that look at wealthy celebrities and think, “Oh wow, if only that person would become a Christian, if only they would join our church… that’d be amazing!” No, God goes the other way, choosing the weak, the sick, the broken, the obscure, the afraid – and then He gives them His version of strength, His version of healing, His version of success, His version of courage.
Why? Why would God do that? It’s certainly not how we would pick our star team, is it? If we lined the whole of the world up against the gym wall and wanted to pick our teams for who is going to lead our religion and tell everyone how to get saved from Hell, who would we pick? The wisest, the smartest, the most powerful, the most influential… right? God’s upside-down kingdom is exactly the opposite!
Why? If you look back one verse it says, “For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.” How can humanity know this is true? By God, “choosing what is weak in the world to shame the strong.” Everyone looks at the person who has great physical or mental powers and is so very impressed – and God says, “That’s not strength. Do you want to see strength? Look at my follower here… they are in pain but full of joy, they have depression but still encourage others, they have anger issues but choose to be gentle, they are in the throes of addiction but choose every day to walk with me instead, they lost everything they had but are still generous with others.” That’s God’s kind of strength.
How else can humanity know that God’s way is “wiser” and “stronger” than ours? Because He “…chooses the low and despised in the world, even the things that are not, to bring to nothing the things that are…” Our society idolizes people who are unique, talented, remarkable, overachievers and successes. We watch singing competitions to see who’s the best singer, talent competitions to see who is the most interesting, hockey tournaments to see who is the best player, and then hand out MVP awards to individuals who outshine even their winning team-mates. Our democratic process is largely a popularity contest, and our movies are dominated by a small group of people the industry has decided are the most marketable.
But God almost always does the opposite. God almost always chooses “the low and despised… the things that are not” to be the ones to carry His signature, be His defenders, show His glory, lead His people, serve His kingdom, do His work. He takes the drug dealer and turns them into a Sunday school teacher, turns the porn addict into a faithful husband and father (or wife and mother). He chooses the smallest group, the most socially awkward person, the one with the lowest score, the one that we would overlook every time – and chooses them to be one of His champions.
The prophecy about Jesus from Isaiah 61:1-4 ( which Jesus says is about Him (Luke 4:16-30)), says this:
“The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn; to grant to those who mourn in Zion—to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit; that they may be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he may be glorified. They shall build up the ancient ruins; they shall raise up the former devastations; they shall repair the ruined cities, the devastations of many generations.”
Who has God chosen to be the ones who will populate His kingdom and rebuild the devastations of many generations? The brokenhearted, the captive, the prisoner, the mourner, the weak… That’s Jesus’ beatitudes from Matthew 5: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, blessed are those who mourn, blessed are the meek, blessed are the hungry, blessed are the persecuted…” Why? Because in God’s upside-down kingdom, their poverty, sadness, meekness and pain is what allows them to realize their weakness and turn to Him for strength!
Why the Weakest?
Why does God operate that way? First, “…To bring to nothing the things that are”. In other words, to negate, invalidate, to deprive of all validity, every thought that says we are good enough, strong enough, and able enough to serve Him, save ourselves, and do good things in this world without Him. He wants to negate that thought completely in our minds.
He wants us to look at the strong, successful, proud, rich, famous person who does not know Jesus and watch them fall apart at the seams because they don’t have God holding them together. He wants us to watch a society built upon human wisdom turn and eat itself, corruptin everything that makes them human, because they have refused to acknowledge God. And then he wants us to contrast that with the weak, obscure, and powerless ones who know and trust God, and marvel in wonder as we try to figure out how they can have such inner strength, such spiritual power, be so kind, so joyful, so wise, so calm, and so patient. He wants to negate in our minds the thought that strength is found within ourselves, or within any human creation. He wants to bring that thinking “to nothing”.
Which leads to the second reason that God gives for why He chooses the weak: from verse 29, “so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.”… so that all of our boasting will be done “in the Lord”.
God wants us to realize our weakness, turn to Him, and say: “I need you because I cannot do this on my own. All that I have is not enough. I need Your Word to guide me, Your Son to save me, Your Spirit to protect me, Your church to care for me, because I am too weak on my own. And whenever I choose my own path, or design my own god, they fail me. I can’t be a good enough husband, wife or parent. I’m not strong enough to conquer this temptation. I’m not wise enough to know what to do. I need the One, True God.”
And then, as He strengthens you, and changes you, and cleans you, and remakes you, and teaches you, and uses you to do His will, you return to Him the glory. “I didn’t do this, God did! I didn’t conquer that sin, God did. I didn’t become less angry, or proud, or vain – God changed me. I didn’t conquer that sin, God did. I didn’t make that wise decision, God lead me.” You get a life that is touched by the blessing of God, He gets the glory. It’s actually a pretty good deal.
Conclusion
And so, let me close with this: You’ve probably heard the scripture that most people call “The Great Commandment” which says “Love the Lord your God with your Heart, Soul, Mind and Strength” (Matthew 22:37-38), right?
I want you to use that scripture to consider your weakness today, and let that acknowledgement of your weakness drive you to prayer, asking Him for help.
Some of us are weak in Strength. Some here are physically weaker than others. You have illness or some kind of handicap. You are not as strong, or tall, or well as others. You cannot run as fast, jump as high, go as far, or do as much as you want to. Acknowledge your physical weakness before God and turn it over to Him. It was His idea. He has chosen to make you weaker so that you will lean on His strength. You are not less of a person because of your health status – you have been given a greater opportunity to show that God can do amazing things through someone like you.
Some of us are weak in Mind. Some here have learning disabilities like dyslexia, or are forgetful, can’t do math well, can’t spell properly, can’t read well, and struggle to pick up concepts well. Does that mean you are less valuable to God? That you can’t serve in His Kindom? Of course not! It means that you have been given a greater opportunity to show what God can do through you! Turn to Him, acknowledge your mental weakness, and ask Him how you can use the gifts he has given you for His glory. Stop trying to be who you are not, and allow God to work with who He has made you to be.
Some of us are weak in Heart. Some have a really hard time with things that most people don’t see – your brain chemistry and emotions. There are people that suffer from Depression, Anxiety, Bipolarity, OCD, Seasonal Affective Disorder, PTSD, Social Anxiety, Eating Disorders, Sexual Disorders, Insomnia, or other things that you didn’t ask for, came out of nowhere, are a constant burden, require medications and doctors and treatments and make your life miserable. Does that make you unfit for the Kingdom of God? Does that mean God is disappointed in you? Does God expect you to suck it up and get strong before you can come to Him? Does God expect you to get healed before you can worship or serve Him? I hope you know by now the answer is “no”.
Though I can’t tell you why, I can tell you that God has given you that so He can use you to shame the wise, shame the strong, and negate everyone who has ever said that people with mental illness are a problem to be solved and a burden to those around them. He has created you exactly the way you are so He can use you in a way that He can use no one else. Acknowledge your weakness, and that you need help – not just from meds and doctors, which are fine by the way – but ultimately from God, the only One who can give you the “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control” that you need to live with what the burden you carry every day (Gal 5:23).
And finally, consider that we are all weak in our Soul. None of us have what is necessary to fix that which is most wrong with us. The Bible says “the wages of sin is death” (Rom 6:23), which means that everyone who has ever done, thought or said something wrong is spiritually dead (Eph 2:1) and in need of the miracle of a resurrection. God promises to do that for all that call on Him. Only God can raise the dead, and it is only by faith in Jesus as the crucified and resurrected Lord and Saviour of the world, that we can experience that healing.
As long as you are trying to save yourself, as long as you think that you are a ‘good enough person’, as long as you think you are better than others, as long as you think that you deserve to go to heaven – you will never call out to God and never receive His healing. It is only when you acknowledge that you are a sinner in need of a Saviour, and turn to Jesus, that you will be saved.
And so, I implore you to acknowledge your weakness, and then turn to God for strength, so He will provide what you need – and then as He does, give Him the worship and praise He deserves.
Pastoral Prayer: We Depend on You, God
O Lord of Grace,
this is the beginning of a new week and the whole world is before us this day.
As we look into it we realize that we are weak,
and fearful
and ill-equipped to handle all that we will face
– but we look to you for strength. Read the rest of this entry »
